DJ BIG STEW Presents Its About The Culture Mixtape

ITS ABOUT THE CULTURE...........Dj Big Stew

Rap's common designation as "CNN for black people" may result from the descendence of rappers from griots, respected African oral historians and praise-singers. Griots were the keepers and purveyors of knowledge, including tribal history, family lineage, and news of births, deaths, and wars5. Travelling griots spread knowledge in an accessible form--the spoken word--to members of tribal villages. Similarly, in the United States, many rappers create songs that, through performances and records, spread news of their daily lives, dreams, and discontents outside of their immediate neighborhoods. Rappers are viewed as the voice of poor, urban African-American youth, whose lives are generally dismissed or misrepresented by the mainstream media. They are the keepers of contemporary African-American working-class history and concerns.

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In the last decade, hip-hop music has followed the path of commercialization that destroyed African-American radio stations in the 1 970s. Whereas prior to commercialization, African-American owners, programmers, and DJs had the freedom to use their stations to serve the specific needs of their listeners --New York's working-class African-American community. They were able to promote local artists and events and to address news events and social concerns as members of the same community from which they drew their audience. However, as corporations owned by businesspeople outside of the community consolidated power by purchasing local stations, African-American AM stations were forced out of the market by more economically-powerful stations owned and controlled mainly by members of the white upper-class. African - American DJs lost their power as the modern-day griots of their communities and as the presenters of hip-hop music and culture