Great Escapes: Neoliberal Optimization and the Politics of Mainstream Rap Music in Contemporary Egypt

Abstract

This study is about the politics of mainstream rap music in contemporary Egypt. It details the relationship between a domestic Egyptian music industry whose current zeitgeist is overwhelmingly dominated by rap, and the structures of power governing the production of culture in contemporary Egypt. This study is also about economics. Specifically, this study engages in close readings of Egyptian rap songs and music videos to show how neoliberal economic logics undergirding the production of mainstream Egyptian rap overtake and undermine those dominant structures of power, becoming itself the central force shaping the genre. This study elucidates how, in this way, the ascension of rap music to the cultural mainstream in Egypt represents a kind of “coup” in that rap hinges upon, is a conscious reaction to, and takes advantage of a contemporary Egypt mired in ongoing failure and instability, that which is rooted specifically in the current regime’s pursuit of policies of neoliberal restructuring at the expense of its sociopolitical and cultural stability. This study argues that mainstream Egyptian rappers deploy rap as a vehicle of escape from such instability, and elaborates on how Egypt’s rappers mount their escape through the vehicle of this “coup.”