Table Of ContentTranscultural Voices
ENCOUNTERS
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ENCOUNTERS: 22
Transcultural Voices
Narrating Hip Hop Culture
in Complex Delhi
Jaspal Naveel Singh
MULTILINGUAL MATTERS
Bristol • Blue Ridge Summit
DOI https://doi.org/10.21832/SINGH8137
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
Names: Singh, Jaspal Naveel, author.
Title: Transcultural Voices: Narrating Hip Hop Culture in Complex Delhi/ Jaspal
Naveel Singh.
Description: Bristol, UK; Blue Ridge Summit, PA: Multilingual Matters, 2022. |
Series: Encounters: 22 | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary:
“This book presents the narratives and voices of young, mostly male practitioners
of hip hop culture in Delhi, India. Through a combination of linguistic
ethnography, sociolinguistics and discourse studies, the book addresses issues
including gender and sexuality, identity construction and global culture”—
Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2021026408 (print) | LCCN 2021026409
(ebook) | ISBN 9781800413818 (paperback) | ISBN 9781788928137 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781788928144 (pdf) | ISBN 9781788928151 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Hip-hop dance--Social aspects--India--Delhi. | Break dancers—
India—Delhi. | Rap musicians—India—Delhi. | Rap (Music)—India—Delhi—
History and criticism. | Anthropological linguistics—India—Delhi.
Classification: LCC GV1796.H57 S56 2021 (print) | LCC GV1796.H57 (ebook) |
DDC 793.3/195456—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021026408
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021026409
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue entry for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN-13: 978-1-78892-813-7 (hbk)
ISBN-13: 978-1-80041-381-8 (pbk)
Multilingual Matters
UK: St Nicholas House, 31-34 High Street, Bristol BS1 2AW, UK.
USA: NBN, Blue Ridge Summit, PA, USA.
Website: www .multilingual -matters .com
Twitter: Multi_Ling_Mat
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Blog: www .cha nnel view publ ications .wordpress .com
Copyright © 2022 Jaspal Naveel Singh.
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form or by any
means without permission in writing from the publisher.
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that are natural, renewable and recyclable products, made from wood grown in
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Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India.
Contents
Figures and Table vii
Transcription Conventions ix
Acknowledgements x
Glossary of Terms xii
Prologue: Gender Everywhere xv
1 Complex Questions: Normalising Voice in Global Narratives 1
2 Studying Transcultural Voices 26
3 Doing Linguistic Ethnography in Delhi’s Hip Hop Scene 60
4 Othering Voices: Prosodic Normalising of the Authentic
Cosmopolitan Self 90
5 Translingual Voices: Remixed Language Ideologies 130
6 Synchronising Voices: Travelling the Delhi to Bronx Wormhole 159
7 Embodying Voices: Breakin Cyphers and the B-Boy Stance 186
8 Overstandin Voices: Methodologies for Hip Hop 228
9 Conclusion 253
Epilogue: Gender, Again 265
Notes 271
References 279
Index 304
v
Für Jonathan
An unsere Freundschaft
Figures and Table
Figures
Figure 1.1 Prabh Deep, ‘Breaking’ and ‘Grafitti’ (Photos by
author, Delhi, 2013) 2
Figure 3.1 Fieldworkers’ recording equipment: a field diary,
a pen and a digital recorder (Photo by author,
Cardiff, 2015) 65
Figure 3.2 The makeshift home studio for recording music
(Photo by author, Delhi, 2013) 66
Figure 3.3 Manmeet Kaur playing the Akai MPC2000XL
sampler (Photo by author, Mumbai, 2013) 74
Figure 3.4 Jaspal setting up his recording equipment in MC
Freezak’s home, Khirki Village (Screenshot, video
by MC Akshay Tashan, Delhi, 2013) 75
Figure 3.5 MC Akshay Tashan recording raps and MC
Freezak doing second vocals, Khirki Village
(Screenshot, video by author, Delhi, 2013) 75
Figure 5.1 (cid:80)(cid:107)(cid:68) (cid:111)graffiti piece, Devanagari script, Okhla
