Gangstas, Thugs, and Hustlas: Identity and the Code of the Street in Rap Music

“Recent research on identity, culture, and violence in inner-city communities describes a black youth culture, or street code, that influences adolescent behavior, particularly violent behavior (360)”. One could notice that starting a family in inner city Philadelphia at this time is not the ideal place to start a child’s education.  The schools in inner city Philadelphia are full of students who one do not want to be there and use school as a place of socializing, and two students who want to be there but can not learn because their classes are continuously interrupted by students who do not care about the curriculum.   Inner city schools over the years have tried to protect their students by adding metal detectors and more security.  Although schools have upgraded their security problems there is still drug dealing and gang violence going on in and out of these inner city schools.  It is sad that a student can not go to school for what the student is meant to do which is to learn more material year by year until you are ready for the real world. After the research I have done I can debate that there is a higher prevalence of school violence in communities where people adhere to the “code of the street.”

When I was a kid I listened to the music that was played around me by my parents, family and friends. Music now a day plays a huge factor in who someone is and how they act.  As a daily listener of rap music I can admit that rap music is based on the “code of the streets” in which they talk about how men should live their lives.  “Rap is “a musical form that makes use of rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular, which is recited or loosely chanted over a musical soundtrack.” Rap emerged from the streets of inner-city neighborhoods, ostensibly as a reflection of the hopes, concerns, and aspirations of urban black youth (361)”. In inner cities “the code of the street” is the way of living and I believe that this is one of the main causes of school violence in inner city schools.  When someone is brought up around and listen to music that talks about selling drugs, killing people and being masculine that is going to give students the idea that although it is wrong it is one way you can get through life. 

  The Rap teenagers today listen to including myself, are songs written in such a way that it tells stories of someone’s life, the rapper.  These stories range depending on what is going on in the rapper’s life at that time.  When Eminem came out with his hit in Slim Shady LP and Marshall Mathers LP, he told stories about when he was abusing narcotics such as valiums. This Rap music became known as “the code of the street” because rappers proclaimed and still proclaim to their listeners that selling drugs, rapping girls, kills people and not snitching are the only rules you need to know to get through life.  This music causes its listeners to believe that the “code of the street” is the way to live their lives.  This article debated that this music does cause inner city students to live their lives based on the “code of the streets” rather than living their own lives by going to school and doing something successful with their lives.

If you go up to an African-American pre-teenager in an inner city Philadelphia area such as North Philadelphia, and ask the individual, “What do you want to do when you get older?” That individual will tell you he wants to be a rapper, athlete, drug dealer or hopefully go to college. It is sad that majority of kids in inner cities do not get to grow up in a good area where the “code on the street” has a better meaning like going to school. Growing up in an inner city neighbor only gives you one perspective of living. It is a one dimensional way of living which give parents a harder job of teaching and bringing up a child through Philadelphia education.

Source:  http://www.gwu.edu/~soc/docs/Kubrin_gangstas.pdf

Code of the Streets

In the article by Erica Stewart and Ronald Simons entitled “Race, Code of the Street, and Violent Delinquency: a multilevel investigation of Neighborhood Street Culture and Individual Norms of Violence” the authors drew on Elijah Anderson’s perspective to conduct a study which examined whether the prevalence of “street culture” in a community could be used to predict violence in adolescents more so than the adolescents feelings towards “street code values”. In addition they also studied whether the “code of the street” mentality being endorsed in a community had an effect on the attitudes of the community’s youth towards violence. For the study they conducted research in two communities, one where street culture was very prevalent and another where it was not, and surveyed over 700 adolescent African Americans. 

The findings of this study were right on track with Anderson’s theory. In the community that adhered more to the “code of the street” as a whole there were significantly higher levels of “violent delinquency”  despite the fact that many of the adolescents surveyed did not endorse the “code of the street”. Stewart and Simons took this to mean that “street culture” in a community impacts an individual’s tendency to be violent even more so than their own values as they pertain to street culture. This is in accordance with Anderson’s findings. Anderson suggested that urban youths will perpetuate the violence in the community around them as a way to protect themselves and their reputations. 

