THE DIGITAL PAST

I have sort of a lot to say about this book, but also not really. Professor O’Malley reminded us many many times that this book was tough to read, but jeez. Was not expecting to be thaaat hard. Sterne jumps around at a lot of points even before he begins his first chapter. I feel like throughout the book he tried more to include more than what was necessary and appropriate in the book. It seemed he tried to fit all his knowledge about everything even if it was not as relevant to the argument he was trying to make. A point we discussed in class was about how some amount of freedom is good and necessary to make way for creativity to blossom in society. Piracy, for example, makes innovation possible and makes it easy for so many people to get ahold of information and to take that, and make something new with it. A point Sterne talked about in his book was that “by using engineering to make use of THE limits of human perception, systems could be made more efficient and thereby generate more profit,” which interested me. It’s amazing that in the form of a sound that a corporation could make so much money. They literally are capitalizing on something we are born with doing and making it into something so sought after. Like AT&T, they “sought to bring life and its mechanisms into the realm of explicit calculations,” which in return would “make knowledge power,” and “an agent of transformation of human life”. Their production of a phone would would do just that.  The MP3 builds a moment to moment relationship between people to each other or people with things, which is really special. It had the “understandings of what it means to communicate and to listen” and “what it means to make music”. It gives us the opportunity to connect worldwide to people, not only to entertain in the form of music.

Also the cat experiment was messed up on so many levels- but I’m not surprised it happened. There were zero ethical guidelines or any committees to get approval from in the time period that took place.

I appreciate softwares like Linux that exist and are open to all people. I think the world is in need of things that people can act and improve on so it can continue to morph and evolve. Compared to Apple, who don’t allow this to occur, it’s bizarre that Linnux or GNU isn’t more popular among young people. As people, on the Internet especially, we want new and improved websites and software etc but it boils down to one thing: money. Greed is stronger than knowledge and sharing unfortunately and Apple would have no incentive to open their software to people.

People like Richard Stallman and sites like Wikipedia that allow for limitless knowledge and improvement are true pioneers of technology and the Internet in my opinion. I myself have succumbed to Apple like the millions of other people in the world solely because it is what is more materialistic if I’m being honest. Sharing knowledge I feel is just a human right, not something that needs to be earned or bought.

(Also I agree iTunes is trash I only use it to backup by iPhone because I break it approximately 3 times a month)

“Adding black beats like seasoning”

“Decontextualization of gospel music”

“No idea where it comes from”

“Who is singing”

Some of the thoughts, comments heard in class today. In my opinion it seemed to cheapen the quality of the music by adding these little tracks and beats. I didn’t really know why this pissed me off so much, but its just so tacky.

During this class when we were comparing the feel of the music between white Americans and African Americans, I thought it was interesting in the differences between them. The African American versions seem so seamless, go with the flow, and just unbothered. They have that “behind the beat,” feel to them that seems effortless, but still comes together to make a catchy song. When white people would try to imitate, it would sound almost awkward. It seemed to try too hard to sound good because it was so much more fast paced and overall just not the same.

I have a question for you! I’m hoping you read this blog again or I’ll just be talking to myself and that would be weird.

Anyways, I want your expertise on this question since you know the most/I don’t know how to find this question through researching. How do you think music would have been evolved or expressed if it weren’t for the the segregation of African Americans/Civil War/other prejudices that existed from the 19th to the 20th century? I hope that question made sense but I feel like so much would have been different if all Americans were able to express themselves freely whether it be on their own television show, radio, in a band with people of other races, or anything. Do you think we would have lost some of the type of music that was produced as an outcome of segregation or would it just sound different?

I decided to look into the history of hip hop for this scavenger hunt Professor O’Malley has sent us on. The first thing I did was start with the Ngram viewer on Google to see when the term first popped up in history. I should say shot up, to better describe it, because from the 1980 mark it absolutely fleeeeww up the chart. Another thing I did was simply Google the word hip hop, which I got a pretty interesting definition. It is defined as “a style of popular music of US black and Hispanic origin, featuring rap with an electronic backing,” which surprises me, but at the same time doesn’t. Not surprisingly is the influence of black Americans, but I am taken a back a little about the Hispanic origins.