Industrial Estate (Photo by author, Delhi, 2013) 146
Figure 5.2 Daku graffiti piece, Roman script, and (cid:80)(cid:107)(cid:68) (cid:111)tag,
Devanagari script, Khan Market (Photo by author,
Delhi, 2013) 147
Figure 7.1 B-boy Gunjan (standing) and b-boy Rishi (posing
in a freeze) practising on the 14th-century Satpula
Dam ruin monument, Khirki Village (Photo by
author, Delhi 2013) 192
Figure 7.2 Sketches from author’s field diary (pp. 76–77) 200
Figure 7.3 The figurative syntax of breakin, screenshot
tracings, Chakreis Jam (Video by author,
Delhi 2013) 205
vii
viii Figures and Table
Figure 7.4 Freeze 208
Figure 7.5 Smoking gesture 208
Figure 7.6 Bhangra-style beckoning 209
Figure 7.7 Marking negative accountability 210
Figure 7.8 Marking positive accountability 211
Figure 7.9 Shadow-boxing toprock 212
Figure 7.10 Mirroring shadow-boxing 213
Figure 7.11 Flying kung-fu kick 213
Figure 7.12 Insinuated uppercut 215
Figure 7.13 Watching the head fly through the air 216
Figure 7.14 Catching ‘flying head’ from up in the air 216
Figure 7.15 Ironic applause as marking of negative accountability 218
Figure 7.16 Go-go dancer and crybaby 218
Figure 7.17 Entering with a powerful flare 219
Figure 7.18 A phallic finish-him move 220
Figure 7.19 Indians cheer in excitement 221
Figure 7.20 Prabh Deep and Sun-J posing in the b-boy stance
for a music video shoot with Dattatreyan and a
mutual friend (Photo by author, Delhi 2013) 224
Table
Table 3.1 Indexing roles in the ethnographic encounter 89
Transcription Conventions
Adapted from GAT2 (Selting et al., 2011)
Sequential and segmental structure
. utterance boundary/tone unit boundary
“…” constructed dialogue
CAPITALS prominent syllable
: vowel lengthening
- unfinished syllable/utterance
((style)) description of style of speech
☺ smile voice
((text)) transcriber’s comments
[ ] overlapping and simultaneous talk
[ ]
= latching
@ laughing syllable
(.) micro-pause (0-0.5 sec.)
(1.3) measured pause
(xxx) unintelligible syllable
underlined utterance in Hindi
Gl. gloss (free translations)
For the transcription of beatboxin (Chapter 5), I use the symbols of the
International Phonetics Association (revised to 2005)
Tonal movements
↗ rising
→ level
↘ falling
↗↘ rise-fall
↘ ↗ fall-rise
ix
Acknowledgements
I might be listed as author of this book, however, this authorship is far
from being my ‘own’. There is no one I can thank more than the hip hop
heads who have actually written this book. I might type these letters into
my computer but these young men and women own these letters. I am
grateful that they trust me to represent them in this book and I invite
them to critique my writing and reclaim their voices at any point.
I am indebted to my PhD supervisor and intellectual mentor
Dr Frances Rock for her tireless and proactive support of this project.
I hope this writing can do some justice to what she has inspired me to do.
I am also thankful to my second supervisor Dr Mercedes Durham and
my previous supervisor Professor Srikant Sarangi for their guidance and
ongoing encouragement. All three scholars have pushed me to do things
I never thought I would be able to do and I thank them very much for
that.
I thank the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) for
generously funding my research under Award Number 1071087.
I thank Virpi Ylänne and Kira Hall for carefully reading a previous
version of this book and for providing me with critical comments and
encouraging me to continue working on this topic.
I also thank two anonymous reviewers for their incredibly rich and
constructive critique on an earlier version of this book. I thank the editors
of the Encounters book series and the entire team at Multilingual Matters
for their amazing support during the publication process.
I thank Nicky Runge for her tireless work on helping me with
the formatting and the references and discussing with me some of the
contents of my argument.
Gabriel Dattatreyan, my good friend and co-incidental fieldwork
collaborator, who you will meet on the pages of this book, has been
x
