GWSS 241 Blog Post #2

       Kathy Iandoli in her NPR interview about the female pioneers of Hip-hop, describes how Niki Minaj set the foundation for the commercial success of current artists such as Lizzo and Cardi B (2019). Before Cardi B dethroned her, Niki Minaj was the highest grossing female rapper of all time. Niki Minaj became one of the first female artists to both fully embrace and commodify her sexuality – being blatant and unapologetic about this process. Before her female artists were sexualized, but from an outward, male gaze. Niki took that gaze and mirrored it back, as if saying, “I see you looking” by “…Marketing herself as the hyperfeminine Barbie.” (Durham, 2013) But this “ownership” of her sexuality is theorized to have been a response to backlash to her “coment[ing] on her bi-sexuality”. Niki only began to affiliate with being a “Barbie” after coming out – possibly as a result of needing or wanting to conform to hetero-femininity. The article “The Stage Hip-hop Feminism Built” discusses how “Frequent and hostile speculation about the sexuality of female rap-pers such as Queen Latifah and Minaj amounts to a kind of policing that suggests the culture is still not hospitable to queer-presenting black women.” (2013) In histories of hip-hop, queer and masc women’s narratives are marginalized even further. Kyle Fleck’s “incomplete” timeline or rap in Seattle, he created for The Stranger, he mentions how Gifted Gab – a not hyper-feminine presenting artists, was left out of XXL’s list of up and coming Seattle artists (2016). Even within local scenes, conformity to gender norms is rewarded.

       Local Seattle artist DoNormaal is a personal friend of mine. I have always considered Christy to defy gender and sexuality in her music – more writing of human experience than a gendered one. She does speak to living a life outside of the gender dichotomy in her song, “Emotional”. She raps “Why I gotta hide the man in me? Why I gotta lose the woman in me?” In her dark and brooding song “Buckle”, DoNormaal declares, “I’ll lay my sexy body down for you, I be the sacrifice, no body can get around on you,” – speaking to the way that women are asked to give of themselves for men. She also speaks to the gendered performance of emotion in her song, “Ego Slave”, saying, “No crying, but you kinda wish you would sometimes”. Throughout her music, DoNormaal questions what is means to be a human with emotions and how we are asked to express.

Buckle – DoNormaal - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFrhbc0zn5A

Ego Slave – DoNormaal - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1Vcd2nMfgI

Emotional (live) – DoNormaal - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_2gNS_pOZ8