Hip Hop Studies Commons^™

A Form Of Our Own: An Examination Of Black Sonnet-Samplers, Lavonna D. Wright

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This study responds to the need for understanding and terminology regarding Black poets’ engagement with the sonnet form. Referring to sampling strategies in Hip-Hop to analyze Black sonnets, this study disputes limiting ideas about sonnets as ineffective mediums to portray Black narratives and honors strategies maintained in Hip-Hop culture that define Black narrative expression, resistance to assimilation, and social reflection. Black sonnets are an ever-evolving vehicle of resistance to elitist ideas about traditional forms, Black aesthetics, and the ways that poetic strategies can be defined. This study names past and present Black sonneteers’ adherence to, remixing in, and rejection of …