Radical America - Vol 18 No 6 - 1984 - November December

8/8/2019 Radical America - Vol 18 No 6 - 1984 - November December

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Editors: Margaret Cerullo, John Demeter, Marla Erlien, Phyllis Ewen, Elizabeth Francis, Ted Ger-

man, Ann Holder, Joe Interrante, Donna Penn, Ken Schlosser, Gail Sullivan, Deb Whippen, and

Ann Withorn. ntern: Virginia Bullock

Staff: John Demeter

Associate ditors: Peter Biskind, Carl Boggs, Frank Brodhead, Paul Buhle, Jorge C Corralejo,

Margery Davies, Ellen DuBois, Barbara hrenreich, John Ehrenreich, Dan Georgakas, Martin

Glaberman, Linda Gordon, Jim Green, Allen Hunter, Mike Kazin, Ken Lawrence, Staughton Lynd,

Betty Mandel, Mark Naion, Jim O'Brien, Brian Peterson, Sheila Rowbotham, James Stark, Ann-

marie roger, Martha Vicinus, Stan Weir, David Widgery, and Renner Wunderlich

COVER: Viv Albertne oj the Slts

S.S Decontrol

Breakng at the Roxy

Vo 8, No.6 November-December 1984

Radica meca welcomes unsocied manuscripts, but can etn them only f sufcen postage is ncluded Writers

aso send abstracts or inqires to Manscript Coodinator, c/o Radca America

RACA ACA S 73 i pbsh vete a (bion t for a snge e Mcho Jne) betentive Edction Poject Inc t 3 Unon Sqare omervle MA 0213 (7) 2855.Coprgt badca Amerca

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Second css ose d t Boston Mass nd addtona ost ofces.

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Ameca History and Life Sociologcal Abstcts, and Women's Studies Abstracs.

RDIL MERCA s erof te tetve s Syndte


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INTDUTN

Two year ago Radica A rica receive theollowig letter to the eitor. Becaue it et imotio the proce which ha le to thi pecialiue o youth a popular culture, we prit ithere

Dear Editors am a tude at Pudue Uiveity ad oud a

copy o you magaze i he torage aea o thelibay. oud it vey teretg. Uoruaely thecopy wa ove a year old I'm hopig you have'quit publhig.

Oe oe o criticim to the ue hat awyoueem to dwell o much o he youth o he ixtie.Graed it wa a time o great awakeig, but we areot livig he ixte ay loge ad hee a ewyouh moveme geeaig It ceter aoud a kido muc called hadcore puk. write thi a a ex-

preo o my ow belie d i ot o be take a ageeralizato o all puk. Bu a ee it h moveme i more evolutioary ad adcal ha a lot ou doe i he ixie o (ad I hae togeealize puk are a let wg ad may, likemyel, are aachit, believig that all govemeae evl. There ae already everal aarchiic collecive wold wde, cludg the US . Th movemet igrowig rapidly amog he youh o the world,epecially Euopea coue lke lad, Ialyad eve trace i Rua Alo lage puk cee"a they are called have appeared the la ew yea Bazil Lebao, sael, Souh Aca, ad ialmot v ciy i the US. The cee ae maagedby puk, meag the kd pu o the how (allage, o copoate lug i old waehoue, clubhoue, o aywhee ele. Bad make o moey,

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pomoe make o moey, how ae expeve,ad uually fve or ix bad play. Poltcally, em mo bad are lef wg o aachc ad hemuic itel i very iee with all the eergy a badca mue gog io every og. The lyrc are whacout. The lyic o a og by he Reeco ae, orexample

Why do we lve i eaVicim o a uclear aget' clea o metha we could live moe peaceully ourelveWth aachyAd buld a wold hat' tuly eeThe choce i ouThe ime heeReclaim our lve, detoy our eaight etablihmet, ight eablhme

Bad are geerally aidug, goveme,relgio, apathy ad becaue we ae uch a miorty,(maybe 0,000 wold wide, eveyoe eem to koweveyoe ele. There i a bod ha ie everyoetogethe becaue we ae o diee. There areliterally huded o aze tha people pu ou ex-preig thei ow vew ad tellg the wold what'goig o. Pleae do' oge that a whole ewgeeao hee ightg or what we believe.

Carl Haynes, IIIW Laayette, IN

Subeuet cotact with the eitor o Maiu Rock and Ro a puk azie iteretei the lik bewee youth culture a politic,raie imilar iue


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Why was there such a istace betwee thevisible eft icluig femiism a may ofthose especially youg people who ietifiewith the rebellious spirit of uk music a the

subculture that surrous it While RockAgaist Racism promote cocerts a culturalevets with eplicit political goals the sub-culture that grew up amog urba black aatio youth with Hip Hop graffitiart abreakacig was rarely o the et ageaYouth ha bee iscare as a politicalcategory as a force for trasformatio Whilemay of us from the New eft poere whywe hat reprouce ourselves as a politicalgeeratio youger eitors a our reaers

pushe us to rethik our otios of politicsWe realize that ot sice 6 ha Radica

Arica focusse o youth or youth culture ithe S At that time the eitors soght t eplai the sources a elaborate the politicalmeaig of the youth rebellio of which theywere part

