"There's a couple lines in our script/I think we should edit": Autofiction and the moment of "consciousness" in black-British conscious rap

“我们的剧本中有几行/我认为我们应该编辑”：自传小说和英国黑人意识说唱中的“意识”时刻

• 批准号: 2887037
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Bristol
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2887037
• 关键词: There; couple; lines; our; script

Omar Shahid defines 'conscious' rap as "a new generation of homegrown artists who aren'tscared to deal in the explicitly political"1. Within politically charged albums, black-Britishrappers embark on longer narrative projects in which they straddle the boundary between the'conscious' and the performative, taking time to play with imagery of the capitalist spoils ofcelebrity and wealth, whilst also carving out spaces for introspection. These works are not onlybeing accepted by mainstream audiences, a far cry from the roots of black-British rap and grimein underground garage collectives, but are also constituting genuine political protest, with themusic leading the "rebellion against what black culture considers to be a hostile government"2.However, it remains unclear as to when the materialistic, single-producing black-British rapperexchanges boastfulness for didacticism. Michael Owuo Jr. (Stormzy), for example, gestures to thecompletion of his self-development upon reaching his third album, "This ain't the same man whosaid his head was heavy"3. And yet, one album prior, he remained uncomfortably between the"commercialized" and the "conscious": "They sayin' I'm the voice of the young black youth/Andthen I say "Yeah, cool" and then I bun my zoot"4. This gestures to a process of transitiontraversing his discography, with a definitive end in the site of his third work, but ambiguitysurrounding the point of origin. In order to understand the work itself better, as well as how thisevolution of conscious rap contributes to and diverges from the existing genre of black-Britishrap, it is critical to ask and answer: when does rap become 'conscious'?

奥马尔·沙希德 (Omar Shahid) 将“有意识的”说唱定义为“不害怕参与明确政治的新一代本土艺术家”1。在充满政治色彩的专辑中，英国黑人说唱歌手开始了更长的叙事项目，他们跨越了“意识”和表演之间的界限，花时间玩弄资本主义对名人和财富的掠夺的意象，同时也开辟了内省的空间。这些作品不仅被主流观众所接受，与英国黑人说唱和 grimein 地下车库集体的根源相去甚远，而且还构成了真正的政治抗议，其音乐引领了“对黑人文化认为是敌对政府的反抗”2。然而，目前还不清楚这位唯物主义、单人制作的英国黑人说唱歌手何时会用自夸来交换。 说教主义。例如，Michael Owuo Jr.（Stormzy）在发行第三张专辑时表示自己已经完成了自我发展，“这不是那个说他的头很重的人”3。然而，在之前的一张专辑中，他仍然在“商业化”和“意识”之间感到不安：“他们说我是年轻黑人青年的声音/然后我说“是的，很酷”，然后我把我的zoot发髻”4。这表明了他的唱片目录的一个转变过程，最终在他的第三部作品的地点结束，但围绕着起源点却含糊不清。为了更好地理解作品本身，以及这种有意识说唱的演变如何对现有的英国黑人说唱流派做出贡献并与之不同，提出并回答这一问题至关重要：说唱何时变得“有意识”？