One of the first articles I read, dated back to 1988, gave almost a glossary of terms used in hip-hop to better help people understand the lingo. It made me laugh because almost all of them are still relevant today. The article was from the LA Times and states that hip-hop origins from West Africa and the terminology has come from the Caribbean. It also states that DJ Kool Herc and Grandmaster Flash, also native to the Caribbean, are credited with bringing the style of music to New York. Lastly, it states hip-hop as an umbrella term. As a subculture, it stands for rapping, deejaying, scratching, breakdancing, and graffiti art. Another article I found, written in the Providence Journal, discusses the “Latino” hip hop as using brassy horns, Latin piano, and aggressive drum beats. I read through this little snippet solely because I wanted to see if it would help piece together the Latin aspect of the definition it gave me, but it seems to just discuss Latin hiphop as a branch of “regular” hip hop I guess? An interesting quote in the Journal, though, was that “hip hop artist say their music doesn’t try to be Latin, but what’s in their blood comes out in their music,” which I found really playful and nice to read.

I was searching more in ProQuest and unfortunately couldn’t find find the full article, but the beginning itself was so interesting to read. I attached a picture underneath and it looks really blurry so I hope it doesn’t post like that, but it describes the whole “hip hop” look. I’m not sure if any other music styles really had a look back then, but I think it’s intersting if this was the first instance of it. I feel like hip hop music introduced so much more to the world than just music itself, but an actual to-live-by culture that people took really seriously.

Another popular name that keeps coming up is Afrika Bambaataa, who was one of the breakthrough artists for hip hop music in general. I can recall some music mentioning his name now that I’ve read more about him. He also originated the Zulu Nation, which were politically aware rappers who were immersed in this, again, hip hop culture. I think its really cool how many things branched out of hip hop music alone. A newspaper article I found in the Seattle times dated back to 1985 states Bambaataa as the king of hip hop, and describes him as a lover, not a fighter. He was someone with an open mind who was able to masterfully mix all different kinds of music, including rock and funk fans. This newspaper article also states some of the origins of hip hop, with it again being started in New York, but also how it got its name. “Hip hop, dont stop, keep on to the body rock,” chanted by a famous rapper Love Bug.

Darling, Cary. “POP MUSIC * Getting Hip to Hip-Hop-A Glossary.” Los Angeles Times (pre-1997 Fulltext), Los Angeles, Calif., 1988.http://search.proquest.com.mutex.gmu.edu/docview/292794268?accountid=14541.

PATRICK MACDONALD, TIMES,STAFF CRITIC. “AFRIKA BAMBAATAA, THE HIP-HOP HERO, WILL PERFORM AT GORILLA GARDENS.” Seattle Times, Seattle, Wash., 1985.http://search.proquest.com.mutex.gmu.edu/docview/385157071?accountid=14541.

RODRIGUEZ, CINDY E. “Latin Hip Hop is there for the Dancin’.” Providence Journal, Providence, R.I., 1989.http://search.proquest.com.mutex.gmu.edu/docview/396884446?accountid=14541.

So did African Americans fight for the Confederacy?

My conclusion, similar to Professor O’Malley’s is yes, but not quite as large as some sources make it out to be. That’s where the real question lies, whether the account of Steiner or Cobb was more accurate. Both were primary sources of the time, but are drastically different. I really couldn’t tell which of them was telling the truth, but whoever wasn’t was a real fool. Cobb would be completely hypocritical saying black men shouldnt be armed, forgetting the fact that three years earlier in Steiner’s comments he was LEADING a group comprised of some black men. OR, Steiner was a fool and couldn’t properly recognize Cobb (Secretary of something of the US at the time) and made it up. I feel if any of them are correct, Steiner’s would be more reliable to trust. Still there’s no solid answer on what happened, which is unfortunate because historians and students can’t come to any real conclusions.

