The Mark of Criminality

Rhetoric, Race, and Gangsta Rap in the War-on-Crime Era

By Bryan J. McCann

SERIES: Rhetoric, Culture, and Social Critique

University of Alabama Press

Illustrates the ways that the “war on crime” became conjoined—aesthetically, politically, and rhetorically—with the emergence of gangsta rap as a lucrative and deeply controversial subgenre of hip-hop

In The Mark of Criminality: Rhetoric, Race, and Gangsta Rap in the War-on-Crime Era, Bryan J. McCann argues that gangsta rap should be viewed as more than a damaging reinforcement of an era’s worst racial stereotypes. Rather, he positions the works of key gangsta rap artists, as well as the controversies their work produced, squarely within the law-and-order politics and popular culture of the 1980s and 1990s to reveal a profoundly complex period in American history when the meanings of crime and criminality were incredibly unstable.

At the center of this era—when politicians sought to prove their “tough-on-crime” credentials—was the mark of criminality, a set of discourses that labeled members of predominantly poor, urban, and minority communities as threats to the social order. Through their use of the mark of criminality, public figures implemented extremely harsh penal polices that have helped make the United States the world’s leading jailer of its adult population.

At the same time when politicians like Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton and television shows such as COPS and America’s Most Wanted perpetuated images of gang and drug-filled ghettos, gangsta rap burst out of the hip-hop nation, emanating mainly from the predominantly black neighborhoods of South Central Los Angeles. Groups like NWA and solo artists (including Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, and Tupac Shakur) became millionaires by marketing the very discourses political and cultural leaders used to justify their war on crime. For these artists, the mark of criminality was a source of power, credibility, and revenue. By understanding gangsta rap as a potent, if deeply imperfect, enactment of the mark of criminality, we can better understand how crime is always a site of struggle over meaning. Furthermore, by underscoring the nimble rhetorical character of criminality, we can learn lessons that may inform efforts to challenge our nation’s failed policies of mass incarceration.

Reviews

This book significantly builds on contemporary understandings of gangsta rap and challenges mainstream assumptions about the value of this music. Thus [The Mark of Criminality] aims not to tell us what our next steps should be in enacting the change this music seems to argue for, but instead encourages us to go forth with an increased understanding of a previously misunderstood rhetorical form. In doing so, McCann makes an important contribution to the study of hip-hop music within the field of rhetoric and paves the way for future scholars to build upon this work.'
—Rhetoric Review

'The rhetoric of gangsta rap that arose from hip-hop and rage at racism and harsh law and order policies is made meaningful by the author. McCann explicates this subgenre’s rhetoric, history during the 1980s and 1990s, deviations from traditions, and complexities of situations and attainments: words, ideas, fame, wealth, violence, death. In pointing out the lessons gangsta rap holds for both public policy making and rhetoric itself, McCann carefully presents evidence from the rappers, the NWA group to Tupac Shakur, the albums Straight Outta Compton and All Eyes on Me, the events, and global and inner-city issues. The power of rap rhetoric as to what it conveys and the actions it influences is made starkly clear. McCann observes that these black male voices up against white male police tactics invite a closer look. In a climate of abiding racism, sexism, and inequitable and excessive incarceration, as well as the continuing fall-out from the mark of criminality rhetoric and gangsta rap, this text is timely. Recommended.'
—CHOICE

The Mark of Criminality offers readers, especially ones not familiar with the conjuncture of gangsta rap and the militarization of policing tactics targeting black and brown bodies, a necessary history and some very intriguing cultural moments related to the era under scrutiny.’
—Eric King Watts, author of Hearing the Hurt: Rhetoric, Aesthetics, and Politics of the New Negro Movement

Author

Bryan J. McCann is an assistant professor of rhetoric and cultural studies in the Department of Communication Studies at Louisiana State University. He has written for Rhetoric Society Quarterly and Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies. In addition to appearing on local newscasts and the national program Democracy Now!, McCann also presented aTEDxLSU talk in 2014 on race and criminal justice.

List of Figures

Preface: The White Boy Listens to Gangsta Rap

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Rhetoric, Race, and Gangsta Rap in the War-on-Crime Era

Chapter 1. The Horrors and Heroics of Crime; or, Mapping the Mark of Criminality

Chapter 2. Parody, Space, and Violence in NWA’s Straight Outta Compton

Chapter 3. Leisure, Style, and Terror in the G-Funk Era

Chapter 4. The Politics, Commerce, and Rage of “Thug Life”

Chapter Conclusion: A Politics of Criminality?

Notes

Bibliography

Index