“Ragamuffin Sounds”: Crossing Over from Reggae to Rap and Back

Caribbean Quarterly

Volumn 44, Issue 1-2, 1998, Pages 153-168

  Cooper, Carolyn ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84864881993     PISSN: 00086495     EISSN: 24706302     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/00086495.1998.11829577     Document Type: Article

References (37)

1. Kamau, Brathwaite, The Arrivants: A New World Trilogy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, rpt. 1978,) 162.
2. Brathwaite, The Arrivants, 162–63
3. For a brilliant reading of Brathwaite's use of musical allusion in “Jah” see Gordon, Rohlehr, “Bridges of Sound: An Approach to Edward Brathwaite's ‘Jah’, Caribbean Quarterly, 26, 1–2 (1980), 13–31. For a classic account of the role of Harlem as a meeting place of dispersed African peoples see, for example, Claude McKay's novel Home to Hartem, (reprint. Chatham, NJ: The Chatham Bookseller, 1928)
4. Garth, White, “Traditional Musical Practice in Jamaica and its Influence on the Birth of Modern Jamaican Popular Music,” African-Caribbean Institute of Jamaica monograph, 64–65, extracted from ACIJ Newsletter #7, March 1982.
5. F., Cassidy and R. B., LePage, Dictionary of Jamaican English, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967)
6. 1 am indebted to Dr. Hubert Devonish, Department of Language, Linguistics and Philosophy, U.W.I., for this insight.
7. Ibid.
8. Stephen, Davis, Reggae Bloodlines: In Search of the Music and Culture of Jamaica, 1977; rpt. (London: Heinemann Educational Books, 1981), 17.
9. Mandingo, “The Origins and Meanings of Dancehall & Ragamuffin,” Dance Hall, February, 1994, 114.
10. Ibid.
11. Ben, Mapp, “First Reggae. Then Rap. Now it's Dancehall,” The New York Times. Sunday, June 21, 1992, 23.
12. Ibid.
13. Marshall, Berman, All That is Solid Melts into Air, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1982), 290–92 in Tricia, Rose : Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America, (Hanover, N.H.: Wesleyan University Press, 1994), 31.
14. Jacques, Attali, Noise: The Political Economy of Music, 1977; English translation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985), 4.
15. Lois, Stavsky, I.E., Mozeson and Dani, Reyes Mozeson, The A 2 Z: The Book of Rap and HipHop Slang, (New York: Boulevard Books, 1995), 72.
16. Ibid.
17. “Looking for the Perfect Beat,” “The South Bank Show,” The British ITV Series, broadcast in Los Angeles on the Bravo Cable Network, Sunday, February 11, 1996. Transcription by Carolyn Cooper.
18. Geneva, Smitherman, “The Chain Remain the Same:’ Communicative Practices in the Hip Hop Nation.” Revised version of an unpublished paper presented at the “English in Africa” conference, Grahamstown Foundation, Monument Conference Center, Grahamstown, South Africa, September 11–14, 1995, 18–19.
19. Bob, Marley, “Bad Card,” Uprising. Island Records, 1980
20. Peter, Tosh, “Equal Rights,” Equal Rights, CBS Records, 1977.
21. The Fugees, “No Woman, No Cry,” The Score, Columbia Records, 1996.
22. Ibid., 18–19.
23. David, Toop, Rap Attack 2: African Rap to Global Hip Hop, (London: Serpent's Tale, 1991), 19.
24. Dick, Hebdige, Cut ‘N’ Mix: Culture, Identity and Caribbean Music, (London: Routledge, 1987), 137.
25. Ibid.
26. Ibid., 138.
27. Ibid
28. Ibid., 138
29. Iam indebted to Dr. Louis Chude-Sokei, Assistant Professor of English, Bowdoin College, these examples.
30. I am indebted to Terri-Lynn Cross, Administrator, UCLA Center for African-American Studies for informing me of the African-American terms which she speculates are of Portuguese origin.
31. Geneva, Smitherman, Black Talk: Words and Phrases from the Hood to the Amen Corner, (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1994), 51.
32. Op.cit.
33. See “Slacknoss Hiding from Culture: Erotic Play in the Dancehall” in Carolyn Cooper, Noises in the Blood: Orality, Gender and the ‘Vulgar’ Body of Jamaican Popular Culture,” London: Macmillan, 1993; Durham, N.C., : Duke University Press, 1995, 136–173.
34. Soe, for example, Carolyn, Cooper “‘Lyrical Gun’: Metaphor and Role Play in Jamaican Dancehall Culture.” The Massachusetts Review XXXV. 3 & 4 (1994): 429–447.
35. Frances Cress Wesling, The Isis Papers: The Keys to the Colors, Chicago: Third World Press 1991), 110.
36. Cheryl L., Koyos, “‘We're More than a Novelty, Boys’: Strategies of Female Rappers in the Rap Music Tradition,” in Joan, Newion Radner, ed. Feminist Messages: Coding in Women's Folk Culture,” (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 216. Keyes quotes Roger Abrahams, “Negotiating Respect: Patterns of Prosontation among Black Women,” in Clairo R., Farrer, ed. Women and Folklore. Images and Genres, (Prospect Heights, III.: Waveland Press, 1975), 67
37. Chuck D, “Looking for the Perfect Beat” video. Transcription by Carolyn Cooper.