In “Azealia Banks” author James McNally analyzes arising rapper Azealia Banks in order to discuss post-racial politics where political elements of hip-hop and the systemic racial inequalities they address, have become gradually ostracized in favor of “color-blind” conceptions of United States society and pop culture. To do so McNally argues that Banks’ music video for “212” and her public rhetoric rearticulates ideas of the mainstream black female identity in hip-hop and confronts the white gaze. In “212” Azealia Banks raps about growing up in Manhattan and her reactions to the situations that she experienced and declares her dominance over all of her rival, while establishing her extensive “technical skill and stylistic versatility as a rapper (61).” Banks combines multiple hip-hop tropes, while infusing her own character in as well to …show more content…
In 2014 Banks calls out calling out rapper Iggy Azalea for symbolizing white exploitation of black culture saying that she uses hip-hop as a costume that she is able to take on an off when she wants to, noting Azalea’s accent and lack of commentary on police brutality. Banks notes that Azealia’s recognition is part of a broader phenomenon in the United States of white appropriation of black musical production (74). Outside of the realm of cultural appropriation Banks’ has worked to re-appropriate derogatory terms usually directed at women, specifically the word “cunt”. Banks not only uses the term to validate the black female body, but to challenge heteronormative norms in hip-hop, and establish herself in a position of power. In addition to allowing her to appropriate a sexual gesture that rappers often used to express power over a romantic interest, Banks’s prominent and provocative use of the word “cunt” reclaims a word men commonly used to belittle women and rearticulates it as a figure of strength and