The purpose of this research is to analyze two Internet sites with a view toward identifying how they relate to theories and concepts associated with hip-hop as a popular-culture phenomenon. The two sites are Davey D's Hip Hop Corner (www.daveyd.com) and Hip-Hop Summit Action Network (www.hsan.org).
In a broad sense, Davey D's Hip Hop Corner can be classed a version of a news service (updated daily, via DD's Hip Hop Daily News and op-ed forum that weighs in on current events, the entertainment industry, and touches on a range of issue fronts that surface in a media-competitive popular culture. The site content deals extensively with reviews of music releases, both mainstream and independent, and music from around the world is covered. Where its focus is global instead of national and African American from a cultural standpoint, it tends to offer evaluations of non-American sources of hip-hop according as they appear to take Africa as a cultural referent. For example, one DVD review of a Canadian artist emphasizes that artist's understanding of the links between hip-hop and Africa, such as "how the oral traditions of West Africa which are the roots for modern day rap actually originated in East Africa which is older and the cradle of civilization" ("Breaking," 2005). Virtually any topic that the site covers is linked to hip-hop in some way--from Hurricane Katrina to hip-hop's role in voter education, and politics.
There is ample attention given to social critique, chiefly by way of site-user forums that invite people to comment on a whole range of issues. In addition, the site has a section devoted to the history of hip-hop, which is less scholarly and documented than a compilation of opinion and interpretation of the ongoing and evolving record of the art form. Even so, the texts speak with authority, and the keynote is one of celebration of the form. Multiple articles, which appear to be added to continually, discuss nuances of...