Sanyika Shakur

In Sanyika Shakur’s memoir, Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member, the audience follows the events that transform Monster Kody Scott into Sanyika Shakur. While writing his memoir from prison, the book starts in 1975 with his graduation from elementary school and initiation into the Crips. His initiation included a brutal beating from fellow Crips members, which immediately followed his first gang shooting against the Bloods. At the age of thirteen, Kody Scott earned the nickname “Monster” due to his violent acts committed against a victim. In 1978, Monster describes himself as having “ambition, vitality, and ruthlessness” in order to build his reputation and define himself as an individual. One year later, Monster was in trial…

The book Monster: The autobiography of an L.A Gang member was written Monster AKA Sanyika Shakur there are various themes emphasized in this book - The first and obvious theme that is noticed in this book is the theme of violence. Monster: An Autobiography of an L.A. Gang reveals various incidences of violence which are highly brought about by drug abuse. An example of violence that is displayed in the book is where Kody shot at Art’s chili dog stand because he wanted to kill Eric (Shakur, 1964,…

able to determine the cause of crime. Monster by Sanyika Shakur is a memoir about his gang life that started when he was eleven years old. Throughout his gang life he becomes the baddest gang member alive while his time was spent in and out of jail. Later into his life he came to a realization that the gang life was not going to help support him and his family. This caused him to drop the lifestyle and working on making a good life for himself. The book provides great examples when trying to…

in the village. The artist, Tupac Shakur is notable in that many of the Cheran youth relate to him: “Alfredo slips in a Tupac Shakur CD, and suddenly the kids are debating in minute detail, the various possible scenarios behind the late hip-hop’s assassination” (Martinez 124). It is apparent that the youth of Cheran can relate to Shakur from what they take away from his lyrics; Tupac Shakur is best known for his lyrics encouraging change and activism toward racism. The lyrics, however, are very…

Lamar. The evolution in hip hop such as topics, tones, and the desire for money and materialism have changed due to time. From discussing the problems in the hood and eye witnessing things to rapping about things that don’t matter like drugs and sex, hip hop has evolved and may as well said is dead. In the 90s, hip hop began to change from the creation of drugs, women, violence, and vulgar language to mainly sex and drugs. The usage of the N-word and calling women “bitches” became more and more…

Kendrick Lamar is a very respected, powerful rapper in the rap game right now. He has a lot of influence on the rap community and to the listeners of his music. He has a lot of different songs that focus around the idea of racism, police brutality, and equality. One of his most well known songs and one of the songs that focuses on racism is his song “Alright” of the album “To Pimp A Butterfly”. The music video to this song is what really tells the story to this song along with the very powerful…

these categories do happen. It does not justify to keep the misogynistic attitude towards women in the genre, however, since it is sexist behavior. Some rappers also have tried to get rid of this behavior as well, both male and female rappers. This fault within Hip-Hop does not only exist in this genre, it exists with other genres that is considered popular culture such as rock or pop, describing women as “the girl next door or the seductress” (Wilson 301). Since it also exists within other…

The companies had ties to gangs, such as the Bloods or Crips, which aided the development and increased the severity of the bad relationship between both labels.The two popular label companies hosted Tupac Shakur (Death Row) and Biggie Smalls (Bad Boy), both already extremely well-known as one another’s rap rivals (Hendrickson 29-31). Tupac, on the West Coast, made many songs attacking the East Coast, and it made a huge impact on this “gang war” (Chadwick). The tension had not always existed,…

song “Self Destruction” in response to violence in black neighborhoods. Similarly, the group Public Enemy Number One advocated black pride through its song “Fight the Power”. However, in the public mind, these songs give way to more violent alternatives like NWA’s “Fuck tha Police”, which said there would be a “bloodbath of cops dyin in LA” (Ice Cube, Easy E, MC Ren). Ultimately, because the violent version of rap drew more attention through controversy, it prevailed over the “socially…

is Eminem’s statement in one of his freestyles stating he knew where Tupac was. “Hip hop ain't been the same since Tupac moved to Cuba on us.” Now we must ask ourselves is Eminem lying? I don't think so. Maybe he wanted us to know the truth. He’s living with his aunt out in cuba doing who knows what. Assatta Shakur is the aunt in cuba who admitted on live tv that Tupac was living with her in cuba.…