Gender, race, class and the problem of meaning: Black female rappers as a site for resistance

The issue of oppression becomes all the more complicated when it is realized that the language used by the dominant culture and, to a certain extent, those who are subordinate to that culture, is not only race- and class-biased but phallogocentric as well. It is primarily through language that social customs, beliefs and practices are normalized and viewed as "common sense" by the people engaging in them. Since it plays an integral role in constructing the "reality" for any given group of individuals, language is anything but a benign method of communication among human beings. Certain groups, however, often manage to break with the dominant discourses and rewrite the language. From within the hip-hop subculture, black female rap artists emerge as a challenge to misogyny and racial bigotry by resisting the hegemonic modes which construct and control the human subject.