In reference to the community’s view of street culture on the individuals’ view of street culture Simons and Stewart found that adolescents who live in communities that endorse to the street code are significantly more likely to adhere to it in their own lives. This finding is important to understanding the circle of violence evident in these communities. It is said that “violence begets violence” and this is certainly the case. These children grow up in an atmosphere where violence is the norm and consequences for it are not severe so it is not shocking that their personal attitudes towards “street culture” have a higher tendency to be favorable.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2010.00196.x/pdf

The Outsiders by S.E Hinton

The Outsiders by S.E Hinton is a great example of the theme “Code of the Streets”. This book is about two groups of teenagers from different parts of a city. The Greasers were from the poorer community and the Socs, were from a richer community. The two groups were constantly at war with one another through bullying and fighting. The main character, Ponyboy, is raised by his older brothers and they are a part of the Greasers. They are constantly pushing him to do well in school and not be subjected to the life they live and the violence that is constantly going on around him. As a result, Ponyboy has good grades in school.

As the book progresses, Ponyboy is directly exposed to violence and death around him. It took a toll on him and his attitude towards life and school. His grades dropped drastically and he ended up failing a class. The teacher gave him the opportunity to change his grade and he wrote about what he has been through over the past few months.  He wanted to show people what his life was like and also have it as a resource for people that have been though the experiences he has.

This book plays “Devil’s Advocate” to the view that communities where violence is high, there will also be higher rates of school violence. Ponyboy could have easily taken his anger out physically when he returned to school to mirror what he had been through in the street. Although his grades did drop from what they once were, he did not bring violence into the classroom. Instead he chose to write about his experiences to influences other students to choose a better path than violence. At the end of the day, once given the resources to be different from the environment a student is used to it is his or her choice to want to do better and not engage in school violence.

Local Rappers Efforts to Influence Students to Stop School Violence

In Philadelphia, there is a growing number of violence inside schools across the city. The community is noticing that the conduct of the streets is being mimicked by children in their schools. The children are learning violent behaviors in the communities they live in and are showcasing it at their schools in forms of bullying, fighting, stabbing and shootings. Leaders are trying to decrease the rates of violence in schools through forums and zero-tolerance policies enacted in the school system.

In this article, rappers from the Philadelphia area return to a school in South Philadelphia where there was a violent uprising a couple months prior. Rappers, Freeway and Young Chris, wanted to educate the youth on the dangers of violence and why they need to live a positive life. The rappers are natives of the same areas that these students are growing up in so they can relate to their troubles. The music the rappers write is a reflection of their past experiences with violence. But, they have since changed their life around and are advising the students to do the same. The goal of the rappers is to encourage students to stay in school and not be influenced by the negative and violent behaviors see in their neighborhoods. Although the rappers came from the same streets and were once part of the violent activities, the have learned from it and know the consequences of what violence in a young person can do. They do not want students to go down the same path they have been down.

The organizers of the event were skeptical of having the rappers speak at the event because of the content of their song lyrics. They changed their minds when they realized that the students can relate to the rappers experiences. It is important for the students to learn some key points from the rappers. The music they are writing is a reflection of what they have been through, it is not something they want children to emulate in their lives and school. I think this is where the misconception begins. Children who come from communities where violence is high and also listen to these rappers music get the idea that this behavior is okay. The rappers that are involves in taking a stand against school violence should be clear about this difference.   Express to the students, the music they produce is a replication of the troubles they have been through and it is not an example of behavior they want the students to mirror.

Students need to be exposed to people who have made it out of the same situations and violent neighborhoods they are growing up in by doing positive things. It is important for students to be influenced by positive figures who have experienced the same things they did. For some students, these antidotes will allow them to change for the better but for others it will go on deaf ears. The fact that the students will have a choice to change and will be given the opportunity to know what positives can come out of violent environments they live in will make the most difference for them. It will also decrease the violence that is occurring in schools across the city because of violent environments the students are coming from.

