Marquita Smith is a PhD candidate in Cultural Studies at McMaster University in Ontario. Her article, “Afro Thunder!: Sexual Politics & Gender Inequity in the Liberation Struggles of the Black Militant Woman,” appears in Michigan Feminist Studies #22. Her research interests include black popular culture, gender, sexuality, race, and urbanity.

Abstract:

"Women of the City Underground: On Jean Grae's 'Tactical' Use of Mixtape Culture"

“I hate empty spaces
Fill 'em with MetroCards that's been already took me places...
It's crazy how I'm still catchin’ yall with no major distribution”
-Jean Grae

These lyrics from Grae’s song “Knock” on her “official” solo debut Attack of the Attacking Things (2002) emphasize the benefits of mobility offered by the city in spite of the economic hardships she faces as a female rapper. By reading this text through Michel de Certeau’s theory of city dwellers’ everyday ‘tactics’, or ways of operating, I will explore how Grae makes use of the urban space to produce and distribute music through networks of mixtape culture, offering a direct rebuttal to economic and gender-based challenges in hip hop and the music industry. I argue that mixtape culture, which is unfixed from the commercial music industry, is a particularly useful tool for female hip hop artists seeking to develop their artistry within an urban framework of limited means. Why is the physical space of the city important in the digital age?

This question calls for a line of inquiry that is attuned to the various challenges for women in hip hop: economics, sexism, and the presence of community. Grae clearly demonstrates the ability of hip hop’s women to “make the city”– a space often envisioned as masculine in itself – according to their own talents and artistic desires as musicians. Ultimately, I seek to extend the analysis of women in hip hop and the ‘tactics’ they use to achieve access to the male-dominated genre.