Call for Proposals: Hip-Hop Archives: The Politics and Poetics of Knowledge
Production

Edited by Mark V. Campbell (Ryerson University)
Murray Forman (Northeastern University)

As editors of this book, we seek contributions that critically address
hip-hop archives
(both digital and physical) and the processes of archivization,
encompassing theoretical
and analytical perspectives and exploring globally dispersed cases. We
particularly
welcome contributions from individuals who are in some way actively engaged
in the
development or operation of hip-hop archives in any medium and at any stage
or scale,
whether independent collections or institutionally supported enterprises.
We also value
the various ways in which hip-hop culture is engaged from historical and
material
perspectives, allowing for examination of the archive as a historical
apparatus as well as a
contemporary physical assemblage of artifacts.

This book focuses on the culture and politics involved in building,
maintaining, and
researching hip-hop archives. It addresses practical aspects, including
methods of
accumulation, curation, preservation, and digitization and critically
analyzes institutional
power, community engagement, urban economics, public access, and the
ideological
implications associated with hip-hop culture’s enduring tensions with
dominant social
values.

Roughly forty-five years since hip-hop culture emerged, a broad and
sizeable array of
material artifacts, recorded materials, and various cultural ephemera has
accumulated.
Pioneering artists, life-long fans, industry mavens, and keen collectors
have amassed
collections of artifacts that are essential to the definition of localized
hip-hop scenes,
providing crucial insights onto the people, places, aesthetics and other
often-obscure
details that trace the arc of cultural development. Included in these
collections are
photographs, event flyers and posters, recordings (in multiple
configurations), video
materials, magazines, clothing and other stylistic signifiers, personal
papers and
notebooks, and oral history recordings. These materials, and their archival
existence,
have thus far received only scant scholarly attention within a sustained
critical framework
and, thus, this book seeks to enhance an understanding of hip-hip culture
more widely by
expanding our knowledge and understanding about the emergent role of
hip-hop archives.
Archives are generally a response to a need to actively preserve a culture,
allowing for
present and future citizens to access and interpret the evolution of a
people’s innovations
and endeavors. Archives encompass facets of heritage and legacy, merging
the temporal
past with present and future implications. They are repositories of
cultural histories and,
as such, they are also sites for the amplification of narratives and other
representational
forms that, in their diversity, disseminate symbolic values and meanings.
At the current
cultural moment, digitization also amplifies the ubiquity and importance of
archival
processes in relation to hip-hop’s ongoing vitality. The archiving of
hip-hop culture
consequently offers a powerful initiative that simultaneously celebrates
the achievements
of cultural forebears while critically engaging with ideologies, social and
political issues,
economic forces, and artistic creativity, repositioning the once-marginal
practices and
attitude associated with hip-hop at the center of larger debates about the
character of our
urban environments and cultural priorities.

The book aims to present rigorous scholarly research that critically and
theoretically
examines hip-hop’s archival turn, including interrogating the distinctions
between small,
independent archives and collections as well as those that feature larger
holdings and that
are institutionally located in public and university libraries or national
spaces such as the
U.S. Smithsonian Institute. Further emphasis will be placed on the ways in
which hip-hop
archives mobilize community involvement, facilitating engagements that take
various
shapes and have diverse implications for how local hip-hop scenes envision
themselves
and their relationship to the wider hip-hop culture.

Of this latter point, the book strongly advocates for a global perspective.
We invite
chapters with a pronounced international foundation, seeking to draw on the
insights and
archival practices enacted in multiple national contexts, exploring the
constraining and
enabling factors that arise in dispersed locales.

Deadline for Proposals: 1 April 2019
Proposals should be 250 words

Proposals can be submitted in word.doc format to:
Mark V. Campbell: [log in to unmask]
Murray Forman: [log in to unmask]

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