"There are great numbers of talented people who do speak, sing, and act out the problems (and rewards) of their social conditions, in ways that can help others to understand and work toward mutually beneficial improvement. Rap can be a useful and beautiful medium for such expression. Mass-merchandised media "art" largely only obscures the artists in favor of what's merchantable."-JohnInKansas

I agree with this comment; I also agree with Lady McMoo's succient comment that "there is rap and there is crap"; and John Hardly's list about why Rap is more widely known in many cultures now than Blues was [with the exception of John's last point about "Education is no longer toward a social norm" ??? which social norm, and which form of education??-since mass media is a very powerful educational tool...

I also would like to add that my interest is in hip-hop culture more than hip-hop music [which I admit to not being a fan of for the most part]. With some notable exceptions such as "n---g" and "ho", I love the creativity of the languaging [including spelling] and the tag names used by rappers. This reminds me of the Blues as the creativity of Blues artists and early jazz musicians/singers was expressed in the way they talked.

Furthermore, similar to hip-hop artists,Blues and early jazz artists were known by tag names and not by their birth names.

Hip-Hop is a fascinating culture [cultures really] to study.