The Influence of Chief Keef
an analogical essay by vvsmonarchy
Keith Farrell Cozart, commonly known as “Chief Keef”, is a well-established rapper from Chicago, Illinois. From a young age, Cozart was thrust into the world of fame and stardom, a vast difference from his impoverished community. Under many aliases, the rapper rose to mainstream success from the age of fifteen with tracks such as, “Love Sosa” and “I Don’t Like”, with the latter earning him a cosign as well as a remix from Kanye West (who was a lot more respectable in 2012). In the early 2010s, Chief Keef was inescapable between making radio appearances or his hit tracks playing at parties. This was only further propelled by social media, and he became a youth icon and designated trendsetter. Because of this, his fans began to incorporate Keef’s style into their own, and a new generation of pop culture was born.
The rapper has been recently dubbed as the “father of drill”, a bass-heavy genre popularized in urban cities, but he was also the main benefactor of the mumble-rap and subsequent Soundcloud-rap genres. Popular rappers such as Lil Uzi Vert and Lil Pump were heavily influenced by his mumble style and carried his name into a new wave. However, at the peak of his popularity, Chief Keef gained global support - reaching audiences that were on the opposite spectrum of his social class, which led to photos of wealthy white teenagers personifying the rapper surfacing the internet. At the time, people laughed at these photos and their ironic nature, but in retrospect, these photos represent a pattern of cultural appropriation that has been detrimental to the African-American community.
Black people built America. This is a bold but true statement; without the “help” of slave labor, this country would not have become the economic powerhouse it is today. Slavery was America’s first “big business”; the process was so deeply enrooted in American economics at the time that consumers from the North were indirectly contributing towards it. In the darkness of slavery, African Americans were brutally abused and mistreated, forced to pick cotton and construct buildings, literally building the country. This birthed a pattern that would continue into modern American culture.
In recent years, black culture has been popularized by various entertainment outlets - thus leading to beneficial and harmful reactions. People began to learn about the struggles African Americans faced even after slavery and segregation and their effects on the community today. However, others were negligent to these dispositions and only highlighted aspects of the black culture they wanted to perpetuate. This is why these photos exist, not to pay homage or out of respect, but due to envy. Wealthy kids will rap along and dress like rappers and gangsters- but be negligent to understanding the heritage of that community, simply using the music and style.
Due to social media, people around the globe are presented with a platform to connect, allowing people from completely different cultures to communicate from the comfort of their homes. Because of this, AAVE, or African-American Vernacular English has grown in popularity and is constantly misused by non-African-Americans. While the dialect is not exclusive to black people, it contains a deep history and meaning, and its newfound community takes away from this. As June Jordan states in Nobody Mean More to Me Than You/And The Future Life of Willie Jordan, "There are three qualities of Black English that intensify to a distinctive Black value system that we became excited about and self-consciously tried to maintain." She elaborates on how black culture constantly faces the danger of assimilation, and the language of this culture acts to stand out - which is exactly what Chief Keef did.
The impact the cultural appropriation of Chief Keef and Chicago gang culture had on American pop culture serves as one example of the plagiarization of black people in the entertainment industry. Although this pattern dates back to slavery, it is an exceedingly eminent issue today. Aside from AAVE, many aspects of black culture are stolen such as food, clothing, and even hairstyles.
Hair is a topic of great importance within the black community, as it is one of the factors that distinguishes African-Americans from other races. Unfortunately, this gave room for racist connotations about black hair, leading many to hate their hair and go to extreme levels to change it, leaving behind an internalized racism in the community. Because of this, racially motivated conceptions about black hairstyles appear everywhere, in the professional environment and at home. The negative effects of this are often overlooked: If one is labeled a "gangster" or "hoodlum" because of their appearance and not the content of their character, they will feel more comfortable and start to align with that status. However, with the rise of Chief Keef, gang life has been romanticized in recent years and his fans want to emulate this lifestyle. This has put many of the previously black, "ghetto", hairstyles on the main stage, resulting in celebrities such as Kim Kardashian appropriating them, thus making them desirable. After facing backlash, many white patrons claim that it's just hair, which is false. It is not just hair in the workplace, where black people are discriminated against for their natural hair. It was not just hair when black people were ridiculed for their afros, cornrows, box braids, and dreadlocs - but when a white person employs these styles, it is just hair.
Chief Keef Sosa directly influenced a generation of black music, and indirectly sparked a conversation about the modern appropriation of black culture. These pictures represent years of oppression and exposed a pattern of white piracy and the original blueprint: African-American culture. Nonetheless, this is a problem with no real solution. It is impossible to change millions of opinions overnight so that this dynamic will continue. This pattern is normalized to the point where black creatives almost expect their work to be stolen by their lighter-skinned counterparts. This is why figures such as Chief Keef are so important, they are given the platform to incorporate change, but many get caught up in their fame and success. However, due to the sudden uprising of social justice brought on by recently senseless racial crimes, this issue is finally being addressed and beginning to change.
SOURCES
Lockhart, P.R. “How Slavery Became America's First Big Business.” Vox, Vox, 16 Aug. 2019, https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/8/16/20806069/slavery-economy-capitalism-violence-cotton-edward-baptist.
Luu, Chi. “Black English Matters - JSTOR DAILY.” Black English Matters, JSTOR, 12 Feb. 2020, https://daily.jstor.org/black-english-matters/.
Skinner, Morgan. “Opinion: Social Media Makes Appropriation of Black Creatives Easier than Ever.” Chaos+Comrades, 13 Apr. 2021, https://chaosandcomrades.com/stories/social-media-appropriation-black-creatives/.
Nobody Mean More to Me than You and the Future Life of Willie Jordan
-June Jordan
