essay so far....

'LL Cool J comes out with one leg of his pants rolled up, the next day everyone is doing the same thing'
How do hip hop music videos featuring contemporary rap stars such as Eminem and Lil Wayne construct ideologies of masculinity and why does this negatively influence teenagers?

Are artist represented in a certain way that it manipulates teenagers to act in a certain way? This essay research is going to find out how hip hop has changed during the years and whether it has had a big impact on teenagers. The hip hop genre has often been criticised for its unhip stereotyped of young particularly black males: 'there are a lot of people who are doing something positive...But too often, the ones that get the most recognition are those emphasizing the negative.' There are many more socially responsible hip hop artists such as Kanye West; and come of those demonised such as Eminem (in his track "not afraid" for example) or Tupac (in ‘ghetto gospel’ and others) promote uplifting values; however, the mainstream media often seems only influenced in perpetuating old-fashioned myths.

The main text that this essay will be looking at are, Eminem's 'love the way lie' and 'no love' and also will be looking at Lil Wayne 'drop the world'. The reasons that these texts have been chosen are because they show the typical codes and conventions of hip hop and also because Eminem and Lil Wayne have made it very big in the hip hop world and are contemporary and known worldwide.
Eminem is an American actor, record producer and rapper. Eminem gained popularity with his album 'The Slim Shady LP' which he won a Grammy award for the best rap album. He released an album 'recovery' (2010) which was very different to Eminem's style and even then the album sold 741,000 in its first week. Lil Wayne is also an American rapper. Lil Wayne signed with cash 'money records' as the youngest member on the label. In 1999 he released a platinum album which sold over one million in the U.S alone. His most successful album was 'the carter III' released in 2008 which sold over one million in its first week.

Men are always seen to be more dominant then women. 'Men nurture their society by shedding their blood, their sweat, and their semen, by bringing home food for both child and mother, by producing children, and by dying if necessary in faraway places to provide a safe haven for their people. This, too, is nurturing in the sense of endowing or increasing.' In the past society has given more power to men although this has now changed and there is more gender equality. There are many women doing jobs that they were not allowed. There are also a lot of female rap artist such as Missy Elliot, Lady Sovereign and the more contemporary which is Nicki Minaj, and this shows that the values in the society have changed giving more rights to women.

Teenagers that listen to rap are behaving in a destructive way research shows. 'Some lyrics can be quite provocative and insensitive and they hear these lyrics and want to do exactly what it's saying...For example: If they hear music about having sex...They want to go out and do it.’ ‘Lyrically, some of hip-hop's most popular songs and musicians have negatively influenced violence, drugs, alcohol, sex, disrespect for authority, and disrespect for woman. For many young children and teenagers, this type of music can create an environment that can become detrimental to their lives and education.’ Rap music can persuade teenagers to act in a degrading manner and so it control the way youths think. Rap music gives youth’s knowledge on social life issues although it’s not very clear which is why teenagers are acting in a shocking behaviour which is the issue of moral panics. This raises the issue that if teenagers can act in a downbeat way by listening to rap then they can also act in an optimistic way, but do teenagers choose to act in an unconstructive way or are they pressurised?