So a) WHY would African Americans fight for the Confederacy? b) Was slavery not as bad as it was portrayed by the north?

a. Who knows. Was there a promise for freedom? The best chance for a decent life? Did they not want to leave their home? It makes sense if people established their family and life somewhere and did not know anything else. But we’re forgetting those who wanted freedom. Maybe the idea of freedom outweighed everything else that matter.

a cont. Why wouldn’t Lincoln allow black Americans to fight for the union either? I wasn’t crazy about Frederick Douglass’s book, but I’m all for him on his argument. Arm the slaves! Let them fight for their own freedom. Don’t just let the white people make a difference. Why couldn’t they? Maybe he overdid his account on how many slaves were fighting in the south so people would be energized to fight for the north!

b. Worst excuse in the book. Slavery has no excuse and it’s tiring to hear about it to this day that it “wasn’t so bad,” “black people were given a home, food, etc” like what? If slavery wasn’t so bad then a country wouldn’t almost split into two over it. Yes there were other reasons like sectionalism, etc but come on. We learned in class that 75% of white people didn’t have any, so only a fourth of the south actually enslaved African Americans. This just reminds me of a Joseph Stalin quote “the death of one Russian soldier is a tragedy, the death of a million is a statistic,” not sure if it’s Joseph Stalin or not (I’ll check later) but it was in one of my psychology textbooks. So why can’t one person being enslaved be enough to make something seem heinous and inhumane. Why does it matter that only 25% of people owned slaves, and only a small amount of those people owned greater than 10 slaves? Why does it have to be such a significant amount of people being prejudiced against for it to matter. I feel like I’m leaving the point here but anyways, slavery was a clear problem that’s repercussions still affect our country now.

**saying all this, there’s no doubt that there are exceptions. I’m all about acknowledging exceptions. Black Americans owning black slaves and such, but I’m not even going to try and explain that one. The only thing I can compare that to is Mexican or Muslim people supporting Donald Trump.

So was Jimmie Rodgers singing like someone else/imitating someone else or not?

His music and voice sort of sounded like he was. I agreed with my other classmates who said that he was trying to sound like other popular musicians of his time or borrowing a sort of sound that wasn’t entirely his. His talent is apparent, nonetheless, but it does seem like it was not the original kind of music he was destined for. It seemed that there was more pain in his voice than there was in his actual life and it seemed a little artificial. Still, he was a talented musician and considered one of the first country singers in America. Another good point made in class was that music has the ability and potential to bring us into other selves, you didn’t have to only be confined to one type of persona or music. It was all your own choice.

In the beginning of this class when Professor O’Malley was discussing how music is a racialized choice, I already was writing my post in my head. I was going to say how even back in history in record stores when you make that choice that is “saturated” in a specific race based on the type of music you’re choosing, it even is like that now. Then he asked the class if we thought society is like that know and it has to be. There still is racial coding among music with all the “white” music being categorized in country, rock, etc and the “black” music being more towards hip hop, soul, and r&b type of music. Of course there are exceptions to this, a white person can love listening to Drake, or a black person loves listening to Kenny Chesney (no idea who that actually is tbh I just hear people associate him with country songs) and that’s fine. At the same time, if you’re going to immerse yourself in “black,” music but still deny the fact that they are, TO THIS DAY, prejudiced against, then you’re apart of the problem in America. That problem has existed since slavery, Jim Crow, minstrels, etc, and anyone who disagrees is probably implicitly (or even explicitly) biased.

In the 1890s, aka the Jim Crow era, Professor O Malley discussed radical racism and segregation and how that has played in a role into the music production industry. As black Americans started to move into northern cities (like Detroit), music that was played in the south was dramatically different than how it sounded up north. First off, Bessie Smith, a black singer, would have a desegregated band playing with her, but since that was not allowed, her instrumental players would go under false names to protect their identity. I thought this was amazing in the fact that people were no different and that music could pull anyone together, as it did for Bessie Smith and Eddy Lang, who was an Italian American musician. It shows how special people thought of their work because the “social norm,” would not matter and all that did was the music. It was beautiful and no matter the color of your skin, you wanted to take part in it with anyone. Muddy Waters song in the south originally sang I Be’s Troubled, which was slow, and fit the society that would be in the south. The beat was slow, you could almost feel the oppression he felt in the beat and the words. Not that all of America up north was suddenly and extremely not racist, but his version in Chicago sang I Can’t Be Satisfied, and it was almost night and day. The beat pertained more to a city life that was fast and exciting, the voice was more clear and there was actual energy in it.

The biggest thing I took away from class was although society was segregated, the musical world was integrated.