Students in Professor Caroline Shipley’s SPN 311 class have watched, read, and listened to a wide variety of Latin American Indigenous literature, music, and poetry throughout the semester. Specifically, we have paid close attention to the new and growing Andean Hip-Hop movement that has large fan bases in countries like Bolivia, Ecuador, and Peru. Our study is focused on Bolivia’s growing Hip-Hop scene and the fusion that has been created by Bolivia’s Quechua and Aymara people, who combine many aspects of their culture like fashion and language with Hip-Hop inherently rebellious themes. As a group, we made journals and kept notes of the new themes expressed in the music with each song we listened to in class. We found that they are incredibly proud of their people’s history and culture and desire for it to be known and respected in the way that it should be. We also discovered that most of the themes discussed in the lyrics of these Bolivian Hip-Hop songs were nearly identical to those expressed by rappers in the United States. They talk about struggles with police and being viewed as a second-class citizen like American rappers do. Although we are all different majors, we all have gained many valuable insights through this research. We gained much more knowledge about Andean and Bolivian Hip-Hop than we ever would have before, but we also learned practical research skills that will translate to all other classes.
Authors: Mijares Paulino, Samuel Humphrey, Nicholas McCarty, Michael Schaefer, Joey Golding
Advisor: Caroline Shipley, Spanish
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