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Accepted Paper:
‘Moya muzyka s podvalov’: Rap and Hip-Hop Culture in Kazakhstan
A'Yanna Solomon
(University of Michigan, Ann Arbor)
Paper abstract:
The far-reaching consequences of the Soviet Union’s collapse continue to reverberate throughout Eurasia as its former states grapple with questions of national and cultural identity. In the absence of the USSR, discussions around the occurrence of a larger ‘Russophonia’ or global population of Russian speakers has exposed and scrutinized links between Russianness and the former ‘Soviet’ identity, demonstrating the ways non-Russians are othered by their proximity, or lack thereof, to Russianness. This complex exploration of identity can, likewise, be observed in Russian-Kazakh rap music.
Within the context of post-Soviet Kazakhstan, rap music can be interpreted as a medium for the construction and expression of the ‘self’ and the ‘individual’ as part of a larger cultural and social environment. Therefore, this paper seeks to determine the relationship between global hip hop culture, language, and aspects of Kazakh poetry and performance in respect to Kazakhstani rap in the 21st century.