In his chapter, “We Wear the Mask: Performance, Social Dramas, and Race” Elam states, “Performances of blackness, historically as well as in our contemporary age, often act as…methods of cultural or personal survival.” But can performance serve as a means for cultural survival for other races in the United States?
In his discussion on survival, Elam brings up examples of personal survival in his discussion of slaves who used ignorance as a shield against punishment and O.J. Simpson’s lawyers who played upon the black-white dichotomy. Elam discusses cultural survival in the context of rap and hip-hop, saying that they emphasize the importance of “realness”, or “being true to one’s roots and one’s cultural foundation”, and “hardness”, which is only learned “in the streets”. While performance of blackness is evident in hip-hop culture, can performance in hip-hop extend to other races? An example would be the Asian American group Far East Movement, which has recently become popular with their hits “Like a G6” and “Rocketeer”. Does this group exemplify “realness” and “hardness” in their raps even though their racial experience is different? Or is the group simply performing blackness?
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