Book Review for Renegade Rhymes

Authors

Meng Ren, University of North TexasFollow

Abstract

Renegade Rhymes delves into the personas, lyrics, and civic engagement of Taiwanese rappers, who leverage rap as a platform to navigate masculine politics, provide social critiques on Taiwan’s neoliberal economy and demanding work environment, and revitalize indigenous languages. Spanning from the post-martial law era spanning from the 1980s to the conclusion of the Nationalist Party period in 2016, Meredith Schweig focuses on the “old-school” generation of rappers, born between 1975 and 1985, whose formative years align with this pivotal historical period. Schweig begins by charting the history of Taiwan rap through interviews, examining three main threads: xiha, raoshe, and liam-kua. She then explores how rap serves as a platform for knowledge production, countering Taiwan's official narratives – notably Sinicization – as promoted by the Nationalist Party. Grounded in Gifford Geertz’s “deep hanging out” methodology, Schweig draws from her extensive fieldwork at rap events to analyze how rap functions as a vehicle for storytelling and knowledge dissemination, facilitating the community’s negotiation of Taiwanese identities amidst rapid societal change. Despite its significant contribution to the burgeoning literature on East Asian Hip Hop, an often-overlooked field, the book’s failure to contextualize rap within the broader Hip Hop culture neglects important considerations regarding the positioning and motivations of the artists involved.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.34718/xmbq-nd60

Volume

10

Issue

1

Recommended Citation

Ren, Meng (2024) "Book Review for Renegade Rhymes," Journal of Hip Hop Studies: Vol. 10: Iss. 1, Article 8.
Available at: https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/jhhs/vol10/iss1/8