by Cody Keeble

Created on: June 22, 2009

Hip hop is a cultural movement that began in the 70's and continues to live today. It was brought together because of oppression and separation of the Bronx neighborhood from the rest of the city of New York by a highway system. The four main elements, all forms of self expression, make up the culture. The only constant in hip hop is change, innovators bring new styles and trends everyday making the hip hop culture extremely diverse.

In the 1970's the city of New York was densely populated and growing still. The city had a new highway system constructed, and it just so happened to separate the neighborhood where the majority of the African-American and Puerto Rican population lived, the Bronx. The neighborhood was already different from the rest of the city because of financial issues, but now a physical separation divided them from the rest. Looking for ways to stand out, and more importantly ways to express their stories and lives the people of the Bronx found four main ways to express themselves: MCing, DJing, graffiti art, and break dancing, what are now the four main elements of hip hop.

An MC, also known as emcee, is short for Master of Ceremonies. Usually an MC introduced performers, or hosts an event. An MC in hip hop isn't much different. Within the hip hop culture an MC hosts an event and helps control the crowd's mood by talking to the crowd, unlike a DJ. A DJ is someone who plays music. DJ is short for Disc Jockey, the word "disc" is used instead of "disk" for the mentioning of the use of CDs or compact discs. The DJ does not use words but the music, and the mixes of songs they make to control the mood of a crowd. Graffiti is an old form of communication which evolved during the beginning of the hip hop culture to pictures that express the life of people. The art is usually on the sides of buildings. During the 90's "tagging" was made popular for claiming territory in areas of gang activity, but has died out slowly over the years. Break dancing is street dancing and is often done to electric, hip hop, or rap music. Many competitions are held such as dance offs to show off talents. All four things have evolved in so many ways over the years.

In the 70's when the hip hop culture began it started out as a way for the oppressed neighborhoods, and people to express themselves. In the 80's hip hop became more about being better than everyone else. The music, the clothes and the lifestyle all became part of hip hop in the 80's and perfecting it was

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