Many Voices | Reclaiming the Vernacular | Playing | Mixing It Up
Many Voices | Reclaiming the Vernacular | Playing | Mixing It Up
The Language of Rap Italiano
Reclaiming the Vernacular
Italian rappers reclamation of the vernacular is a way to represent themselves and their reality in disregard of dialects' social stigma. As Vulcano of the Sicilian group I Nuovi Briganti (The New Brigands) explained:
"It is the most direct form of communicating efficiently for those who frequent the centro. It is the language we always used to express ourselves, since we were kids, playing in the streets. In the end, we only spoke Italian in school."This sentiment prevails for other groups as well: Sa Razza in Sardinian, Pooglia Tribe in Selentino, DLH Posse in Friulian, Pitura Freska in Venetian.Rap in dialect is also understood as a political act. This is especially true for artists coming from the South and in particular Naples like Almamegretta, Bisca, and 99 Posse. Expounding on the devaluation of Neapolitan's plebeian cadences, La Famiglia's "PRRR" is a hilarious and brilliant Bronx cheer to standard Italian.
African-based verbal dueling found in rap and older folk forms of "Playing the dozens," as well as Jamaican toasts, finds its European correlate in the improvised gare, contrasti, and dialoghi found throughout the Italian peninsula and the islands. The poetry's metrical form is known as ottava rima and consists of eight hendecasyllables in alternating rhyme. These spontaneous poems and song forms (performers often shift between reciting and singing) allow contestants a public forum for demonstrating their wit and verbal dexterity on a chosen topic. In their written forms, these poetic dialogues often pit a socially inferior character like a peasant against the rich landlord, with the former winning the argument.
Tony Mitchell points out the similarities of rap Italiano with earlier forms of opera in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which were a type of recited music drama. After "the development of commercial opera in Venice" and the introduction of songs and dances, eighteen century "audiences had grown weary of the single voice in opera, and the duet form was borrowed from comic opera, which enabled characters to 'quarrel and call each other names'."
While Hip Hop Italiano is influenced by African American rap and its love of word play, these folk and classical European traditions resonate in the songs performed by Italian rappers.
As with musical contamination, rappers from the Boot are mixing up Italian with Hip Hop slang. A full range of words have become part of everyday speech — DJ, MC, mix, hardcore, etc. In addition, English words are Italianized to create hybrid words like dopa (dope), funkadelico, scratchare, and suckeroni — vocabulary better suited to expressing new desires, fresh ideas.
È il modo più diretto per comunicare efficacemente con chi frequenta il centro. È la lingua nella quale ci siamo sempre espressi, sin da bambini, giocando per la strada. Alla fine l'italiano lo abbiamo parlato soltanto a scuola. BACK
Many Voices | Reclaiming the Vernacular | Playing | Mixing It Up
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