Solution or a “Fake Sense of Integration”?

Contradictions of Rap as a Resource within the Danish Welfare State’s Integration Project

Authors

  • Kristine Ringsager Aalborg University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1558/jwpm.37845

Keywords:

Danish welfare state, inclusion/exclusion, integration politics, rap music, social technologies

Abstract

During the past decades, rap music and hip hop culture have increasingly been utilized within the context of the Danish welfare state's integration project as a solution to societal problems with youths, who experience being marginalized and "Othered" within Danish society. This article addresses some of the contradictions that are related to this. By approaching the blend of hip hop pedagogy and policies against radicalization and criminalization of these youths through the theoretical lens of social technologies, it can be illustrated how mechanisms of power are conducted within social rap-based programmes. While such programmes are often considered as great successes by funding bodies and users alike, the article critically discusses how the use of rap as a resource for citizenship-building and inclusion of the target group in a broader societal context might entail the risk of actually excluding them.

Author Biography

  • Kristine Ringsager, Aalborg University

    Kristine Ringsager is Assistant Professor at Aalborg University, Denmark. Her research centres on the anthropological study of music, primarily focusing on issues of musical affect, agency and representation in relation to migration, displacement and identity. She has done extensive ethnographic research among visible minority rappers in Denmark, focusing on issues of experienced Otherness, citizenship and cosmopolitanism, and in Turkey, focusing on political and politicized Kurdish musicians' experiences of censorship. Her current research focuses on musical practices in times of war, displacement and humanitarian crisis.

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Published

2018-12-28

How to Cite

Ringsager, K. (2018). Solution or a “Fake Sense of Integration”? Contradictions of Rap as a Resource within the Danish Welfare State’s Integration Project. Journal of World Popular Music, 5(2), 250-268. https://doi.org/10.1558/jwpm.37845