The Impact Of Popular Music On African American Culture

In the Declaration of Independence, it is famously written that all men are created equal and that the founders believed this truth to be self-evident. This statement is the framework of ideals of American society, but that statement has been hypocritical ever since it was first written. The founding fathers were slave owners who benefited greatly from the racist ideals of the era. Throughout the entire history of the United States, there has been no true equality for African Americans. African Americans have endured many forms of racism throughout the hundreds of years, ranging from slavery to mass incarceration and social discrimination.
The subject of the racist history of the United States is often seen as taboo to talk about in mainstream conversations. Many people do not want to think of this dark part of American history and would prefer to pretend that it didn’t exist in the past or in the modern era. This however, must not be the prevailing attitude among society. It is important to understand the struggles of the past so that we may avoid the same mistakes in the future. …show more content…
The music of any particular era can give a quick snapshot of the societal structures and societal beliefs of that time. If you are able to follow the progression of popular music in a particular society, then you can see how those societal structures and cultural beliefs have changed throughout its history. In this paper I will be taking a look into the historical progression of racism against African Americans in the United States by examining the progression of the messages in popular music from era to era. Some of the lyrics I will be examining will be vulgar and have some highly racially insensitive content, but I will not omit these songs due to the fact that they are part of our history and we can’t pretend that it didn’t