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Aria S. Halliday publishes important books on Black women & girls

By JORDANNAH ELIZABETH

Special to the AmNews

The interest and conversation surrounding the behavior, socioeconomic patterns and consumer participation of Black women and girls is long overdue. Since the 1960s, Black women have had an undeniable hand in shaping post-modern American popular culture. From childhood to womanhood, Black women have innovated distinct styles of hair and clothing, made musicians like The Jackson Five, Prince and Beyoncé household names, and continue to shape our culture as consumers, heads of households and leaders in the Civil Rights Movement and Black Lives Matter.

Assistant Professor in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies and African American and Africana Studies at the University of Kentucky, Aria S. Halliday Ph.D., has directed her astute intellect on examining and documenting the importance of Black women’s presence and contributions in American culture.

Her books “Buy Black: How Black Women Transformed U.S. Pop Culture” published by University of Illinois Press in April 2022 and “The Black Girlhood Studies Collection” published by Canadian Scholars in 2019, are invaluable explorations of the impacts, theory and existential experiences of Black women and girls.

The Black Girlhood Studies Collection “brings together emerging and established scholars from North America to discuss what Black girlhood means historically and in the 21st century, and how concepts of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class, religion, and nationality inform or affect identities of Black girls beyond school or urban settings.” Halliday does an amazing job of creating a thoughtful and well-researched literary environment that considers Black girls in a world that ignores the deep crevices of their lives and perspectives.

Buy Black “reveals what attitudes inform a contemporary Black sensibility based in representation and consumerism. It also traces the parameters of Black symbolic power, mapping the sites where intraracial ideals of blackness, womanhood, beauty, play, and sexuality meet and mix in consumer and popular culture.”

“There’s still so much that is not documented about Black girls’ and women’s experiences. The research is interesting because it allows me to talk to some of the most interesting people and make sense of US and Caribbean societies through their eyes,” says Halliday in a recent interview the online site Music Journalism Insider.

Halliday’s courageous and informative concentrations will help shape a new understanding of underrepresented Black women and girls. She has much to offer as a powerful thinker and scholar.

She tells MJI, “Currently, I’m really enjoying exploring research on nostalgia in Black communities, Black girls’ representation in film, and Black women’s cultural production. I’m working on several projects, one that includes listening to a lot of Millie Jackson and examining her life and career in conjunction with more contemporary ‘raunchy’ artists.”

Avid readers and those interested in African American and gender studies will enjoy her books and should anticipate the continuation of her research well into the future.

A look at hip hop books of 2022

By JORDANNAH ELIZABETH

Special to the AmNews

Since the 1990s, the emergence of hip hop non-fiction and historical books has been steadily growing. In 1994, Tricia Rose became one of the earliest hip hop documentarians in the book market with her seminal book “Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America.” Since then, the exploration of hip hop music, culture and biographies and odes to iconic artists like Tupac Shakur, has expanded into a viable topic in the major book market.

There is, of course, always work to do in exposing American and world culture to the influential contributions of Black hip hop artists, but 2022 is revealing an effort from the publishing world to push this incredible narrative and culture forward.

A few notable hip hop books, all biographies and memoirs, were published in the first half of 2022, and they are all continuing to lay the groundwork for an explosion in hip hop literary interest.

“It Was All a Dream: Biggie and the World That Made Him” by journalist Justin Tinsley was released in conjunction with the year rapper Biggie Smalls would have celebrated his 50th birthday. The book includes several interviews with the people who knew Biggie best: his neighbors, friends, DJs and musical colleagues.

The book takes an in-depth look at the rapper’s life beyond what was only reported in the news and media. Take a deep dive to learn about this deeply talented musician who left the world way too soon.

“DJ Screw: A Life in Slow Revolution” comes as a follow-up to Lance Scott Walker’s “Houston Rap Tapes”, a photo book about Houston’s hip hop culture. Walker does scrupulous research in the form of a broad span

of interviews with nearly everyone who knew the seminal Houston DJ, DJ Screw. Known for his unforgettable style “chopped and screwed” where he collaborated with local rappers who rhymed over his beats, then proceeded to slow the songs he created down dramatically. His music created a craze in Houston in the 1990s and has put him on the map as one of the most unique DJs in hip hop history.

Award-winning journalist and hip hop music business expert, Dan Charnas teaches a course at New York University entitled “Topics In Recorded Music: J-Dilla” a definitive look at the life and music of the late Detroit born hip hop production genius, J Dilla. “Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm” journeys from Dilla’s childhood to his untimely death of a rare blood disease. He is known to be one of the most revered hip hop producers of all time, unequivocally defining the sound of the hip hop soul area in the 1990s and 2000s.

Canadian rapper, Cadence Weapon, also known as Rollie Pemberton, published a tell-all memoir about his personal experience in the music industry as a hip hop critic and well-known rapper in Canada. “Bedroom Rapper: Cadence Weapon on Hip-Hop, Resistance, and Surviving the Music Industry” gives an intimate portrait of the life and times of the independent rapper and writer. “I want there to be something for every reader to take away from the book. I want it to be something that could be useful, whether it’s a guidebook for hip hop or underground rap or Canadian music. But ultimately, the reason why I wrote the book was I realized that it was a story that had never really been told,” he told Flaunt in July 2022.