called 'Hip-hop'? Hip-hop music is a style of popular music that has become a major cultural force within the last twenty years . It is an African American and Afro-Caribbean youth culture, which emerged during the 1970s in the crime-ridden neighbourhoods of South Bronx, New York during a time of civil upheaval. There, talented teenagers with little cash but lots of imagination began a new musical style that was quite simply, the product of streetwise ingenuity. It was the voice of a generation that refused to be silenced by poverty, which has gone on to become a globally recognised musical art form . Hip-hop is a diverse and dynamic force in which the voice of the disenfranchised has been able to have their say about both political and social problems. Hip-hop culture is comprised of four main elements: graffiti, break dancing and DJing, rapping (also known as MCing) music . It also represents other signifiers and themes with enormous meaning such as the empowerment for displaced people, their struggles against racism, and political opposition .
             Hip-hop is a musical art form and its general make-up consists of one or more rapper's chanting semi-autobiographic tales in a powerfully rhythmic poetic form using techniques such as assonance, alliteration and rhyme. In conjunction with the rapper, there is usually a DJ or live band that keeps the beat and in addition to the beat, other sounds are synthesized and performed . Hip-hop emerged in Aotearoa New Zealand in 1980s and was not widely accepted initially, some radio stations even refused to play Hip-hop according to Shute (2004). One of the common criticisms that Hip-hop faced initially was it being the clone of US Hip-hop. However, criticism for a new musical genre is not uncommon, Rock n' Roll had a similar criticism levelled at it when it was first played in the 1960s; it was seen as being dangerous with loose morals . Despite this, Hip-hop has pro...