Toay the public recogitio of youth athe attempts to egage them politically havecome from the Right eve if the appeal is clear

ly to a particular segmet of youth The factthat a growig umber of those uer 25 ietify with the Republica Party a i 84vote for Reaga shape our ow view ofyouth politics as basically coformist that isatiyouth" The meia reiforce this viewwith images of clea white youth liig upbehi Reaga I cotrast Black a atioyouth

have bee cast as threateiguem-

ploye violet or pregat For the most partpeoples awareess of the subcultures which op-

pose these omiat images is through theirepictio i mass culturei high fashio or ifilms like Suburbia Bat Strt Brakin orDcin of Wst Civiization Yet the surfaces more tha the cotet emerge: the sub-cultures become styles " their ier workigssupport systems lifebloo remai hie

I the face of the images of Reaga youth(the iroic ame of a puk ba we werealerte to the sigifcace of youth subcultures

by letters like Carl Hayes Fazies likeMaiu Rock and Ro (MRR) epose us tothe itesity a vibrace of a elaborate iter-atioal etwork of youth Jeff Golthorpe

iterviewer of the MRR eitors wrote to us lastyear:

I a era whe righi culura poliicprevail, i migh eem of coequece i f a i-

eaioa youh ubcuue proued up iwhich cahig criicim of he yem" wahe orm migh eem oabe ha repecedmuicia i ha ubcuure raied agaiapahy, US war preparaio ad acim A aime whe majo lef pee ae ofe eeeigo he brik of fiacia ui, i woud be ur-piig o fid ha uch a ubcuure i he UScoud paw over a hudred ga oopublicaio, may produced by eeage Imigh alo eem of impor if hee wa a aioa magazie, ru by avowed ociali adaarchi, wih a paid circuaio of ,,iked o a ydicaed adio how heard over2 or o aio, boh of which rived o ecourage a ciical, hikig aiude i he ubculure ad coopeaio amog muicia, i-ead of he ehic of he akepace. I wouldappea o be pheomea fo a molyodergeeaio of miia o ake a eiou i-ere i"

Golthorpe cofrote us with the subculture s critiue of the 60s legacy The yougergeeratio faces a future that appears bleak

uchage by the 60s rebellio The utopiaimpulses of the previous couterculture apolitical activism fi o place i this high techworl where techological iovatios reflectthe goal of omiatio o the part of the elites:scietific political a military Artificial itelligece a robots service a militarizeculture These evelopmets measure a istacebetwee the forms of power cofrote by the60s geeratio a the youth of toay. The uaturaless of S society is reflecte i puk

images societys barbarism capture i puksymbols I playig with the uersie of theomiat culture the youth rebellio eists oa agerous ege Whether the ager becomeslike to a iea of social trasformatioepes i part o how progressive politicstake shape: our receptivess to epressigalieatioour willigess to take up a critiueof the culture

The iterview with Maiu Rock and Ro

was provocative geeratig the iscussios ofthe let a youth subcultures raise above Italso cotribute to breakig our perceptio ofyouth as solely allie to coservative politics


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yet may uetio remai We woereabout the limit of iroy a whether the ucce of puk paroy reult i a iability toefie a cofrot their ow take i thefuture Dicuio of the cla a cultural

origi of puk lacke a elfcocioueabout the eeper meaig of thoe iue forthe ubculture itelf Fuio betwee harcorea other muical tyle with all thepoibilitie that raie receive oly a metioikewie the icuio of gay i the pukcee toppe hort with a ackowlegemetof homophobia Thi eeme to cotrat harp-ly with puk preetatio the epre eire toubvert covetio but perhap highlight theambiguity of epoig cultural orm byiplayig their logical ece

While we were captivate by the eergy ofMRR a other fa a photozie we weretruck by the overwhelmig projectio of mea male image The iterview faile toawer our uetio about the image a thereality of wome i puk: how wome proectthemelve ito a cee o preomiatly malewhether the uet io of tyle take o ifferetmeaig for them how wome efie their

relatiohip to the violece or peuovioleceof the cee While we were iappoite withome apect of the iterview a lively icuio about thee iue oe cotiue i thepage of MRR I fact the compellig

character of the ubculture i well ocumetei the fazie If we igore thee evelopmetwe mi a opportuity to lear how youthorgaize themelve agait prevailig ormwe mi their iight ito the meaig ofgeeratio ito the motivatig factor foryouth i eeig themelve a political agetThi iue i a begiig effort to make moreviible ome of the theme the curret youthubculture are cocere with: the politic oftyle a image the itegratio of art itoeveryay life the relatiohip betwee thecultural artit a the cultural auiece atheir ow iteral ebate o eim aracim

