Soul Thieves The Appropriation and Misrepresentation of African American Popular Culture

This book looks at the misappropriation of African American popular culture through various genres. Hip hop, the current most dominant African American popular culture creation, serves as the underpinning for the core areas of this book which delineates music, dance, television and film, sports, technology, fashion, sexuality, and religion. However,Soul Thievesis a historically inclusive documentation of the misappropriation of black popular culture, thus spanning other areas and genres besides the current craze. Perhaps the most daring and unique charge here is that most African American cultural creations have the inherent potential to be healing agents, and while many whites acknowledge these potential curative inclinations, they exploit the art for commercial purposes and to maintain and expand white ruling class hegemony over the black and white masses. However,Soul Thievesmoves beyond victimization to analyze the roles that some African Americans play in the exploitation of African American popular culture.

Baruti N. Kopano is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Communication Studies at Morgan State University.

Tamara LizetteBrown is an Assistant Professor of History and Director of Women’s Studies at Bowie State University.

Preface; Tamara Brown
PART I: ENTERTAINMENT AND FASHION
1. 'So You Think You Can Dance'; Tamara Brown
2. 'Foraging Fashion'; Abena Lewis-Mhoon
3. 'In the Eye of the Beholder: Definitions of Beauty in Popular Black Magazines'; Kimberly Brown
PART II: BLACK POWER STUDIES
4. 'Neutering the Black Power Movement: The Hijacking of Protest Symbolism'; James B. Stewart
5. 'Silent Protest: The Appropriation of Black Athletic Power'; Jamal Ratchford
6. Black Comic Book Characters; David T. Terry
PART III: MUSIC AND TECHNOLOGY
7. Soul Thieves: White America and the Appropriation of Hip Hop and Black Culture; Baruti Kopano
8. I'm Hip: An Exploration of Rap Music's Creative Guise; Kawachi Clemmons
9. 'Cash Rules Everything Around Me! Appropriation, Commodification and the Politics of Hip Hop and Contemporary Protest Music'; Diarra Osei Robinson
10. 'The Appropriation of Blackness in Ego Trip's The (White) Rapper Show'; Carlos D. Morrison and Ronald L. Jackson, Jr.