Blog Post #2

Rapping for a Revolution

(This article also gave me an incredibly hard time. I kept re-reading to try and understand where the answers to the questions were but I could not formulate a complete answer that made sense. However, I gave it my best shot.)

In this article Rapping for a Revolution, the author is discussing how music is being used to spread political awareness to people and to get people active and informed with politics. A key term that is defined in this article is hegemony, which is defined as "the way in which the dominated or subordinate consent to their own domination by ruling classes, as opposed to being simply forced or coerced into accepting inferior positions. The opposite of the word is counter-hegemony, which refers to "a creation of an alternative hegemony on the terrain of civil society in preparation for a war of position". The man that coined the term Hegemony had views of elections that were similar to the definition of Hegemony. He viewed elections as "as being merely the reflection of a battle". His view of elections fits into the idea of hegemony because, in both the elections and hegemony and elections, there is a battle going on.

One effective tool against counter-hegemony is music, and this is because music is able to "take society before it takes state", which is something that must be done "in order to affect the civil societies that keep the dominant groups in power". Music does this by getting people involved because it can rally people to a common cause. Also, it gives people identity by giving them a message they can relate to.

One group that has been a big part of "Rapping for a revolution" is Rebel Diaz. They accomplished this by striving to cultivate cultural memory by using quotes from civil rights marches in the lyrics of a song.

During elections, Rebel Diaz typically would show support for at least a single candidate, even if it was not full support. However, during the 2016 elections, Rebel Diaz "declared his loathing for practically all the candidates" by saying things such as "Fuck this election. Fuck the Green Party. Fuck Bernie. Fuck Hillary and the Democrats. Fuck Donald and the Republicans".

Later on, after the election for president had concluded, Iowa caucuses had commenced their primary election. Residente tweeted about how his followers should vote for Bernie and how "Latin Americans living in the United States who defend laws in favor of immigrants' rights should vote for Sanders".

I cannot answer the rest of the questions and I am very sorry. I am having a hard time understanding all of these readings. 

Chilean New Song

"In Chile in the early 1960s, social divisions were severe". Throughout the entire first 3 paragraphs, the political, social, and economic environment of Chile is described. For example. thousands of people were living in shanty towns, workers had terrible working and living conditions, "Women were paid 30% less than men for the same work", and large estates controlled over 80% of all agricultural land. Overall, the people were oppressed and it looked like nothing could be done for retribution. Out of these troubled times came La Nueva Canción, otherwise known as New Song. This new type of Chilean music is characterized as "new forms of politically aware and socially conscious music, rooted in Latin American folk traditions, that spoke tot he aspirations of the time". Musically, the lyrics "were poetic and stirring; the music, a haunting blend of indigenous wind and stringed instruments-some dating from the ancient Inca empire". The music is described as "emotional, ethereal ancient and modern at the same time". The main audience for the up and coming music were mainly socially aware students, but it had also spread to "unionist, rural workers and campesinos, and shantytown dwellers around Santiago".

According to the article, the main purpose that the author argues Chilean New Song had was to "mobilize and unite people in a common cause". The way it did this was to motivate people to participate in politics and to maintain that participation. It also gave the demands of the people a voice which they had lacked for quite some time. Some of the typical instruments of New Song included the quena; a bamboo flute, pan pipes that are called sicus, the bombo leguero drum, the charango. Also, the music "incorporated campesino styles and rhythms from Chile's countryside and other traditional music from other Latin American countries". The uses of these instruments are significant because they are instruments that their Latin American ancestors used to make music, which gives the music a distinct feeling, especially of for the Chileans who can claim this music as their own since their heritage is utilized in its creation. Overall, the creation of the type of music "began to contest, and reconfigure, the elite, exclusionary sense of identity that prevailed in the dominant culture. The music played a crucial role in building a broader more inclusive vision that valorized Chile's, and Latin America's, working and peasant classes".

One incredibly important person to the New Song movement was someone named Violet Parra. Many artists saw her as an important part of this music because she "consciously sought to recapture and renovate Chilean and Latin American traditions and music as part of an effort to build a different consciousness and way of life, an effort that grew to reflect enormous hope and energy. Essentially, what she did was she made sure to preserve the traditions of the Latin American ancestors in order to give the listeners something to identify with listening, making them feel at home with the music and like they belonged.

Finally, some ways that Chilean New Song engages in the idea of cultural memory is that it keeps the traditional music style of the Latin American ancestors alive by using traditional instruments and traditional rhythms. Once again, this helps the listeners feel at home while the listen and makes them feel like this music is truly theirs.