LO1: Comparison of how different promos creat their meanings (Distinction)

Music Video - Dr Dre - Still D.R.E. ft. Snoop Dogg - Genre: Hip Hop:

The most common and noticeable conventions of a hip hop music video are as follows:

-Hyper Masculinity: As the name suggests, this is when a males masculinity is in the spotlight, as if it is the most important aspect to being a human is your masculinity. Hyper Masculinity is symbolised through men who are strong, tall, handsome, and usually rich.

-Black Males: Excluding certain cases, such as Eminem and The Four Owls, Hip Hop is predominantly a black art style, meaning that they prefer to represent the people they associate with as all black, most examples of this are because of racism in America, which has led to social groups segregating themselves from each other, however in other cases, this is just because that particular artists wants to make it clear to the viewer that this is black art. Visually this is symbolised through the dancers, and acts to all be made of black actors/artists.

-Brands: Because Hip Hop is built around making yourself as an artists look bigger and richer to improve self esteem, the actors/artists in Hip Hop music videos usually feature themselves wearing expensive brands which are popular at the time. This is symbolised literally through the actors/artists wearing the brands, and in some cases showing the artist buying the brand.

-Dancers/Escorts: A very common trait in Hip Hop music videos are Dancers who are presenting themselves as sexual objects, who dance in a sexually provoking way and wear closes which are either none existent or revealing. This trait is included to make the audience aware that the hip hop artist is both rich and attractive, and links to ideas of Hyper Masculinity, since woman are considered as assets to their masculinity in this context.

-Money: Another common trait, sybolised either through the males wearing gold, driving expensive cars and imagery of them holding huge amounts of money, and in some videos throwing that money around, to connote the idea that they have enough money to not care about money. These ideas are always evident in hip hop music's lyrics, for example a quote from Snoop Dogg: "with my mind on my money and my money on my mind".

-Patriarchy: A trait which comes up often in videos, which shows that all the males in the music video are dominating and are in charge over the women in the video.

-Sub-culture: The sub-culture being shown is the hip-hop culture in America.

a culture within a culture

Create meaning

titles and graphics
use of transitions
editing techniques
narrative
peformance
diegetic and non diegetic sound