A Sociolinguistic Analysis Of American Rap Slang

It is impossible for any living language to be static. Language always responds to new concepts and developments with new usages. Rap music—emerged in the black inner city neighborhoods—has not only been denoted as one of the most popular musical styles in popular culture today, but also as the poetry of the black youth. The main source of Rap music—African American English has been considered as the lowest form of communication, however, more and more American youth accept it and create a new genre—Rap slang.Language is regarded as a communicative medium and carrier of culture, and the impact of culture upon a given language is something intrinsic and indispensable. Such a departure from majority language usage is a natural consequence of cultural differences. Most sociologists, linguists and psychologists believe that the use of Rap slang is often a conduit of self-differentiation that helps forge group identity, solidarity and ethnic pride, meanwhile, a way to resist the white culture passively for their own equality and freedom.Consequently, a tentative study on Rap slang is carried out from the perspective of sociolinguistics by certain qualitative research methods, focusing on relationships between language and culture. This thesis undertakes a comprehensive linguistic description of Rap slang in terms of spelling, grammar rules and lexical features so as to indicate the main feature of Rap slang—"as simple as possible". The following study focuses on the influence of Rap music and Rap slang on American society from two aspects: firstly, the influence on American English has been explored; secondly, how the white community accepts what Rap music represents as a youth subculture. More emphasis is given to the cultural connotation behind Rap slang. It is acknowledged that most Afro-Americans take Rap music as a form of bringing out self-identity and a medium to resist the white establishment in order to strengthen the Black nationalism of African American.In addition, the comparison analysis between American Rap music and Chinese Rap music is also presented. This part gives a further explanation that why Rap music got popularity in the United States instead of China.