Articles tagged with ‘Koolism’

• 2nd Generation Migrant Expression in Australian Hip-hop

  “Lebanon ain’t got no money, but there’s no land more greener, So proud to be a child of the cedar. Some Aussies can’t believe it when I look ‘em in the face. Proud to be a wog, I mentally laid them to waste. They say ‘But wait, you’re Australian’. ‘You wait and stop your speaking, I am, but I’m descendant from Phoenicians.’ … What we gotta do is not forget our culture, Yallah my brother, your culture given from Allah, remember your history, it helps you work harder, Helps you respect more your mother and your father, Your parents or grandparents came from another land, You might be Australian now but it’s not your mother land.”

  – Sleek the Eilte, ‘Child of the Cedar’

  This essay focuses on 2nd generation migrant hip-hop artists including MC Trey, Maya Jupiter, Sleek the Elite and Hau from Koolism and their distinctive use of hip-hop as a tool of expressing their status of being in-between their ethnic heritage and Anglo-Australian culture.

  Tags: Maya Jupiter, MC Trey, hip-hop and migrant experience, Sleek the Elite, self expression, Tony Mitchell, localising hip-hop, multilingualism, multiculturalism, South West Syndicate, Curse ov Dialect, Downsyde, Western Sydney, TZU, Koolism, breakdancing, Hau, Conference Papers

• The DIY Habitus of Australian Hip-hop: Embodied Histories, Community and Scene

  If habitus is regarded as ‘deep seated generative principles of thought, perception, appreciation, and action’, this ‘fit’ seems eminently applicable to the ‘embodied history’ of hip-hop subcultures and the expression of their ‘objectified history’ in practices such as recording, performing, internet interaction, music journalism, and independent radio and television broadcasting.

  This paper, originally published in Media International Australia, looks at the Australian hip-hop culture in terms of its do-it-yourself ethos, which is, in part, a result of a lack of support from the commerical record labels. Tony Mitchell here discusses the artists, groups and independent labels that have championed this DIY ethos and have built a community of practice outside the mainstream industry.

  Tags: localising hip-hop, community radio, authenticity, independent record labels, Tony Mitchell, Aboriginal language hip-hop, DIY ethos, Pegz, Elefant Traks, Obese, Hilltop Hoods, Koolism, Reason, Indigenous hip-hop, Conference Papers