The Journal of Hip Hop Studies
Edited by Cassandra Chaney, Daniel White Hodge, and Travis Harris
While promoting his latest album, Yeezus, Hip-Hop artist Kanye West proudly proclaimed during a 2013 BBC Zane Lowe interview: “I just told you who I thought I was. A god. I just told you. That’s who I think I am.” Although this comment was met with a great deal of criticism, it is important to acknowledge that since its inception, Hip-Hop has frequently discussed the significance of God, religion, and spirituality. Given the increasing amount of racial, social and political commentary on marginalized communities, it is vital that scholars offer substantive examinations of how racial, economic and social inequities have been experienced and challenged via the Hip Hop genre.
For this special issue, the editors seek submissions that examine how God, religion, and spirituality have been discussed by Hip Hop artists and to think expansively about how Hip Hop has historically and contemporaneously emphasized the experiences, opportunities and realities of marginalized communities within these complimentary, contradictory, and at times, mutually-supportive contexts.
We invite papers that examine how shifting conceptions of God, religion, and spirituality have been shaped by The Black Church, political activism, poverty, prophetic identities, race, race relations, social justice, sociology, the economic and social standing of marginalized communities, as well as gender/race/sexual identities. We would especially be interested in essays that examined and critically engaged the uprisings in both Ferguson ,MO and Baltimore, MD and the way in which Hip Hop played a role.We also solicit contributions that offer conceptual and methodological examinations of God, Religion, and Spirituality.
Possible Topics & Themes: afterlife, black urban spaces, death, family, ghetto life, god, heaven, hell; meditation, mysticism, prayer, redemption, resurrection, religion, spirituality, and theology.
We welcome you to submit a manuscript for consideration. The 11,000 word manuscript, with citations in the Chicago Manual of Style (CMS) 16th format (with numerical footnotes), would be due on August 18, 2016. Authors must include an abstract of no more than 150 words that briefly describes the manuscript’s contents. Upon acceptance for review, the Journal of Hip Hop Studies editors will send manuscripts, under a double-peer reviewed process, to no less than two, and generally three reviewers. Reviewers provide their recommendations to the editor, who makes the final decision to accept the manuscript. We will be in touch shortly after with notification as to if the manuscript will be accepted for publication.
Send manuscripts to
Cassandra Chaney at Louisiana State University (cchaney@lsu.edu)
Daniel White Hodge at North Park University (dwhodge@northpark.edu)
Travis Harris (travis.t.harris@gmail.com)
