AROUND THE WAY GIRLS COLLECTION
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Growing up in NYC, Hip Hop was the sound of the streets. Big business hadn’t yet grasped the star power of Hip Hop artists, which was just fine with us. It was OUR music, telling OUR stories, through our eyes.
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Or was it?
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As a young woman submerged in NYC’s hip hop culture, I’ve always been torn by the ways Hip Hop built me up while tearing me down. These men called my independence being a bitch; My budding sexuality was ho tendencies; My right to choose- slut talk. Yet, these same artists had a way of speaking sweetly of the women they loved most- their mamas. Women who were problematic in their own ways. Women just like us.
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But it wasn’t all bad. Many of us took on the mantle of bitch as a badge of honor. Ho could no longer do us any harm. The sluts were empowered. These derogatory terms, this idea that no man would share themselves fully with us, that we were unworthy of care, fueled the fires that taught us to take care of our damn selves.
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Today, the daughters of this era, hold higher degrees than our male counterparts, garnered higher executive titles than our male counterparts, and own more personal property than them, too.
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We took everything that could have poisoned us and let it be our strength. We let each lyric intoxicate us until we were all singing at the top of our lungs. We let the rhythms push us forward. Turned the hooks into our battle cries. Taught them to our daughters. A verbal history of all we’ve overcome, even as it was still a part of us. It/We couldn’t be stopped. We did it for the culture.
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You can take the girl out the hood but she’s always gonna be on the lookout for a baconeggandcheese. Nahmean?