MUSI3401 (Hip Hop in the Music Industry) course reviews and ratings at Northeastern (NEU). Compare professors with RateMyProfessor reviews.
Focuses on black popular music as art, activism, and commodity from the post–Civil Rights era to today. Studies the immediate musical, historical, cultural, and industry-based precedents for rap music, which emerged in opposition to the music industry—and many other institutions that perpetuated the inequalities against which early hip-hop artists were protesting. The contemporary moment provides a unique opportunity for refocusing on the origins of hip-hop and black protest music as they relate to the industry’s embrace and commodification of certain aspects of hip-hop culture. Explores the dynamic tensions between rap music as aesthetic object, countercultural expression, social commentary, and industry commodity, engaging with current expressions of all of these in the Boston area.
Data updated October 2026.