1.5M ratings
277k ratings

See, that’s what the app is perfect for.

Sounds perfect Wahhhh, I don’t wanna

Crime Rates versus Crime Lyrics by Emmanuel Khodra

After the persistent media coverage about rap lyrics being used as evidence in trials, I decided that it would be beneficial to map crimes mentioned in rap lyrics against crime rates across the country. The study would provide insight into whether there was any correlation between lyrics that involved crime and the crimes themselves. Many people have associated rap lyrics with rising crime rates, suggesting that the genre is violent in nature. However, during my research, I stumbled upon an article on The Wire that described the opposite. The article describes that as hip hop became more popular, crime decreased. I centered my project around investigating this trend and its legitimacy.  My project focused on crimes individually, which means I compared robberies as well as violent crimes, drugs and gun possession. I collected data using Tahir Hemphill’s database The Hiphop Word Count, which ran through lyrics for a set of provided crimes and crime related words. Using the outputted list , I found the number of crimes mentioned for each year. I used the timeframe from 1989 - 2009. I then found a database online which contained most of the information I needed concerning crime rates. Once I had all of my data, I put it into a spreadsheet. 

Using the spreadsheet, I started on representing my data visually. My initial data visualization was unsuccessful. It displayed some of the data incorrectly and it crashed eventually. However, the incorrect display may have been a consequence of the type of graph I chose to use. On the other hand, I did find a data visualization I could use, which required exporting my data as a csv file. Although this second data visualization wasn’t as aesthetically pleasing as my initial data visualization, it displayed the data correctly. The data showed very little correlation between the crimes in the lyrics and their counterparts. For example, a significant crime drop between 1993 and 1995 is easily seen while crimes mentioned in rap lyrics are steadily increasing. Minor correlations such as stagnant robbery rates do not suggest causation, however. The results of my project suggest little correlation between crimes in lyrics and crimes in reality. In fact, certain parts of my results solidify the claim made in The Wire article, which suggests that increasing popularity in hip hop was concurrent with dropping crime rates.

More you might like

The Rapper Popularity Calculator by Edwin DeJesus

image

The Rapper Popularity Calculator is a measurement tool developed by Edwin DeJesus in association with Tahir Hemphill @ staplecrops.com

This tool has two purposes:

  1. To prove that net worth does not necessarily equate to fame
  2. To develop a standardized system of measurement for a rapper’s (or other types of artists) fame based on a variety of aspects involving personal statistics and social media.
8 Types of Niggas “ “1. Close Friend, someone who got yo back, yo “main nigga." 2. Rooted in blackness and the Black experience. From a middle-aged social worker: "That Brotha ain’t like dem ol e-lights, he real, he a shonuff nigga" 3. Generic,...

8 Types of Niggas

“1. Close Friend, someone who got yo back, yo “main nigga." 

2. Rooted in blackness and the Black experience. From a middle-aged social worker: "That Brotha ain’t like dem ol e-lights, he real, he a shonuff nigga" 

3. Generic, neutral reference to African Americans. From a 30 something college educated Sista: "The party was live, it was wall to wall niggaz there”

4. A sista’s man/lover/partner. from the beauty shop. “Guess we ain’t gon be seein too much of girlfriend no mo since she got herself a new nigga” From Hip Hop artist Foxy brown, “Ain’t no nigga like the on I got." 

5. Rebellious, fearless unconventional, in-yo-face Black man. From former NBA superstar Charles Barkley, "Nineties niggas… The DailyNews, The Inquirer has been on my back… They want their Black Athletes to be Uncle Tom. I told you white boys you’ve never heard of a 90s nigga. We do what we want to do” quoted in The Source, December 1992). 

6. Vulgar, disrespectful Black Person, antisocial, conforming to negative sterotype of African Americans. From former Hip Hop group Arrested Development, in their best-selling song, “People Everyday” 1992: A black man actin like a nigga… got stomped by an African" 

7. A cool, down person, rooted in Hip Hop and black culture, regardless of race, used today by non-blacks to refer to other non-Blacks. 

8. Anyone engaged in inappropriate, negative behavior; in this sense, Blacks may even apply the term to White folk. According to African American scholar Clarence Major’s From Juba to Jive, Queen Latifah was quoted in Newsweek as criticizing the US government with these words. “Those niggers don’t know what the fuck they doing”

― H. Samy Alim

The 8 Different Types Of N-Word by Gabriel Willoughby

image

In Rap Music’s long history the use of the “N” word has increased as time moved on. Before a certain time the word was used to insult Black people and to decrease their motivation. In our generation the “N” word has transformed into a word of endearment. 

When the rapper YG came out with his brand new single “My Nigga” it was controversial due to the overwhelming use of the “N” word 158 times.

YG is quoted saying “The word is based off of friendship. When you say the ‘n-word’, ‘that’s my n-word,’ you saying ‘that’s my homie.’” This seems to be a popular trend in Rap music and made me question if the word is really used as a term of endearment. 

My project uses YG’s music as a sample to understand the different types of the “N” word use in Rap. To do this I used Clarence Major’s definitions from the essay “Types Of Niggers”  for a comparison.

An Analysis of the F-Word In Rap: Understanding N.W.A. By Tremayne Baker While reviewing the data I came across the fact that the 1980’s had the highest uses of the f-word as an intensifier and that is because of the rap group N.W.A. This lead to the...

An Analysis of the F-Word In Rap: Understanding N.W.A. By Tremayne Baker

While reviewing the data I came across the fact that the 1980’s had the highest uses of the f-word as an intensifier and that is because of the rap group N.W.A. This lead to the side poster project of “Understanding N.W.A”. “Understanding N.W.A” is inspired by the “Understanding Shakespeare” project where the verses in each rap that contained the word fuck are singled out and the word fuck is color coordinated based on the content which it is used. The result of the project gives the public a view of how N.W.A uses the word fuck.

New York City’s Most Successful Borough By Nonye Irozuru During my time at the Rap Research Lab I have been working on researching which borough has the most successful rappers in New York City. I determined this by categorizing the rappers’ twitter...

New York City’s Most Successful Borough By Nonye Irozuru

During my time at the Rap Research Lab I have been working on researching which borough has the most successful rappers in New York City.  I determined this by categorizing the rappers’ twitter followers, net worth, albums, record sales, endorsements, court appearances, years it took to get signed (from when first active), reality (fact vs. fiction), and total concerts.

I started this project by choosing the rappers I was going to use to represent the borough they came from. Then I made a spreadsheet on google drive of the rapper’s data, soon after I then transferred that data to Microsoft Excel. When the data was prepared I visualized it as parallel coordinates. Then I brought the charted data into adobe illustrator and made a 3D shape that represents the rapper 50 Cent.

See this in the app Show more