Another Lost Opportunity for the Hip-Hop Industry

by Leroy Moore/Illin'n chillin

Although I’m very ecstatic that Foxy Brown regained her hearing, I’m once again disappointed on the lost opportunity for the Hip-Hop industry to gain needed education around disability and the growing population of deaf/disabled artists. I was saddened when I heard last year, 2005, that Foxy Brown had lost her hearing. Trying to make it positive, I thought this would be the time that hip-hop would be forced to look at deafness and deaf artists in the industry. For the most part I was once again wrong. Throughout Foxy Brown’s deafness, I only saw news about her coming out and saying that she had lost her hearing and then the news just focused on her surgery to regain her hearing.

At least today, artists like Foxy Brown can voice their incidents, from a disabling event to court cases. I remember the media around Teddy Pendergrass, TP, and the car accident that left him physically disabled in 1982. His voice was missing and the media at that time had written him off as a Black, sexy stallion in the music industry and in the Black community. It took TP years to find a publisher to publish his book, Truly Blessed. Today I see some progress in the media when it comes to musicians’ trails of disability, but very seldom does the media go beyond the individual disability to the general environment of the music industry for newly disabled musicians.

Hip-hop has had many opportunities to go beyond the experience of artists on slot of disability to focus on the industry’s attitudes, physical landscape and inclusiveness. From MF Grimm, who is an old timer in hip-hop and who is a wheelchair user to many underground disabled hip-hop artists, the hip-hop movement is missing a great opportunity to be educated and to open their doors a lot wider. From my research and interviews, Deaf hip-hop is growing all over the US & UK. However, the mainstream media around Foxy Brown’s deafness didn’t expand to mention Hip-Hop Anansi, the first hip-hop play with a deaf and hearing cast, or The Helix Boyz, a deaf hip-hop group, or post production of "Lost For Words", a proposed movie about an internet love affair centering around the hearing-disabled hip-hop scene in New York by Kori Schneider. All of these received some press but not the amount they deserved.

It’s not up to Foxy Brown or any other artist to carry the mantel of their recent disability, especially in the early stages. It is up to our media and this hip-hop generation to go deeper into stories of an individual musician and their community past and present to put it in a broader context.

Now that Foxy Brown is back working on her new CD, I wonder, will she mention her experience of loosing her hearing in her songs, like MF Grimm has done in his recent Cds? Although Foxy Brown can hear now, the opportunity for the hip-hop industry is still at their doorstep. The question is will the hip-hop industry, its media and us ever open the door all the way to not only the disabled hip-hop artists, but also to do some Spring cleaning in the industry of attitudes around the marketability of disabled artists and other dirty laundry that makes it overwhelmingly inaccessible beyond the underground?

Like I said in the beginning, I am so very happy that Foxy Brown can hear now, however I would like to mention some incredible deaf artists who are living with their deafness every day and continue to do their art. Check it out:

Deaf Hip-Hop/Poetry

- The Helix Boyz, their new CD is called The H. www.soundclick.com/helixboyz

- Wawa Snipe, a Deaf Rapper who acted in the play, Hip-Hop Anansi.

- Ayisha Knight, a Deaf poet and photographer with her CD, Until. She is most proud of being the first Deaf person to appear on HBO’s Def Poetry Jam. www.ayishaknight.com

- L.Y.F.E, a Deaf hip-hop artist with solo CD: Southern Comfort. www.soundclick.com/lyfe

- Hip-Hop Anansi play, for more information about this play go to www.imaginationstage.org

AND A LOT MOORE…………..