‘One of the boys’ or a sexual object? A qualitative study on the role of gender and race in the perception of Dutch hip-hop music

Hip-hop music is a genre that has grown extremely popular over the last few decades. Starting out as a political cultural form in the South Bronx, hip-hop became one of the most important ways of expression for young members of the black community in New York. How does this translate into different cultures all over the world ever since the genre has spread globally? This study investigates to what extend and how racial and gendered stereotypes play a role in the perception of mainstream hip-hop music in the Netherlands. Relatively few researchers have tackled this phenomenon of ‘Nederhop’, making this thesis relevant in today’s climate. As this is an inductive research using qualitative in-depth interviews, ten young adults of mixed genders were interviewed and asked about their opinions on hip-hop artists of different races and genders. The current work includes a theoretical framework that focuses on the development of hip-hop, gender inequality in the music industry, and several audience perception theories. Using these theories as a base, thematic analysis provided three main sensitizing concepts and themes that arose from the data. The first theme concerns stereotypes that are often used by the audience of Dutch hip-hop artists. Many stereotypes came forward from the interviews, and a lot of them focused on women, describing them as sexual beings that are objectified in different layers of hip-hop music, such as lyrics, video clips, and especially the representation of women overall. In fact, most interviewees could not even name any female rappers when asked about it. In the second theme that came forward, these stereotypes are discussed in relation to black women in particular, who are even more likely to receive such negative backlash and are more prone to stereotyping. The third theme explains that audiences experience the show of emotions and ‘real’ stories as a form of authenticity. Insights provided by the interviewees reveal a double standard that rests on female hip-hop artists, in which they are expected to show emotions to be authentic, but at the same time they do not receive the reception one would expect. In addition, there is a clear difference in perception of stereotypes between men and women, where men argued that women do not have the right voice for the rough image that comes with hip-hop, and women mainly focused on the reasons why women are so terribly underrepresented in the Dutch and international hip-hop industries.