A term used by African Americans to define a stylized way of speaking. Salient features
of a rap are braggadocio, double entendre, formulaic expressions, signifyin’, and “playing
the dozens.” Folklorists trace the popularity of this speech genre to 1960s Black
nationalist H. “Rap” Brown, whose praise name (nickname) depicted his style of
speaking, called rappin’. Although Brown is credited for the name of this genre, elements
of rap can be traced from African epic bardic traditions to rural southern-based
expressions of African Americans such as toasts, folktales, sermons, blues, and game
songs (such as the hambone).
African Americans transported Southern traditions during massive migrations to
Northern urban centers between the 1920s and the 1950s. In the new milieu, Southern
traditions were transformed and modified to reflect urban life. This new context also
fostered a style of speaking known as jive talk, a metaphorical way of speaking that uses
word and phrases from American mainstream English, but reinterpreted from an African
American perspective (for example, man becomes “cat”; or house becomes “crib”). The
art of jive is predicated on its ability to remain witty and original—hence its constant
fluctuation in vocabulary over the years.
Between the 1930s and the 1950s, jive gained prominence in the performances and
speech culture of jazz musicians like Cab Calloway, Louis Jordan, and Dizzy Gillespie
and comedians like Redd Fox, Pigmeat Markham, Jackie “Moms” Mabley, and Rudy
Ray Moore, who was known for popularizing toasts like “The Signifying Monkey’ via
audio recordings. In addition, Black radio disc jockeys—namely, Al Benson and Holmes
“Daddy-O” Daylie—introduced jive talking to music (in rhyme) via the airwaves.
By the mid-1960s, jive was redefined and given newer meaning by H. “Rap” Brown,
who adorned his political speeches with signifyin’, rhyme, and double entendre.
Although his way of speaking inaugurated the shift from jive to rap, Brown’s stylized
speech soon gained popular acceptance among young urban admirers as rappin’. It was
not, however, until the late 1960s that Brown’s speaking style was set to a musical
accompaniment by political poets such as the Last Poets of Harlem and Gil-Scott-Heron,
who recited rhyming couplets over an African percussion accompaniment.
In the late 1960s and the 1970s, the concept of rappin’ over music emerged among
Black music artists as two distinct song styles: the love rap (as in the music of Isaac
Hayes) and funk rap (for example, George Clinton and his group Parliament). Unlike
rappin’ performed by early entertainers, these raps were loosely chanted over a repetitive
instrumental accompaniment.
Rap as a distinct musical genre evolved in the Bronx, New York, during 1972 with
itinerant disc jockeys called “mobile djs,” who mixed prerecorded hits alternately on two
turntables while reciting party phrases to the crowd in a microphone. Because deejaying
became a demanding art, party-styled emcees teamed with deejays, thus giving rise to
rap’s 1990s form.
Rap music artists include Kool Moe Dee, Queen Latifah, Public Enemy, and Arrested
Development, among others.
Cheryl L.Keyes
References
Keyes, Cheryl L. 1992. Rappin to the Beat: Rap Music as Street Culture among African Americans.
Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research Press.
Smitherman, Geneva. [1977] 1986. Talkin and Testifyin: The Language of Black America. Detroit:
Wayne State University Press.
Toop, David. 1991. Rap Attack 2: African Rap to Global Hip-Hop. rev. ed. New York: Serpent
Tail.