LINK TO ARTICLE:

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-12-09/entertainment/philadelphia.rappers.school_1_school-violence-freeway-gun-violence?_s=PM:SHOWBIZ

Dance With The Devil By: Immortal Technique

A song that relates best with "code of the street" is "Dance with the devil" by Immortal Technique.  “Code of the street” is when people reject authority and commit crimes because they feel the need to fit in, gain respect, survive life themselves, and don’t trust law enforcement. The song dance with the devil is about a troubled teenager named William whose rough childhood resulted in him committing crimes throughout his young life.  Among those crimes was the rape and killing of a lady who turned out to be his mom.  He does this because when he went to jail, he snitched an act that is looked down upon under the “code of the street”. Snitching caused him to lose a lot of respect from people in his crew.  After getting out of jail William felt like he needed to get his respect back in any way possible and knew that if he did something violent he had a chance of getting it back. So did, not caring about anybody but himself and his crew and ended up killing his own mother.

Although the song doesn’t talk about William in school it still shows how school violence is higher in communities where people live by “code of the street”. This is the lifestyle that William is use to, and lives by no matter what the circumstances are. He can take his “code of the street” mentality to school with him just so he can prove a point and get the respect he wants from others in the streets. Under the “code of the street” proving a point usually results in acts violent behavior. If William is always trying to prove a point and gain respect so will others kids from the streets, and his crew making the school violent. “Code of the street” is a major reason why some communities have high school violence. Not having to live by “code of the street” makes a school less violent because the students do not have anything to prove.

Gang Mentality Leads to School Violence

img credit: http://rethinkingreentry.blogspot.com/2009_11_01_archive.html

by: Melissa Bruny

School violence can sometimes be an extension of the violence that takes place in the communities and neighborhoods of each particular school. In poorer inner-city areas, many follow a set of rules or laws also known as the “code of the street.” Journalist Doron Taussig asks the question “Is recent school violence a flashback to 1970s street gangs? Or is it something more dangerous?” In his article entitled “Gang Mentality,” Taussig investigates incidents from Martin Luther King High School and Germantown High School in Philadelphia, PA. Currently, gang violence is on the rise with teenagers from high schools all over the city that group themselves based of the different streets they live on. Taussig interviewed two students, one from Germantown High and another from Martin Luther King High School that agreed to explain the dynamics of gang violence and the codes of the street. One student stated that many students join these gangs simply for safety. If one were to get attacked at school, they would have their ‘gang’ on call to get revenge for the person attacked. The student from Germantown High stated that the most essential rule is to always step up and fight for your friends. If you fail to do so then you might be left to protect yourself from your own gang as well as those you failed to fight against. In school’s such as these, fights don’t just end; they lead to retaliations that lead to more retaliation. An interviewed ex-gang member made the point that most of these incidents of violence take place because teenagers these days do not know how to accept losing a fight. Their embarrassment and hurt pride lead them to even more aggressive methods of revenge, such as carrying weapons. Being that many of these groups distinguish themselves based on the street they live on, rival gangs are frequently in the same schools, provoking each other until it leads to a fight. The Germantown High student stated that most fights start over something insignificant such as someone stepping on another’s shoe, but in most cases those incidents lead to more significant acts of violence.  Trying to be the dominant group and ‘one-up’ the next rival gang seems to be the main issue. Most of the time these groups are a product of their environment and if all they see from a young age is people fighting in their communities in order to prove themselves, it shouldn’t be surprising that they pick up the same qualities. After being exposed to the ‘code of the street,’ which revolves around one getting respect, these teens take their means of proving themselves to the extreme, often resulting in senseless murders. Students provoke others just to be given the opportunity to show they are deserving of respect. Attempts of demonstrating ones worth frequently spill into the schools, endangering the lives of many. If it is assumed that codes of the streets are practiced by today’s youth, the only chance of decreasing the amount of violence in schools is to work with the surrounding communities by targeting at risk children for violence from a very young age.

Source: http://archives.citypaper.net/articles/2004-12-16/cover.shtml