Blings: The Hope To Achieve Most Hip Hop Members' Goal If It Has Not Been Already Done

Saly

English 120

13 December 2007

Blings: The Hope to Achieve Most Hip Hop Members' Goal If It Has Not Been Already Done

On TV, on radio, or even in the street, people are nowadays faced to blings in everyday life. "Pling" or "Bling" describe the imaginary sound produced by a gleam or a starburst of a smile projected into eyes because of the cleanliness of teeth, when rays of light are reflected from the sun, like in many 1970s and 80s toothpaste and chewing gum advertisements (Wikipedia, "Bling-bling"). Likewise, "bling" also sounds like when a light reflects off a diamond (Bok).

"Bling" -as a term- has been first coined by the rapper B.G., member of Cash Money, who used it as the title of a track extract from his album “Chopper City in the Ghetto” in the 1990s. Then, the term quickly spread from the African-American Rap world to the Latin Hip Hop and reggaeton world and even to the whole world. Afterwards, it has been "added to the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary in 2002 and to the Merriam Webster dictionary in 2006" (Wikipedia, "Bling-bling").

Actually, "bling-bling" or, in simpler terms, "bling" is a mix of conspicuous wealth and pointless spending. It can relate either to a noun, "synonym for expensive, flashy jewellery sported by African-American Hip-Hop artists and middle class Caucasian adolescents and Chavs" or to a verb meaning "the act of sporting jewellery of an extravagant, gaudy nature" (Bok).

Thomas Alexis wrote about it by simulating a family reunion during which a rap track had been broadcast on the radio. The rapper hollered "blings". The parents decide to take advantage of the situation to raise the huge paradox blings hide by, firstly, asking to their sons what are blings:

With the belief that they were teaching us a lesson for a change, they confidently explained that "bling bling" referred to the jewellery that many rappers flaunt, especially large gold or platinum pendants, and diamonds rings. We asked them, "If you see a person who is bling blinging, does this mean they're wealthy?" They looked at us as if we had asked a stupid question, and then they winked at each other. "Of course," they answered. "How could they buy all that jewellery, the cars, and the fresh clothes they wear if they didn't have money?" But there’s a huge difference between having money to spend and having the wealth to pass on. (Alexis 3)

The bling bling fashion often lead people up the garden path. Wearing blings doesn’t necessarily mean being wealthy. Actually, most bling bling fashion victims are like a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Now, the question is: why are blings part of the hip hop culture while most members are from the ghetto? First of all, in ghetto inhabitants' mind, blings could be a means to express the pride of having become rich by starting with nothing and by this way fulfil every ghetto inhabitants' dream; furthermore, blings permit to make people dream by giving them the impression of being wealthy even if they are not.

Firstly, people cannot deny that most Hip Hop members come from modest means. The ghetto, especially in the South of the United States -the "Dirty South,"- is the reign of poverty and unemployment. As a consequence, every ghetto inhabitants' aim is to crawl out of poverty. However, they know that is a hard nut to crack when everything seems to be against them. So, Hip Hop appears as their only one refuge. The only way to achieve their goal is to become known in the Hip Hop sector of activity they are good at; that's why the Hip Hop culture had grown with the ideal of battling. All of its members -DJs, MCs, rappers, dancers et al. - are always battling. For example, rappers are always worried about who will sell more CDs and by this way who will be more famous and who will earn more money. We often find this king of competition in Hip Hop tracks lyrics. Awkward, "Hip Hop... remains a never-ending battle for status, prestige, and group adoration, always in formation, always contested, and never fully achieved" (Rehn and SkÐ"¶ld 8). Blings can be viewed as the achievement of this aim.

Accordingly, Hip Hop culture finds itself in 2003 by splitting into two Hip Hop camps: The Old-School and the Hustler one. On the one hand, there are people who want to "keep it real" by staying independent and trust in old-school hip hop ideals. On the other hand, there are Hustlers who are focused on developing a "ghetto fabulous" aesthetic and the bling-bling attitude. According to Vladimir Propp, the first one faces the ghetto realism, and rap about how to escape poverty seeking for solutions. In contrast, the second one, related to a fairy tale: believing they have fulfill their aim, hustlers focus on bragging and showing off. However, the bling-bling attitude has nowadays come to be the dominating attitude in rap music and in Hip Hop Culture; as well as references to the bling-bling as a movement, a “bling-bling-ism” is now available on the Internet. Indeed the Bling-bling Fashion exists as an attitude among others (Rehn and SkÐ"¶ld 9).

The precursor of the "bling-bling-ism" is the Hip Hop group called Run-DMC; in 1986, after having sold lot of CDs and obtaining the copyright, the whole group earned an important amount of money and decided to adopt a new clothing by combined coats and Adidas trainers without laces with big jewellery. (Bok) This fact immediately influenced the hip hop style and behaviour. That is a first proof that blings permit to express how successful ghetto inhabitants had been. Every hip hop member coming from modest means cannot keep quiet about their financial success because they are pround of having fulfilled their dream: being rich. At the beginning, this attitude was totally justified, but, nowadays, successful Hip Hop members tend to be too expressive about having become rich, and, with the battling behaviour learned from the Hip Hop culture and considering blings as "Veblen goods", they develop a "conspicuous consumption."

According to Thorstein Veblen, the famous economist who wrote The Theory of the Leisure Class. An Economic Study of Institutions, a "Veblen good" corresponds to any commodity for which people's desire to buy it increase when its cost increases (Wikipedia, "Veblen good"). Besides, blings refers to any oversized jewellery people wear to show off. It tends to be very expensive. Of course, to