Reebee Garofalo i hi article Hip Hop"focue o S black a atio urba ubculture of the 70 a 80 which iclue rapmuic graffiti art a breakacig ikeMaimum Rock and Ro the Hip Hop ub-culture how a relatiohip betwee muc

fahio tyle a a ee o f alieatio which iboth cultural a political Hip Hop rie outof both a oppreive urba ettig a a eeof black a ietity politic

Hip Hop begiig like thoe of the pukubculture were locally orgaize a ecetralize Thi youthefie rebellio tookhape i creative epreio for eample DJrather tha becomig paive coveyor of topow pop muic are active creator of rap acratch appropriatig a reeergizig

maitream muic Youg graffiti writerthrough their bol ue of pray pait a theirfocu o ubway trai a builig a publiccavae reveal creativity a cultural epreio i what wa iitially ee outie the ub-culture a vaalim

I cotrat to America puk which rejectcovetioal taar a prouce aaethetic which reflect the ugly uerpiigof the clea a aitary veeer of Americauburbia Hip Hop evelop a a attempt totraform the barre bureout lacape ofier city area like the South ro Pukemerge from a white primarily milecla


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eperence and has ts ass n the negaton andrejecton of that eperence Hp Hop s a set ofart forms whch oth descre and go eyondthe eperence of uran ack and Latnoyouth We grafft reveas aenaton and

reeon ts artstry speaks n a postve wayprovdng an aternatve cutura dentty to ecamed y otherwse margna youth

Ddon to Subway A

More so than punk whch actvey rejectscommercaaton Hp Hop has een sujectto the assaut of manstream asorpton Aspresented on records fms or teevson HpHop often oses the hard edge of aenatonwhch produced t The harsh reate of the ur-an fe ecome urred y a romance wth styeand success Ths process aso shatters the soa

ton whch fostered ts eary deveopmentarofoo ponts out that some Hp Hop artstshave successfuy een ae to negotate the ntegraton of ther work nto mass cuture andmajor record aes and that the natona fmattenton dd revtae reakdancngHowever he aso ponts out that as n the caseo graft wrters the change of audence fromnsde to outsde the sucuture tsef from suway cars to studos from ega to ega r

revocay reaks down the potca form andmessage of the artIt s mportant to note that whe young

women were actve from eary on wthn theHp Hop rap and reakdancng movement

and n fact were promnent characters n fmssuch as Wd Stye " the compettve nature ofreak dancng crews and r ap teams eventuayshut young women out

Stuart Cosgroves artce on the Zoot Sut

rots n the S n the ate 30s and 40s remnds usthat Hp Hop had precursors As wth Hp-Hop young men who donned the oot sut andther femae counterparts n short skrts andtghtwasted jackets defned ther dentty asack and Latno youth n tenson wth thedomnant cuture The famoyant and etravagant fashons adopted y the gangs weredefant vsua decaratons of raca dfferenceand nonconformty to natona patrotc

demands for austerty and sefsacrfce Wear-ng the oot sut represented the open refusa ofack and Latno youth to partcpate n the wareffort Ths refusa erupted nto voent rotswhen Zoot Sut gangs cashed wth patrotcracst whte servcemen

Stye and fashon as epressons of areeous dentty or as erotc communcatonhave een a mae prerogatve Women/grshave een constraned y ther status n thecuture as oject to e ooked at and y reathreats of assaut rape and harassment thats y men assumng ther rght to defne and nvade the femae ody The freedom of men topay wth mage and the constrants on womenfnd common ground: the power of men n thecuture

Shery arratt and Sue Steward two Engshwrters epore these ssues n What Sha IWear?" The many women muscans they n-tervewed (across genres race and age present

the tenson etween sefdenton and thedemands of the commerca musc market Atthe ntersecton of sucutures and the domnant cuture they confront the mts onwomens aty and mens contnued power todefne the meanng of mages The womenseraton movement dsrupted ths powerWomen refused to project mages peasng tomen ut n ther reeon femnsts tended todeny meanng to stye and mage ecept as

repressve forms of masquerade Womens em-race of the natura" too often meant thedena of the ody the cedng of fashon mage and erotc communcaton to men

We prnt matera from the oca ock


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UBB NOW TO

EN IN OFIC WORK

OR PLAC ORGANZIN

._THCONTROL' UGENICS , Il

-."',..,

RICA AMRCA is a idepedet socialist-femiist joural thath published cotiuously sice 197 Articles feature the history ad curret developmets i the workig class, the role of wome ad ThirdWorld people wth reports o shop oor ad commuity orgaizig thehistory ad politics of radicalism ad femiism, ad commetary adaalysis of curret socialist theory, pular culture, ad social movemets.

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Seleted fom the pages of RuA oe of he few New Lubiti orgatg t 19605 suiv to th eghts, s atls ara ra combato of labo d socastoy wtte by egage scholas fo a aee as well as opoaydes of labor mo ls adworlac stggles w by wokertlecals actst hstos. ongeoe aseam scholas of Amecnhsoy he wes R Amawee osg o he wok expeeces as fr t shopoor d n t lsses of wom d blacks

Radical America - Vol 18 No 6 - 1984 - November December

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