Untold Stories of DIY/Underground Iranian Rap Culture: The Legitimization of Iranian Hip-Hop and the Loss of Radical Potential

Abstract

In this article, I aim to explore how legitimization and de-radicalization of the underground hip-hop subculture have restrained the DIY creation of social norms and cultural behaviours that mobilized Iranian hip-hop in the early 2000s. The article offers a critical discussion of the literature around legitimization of DIY/underground subcultures, specifically youth musical subcultures such as punk and hip-hop, before turning to an analysis of Iranian hip-hop culture in three phases: (1) hip-hop and the creation of a community, 2000–2003; (2) the golden age of Iranian hip-hop, 2003–2009; (3) contemporary Iranian hip-hop, 2009–2016. The article suggests that these three phases have finally led to the entry of hip-hop into the mainstream system and cultural industry, as recent trends bringing it in line with the values and standards of Islamic Iran result in turning underground DIY culture into a mainstream popular form of music supported and funded (indirectly) by the Islamic state.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 20 citations exist upstream.

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.