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Reggaetón (Latino Studies)

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  1. Introduction
  2. Reggaetón (also spelled reggaeton, reguetón, and regeton) is a popular music characterized by rapid vocals and a steady “dembow” beat. While early reggaetón was often described exclusively as a rap-dancehall hybrid, more contemporary versions of reggaetón incorporate elements from other genres of music such as R&B, vallenato, bachata, merengue, pop, and electronic dance music, among others. Scholars and fans alike debate reggaetón’s origins. Some argue that reggaetón began as reggae en español (also called plena) in Panama. Others claim that the genre developed first as underground on the island of Puerto Rico. While these debates may never be resolved, what is certain is that reggaetón is indebted to multiple streams of migration, including (but not limited to) West Indians to Panama, Dominicans to Puerto Rico, and West Indians, Dominicans, and Puerto Ricans to the United States. These transnational movements not only exposed people to different musical genres, but also offered possibilities for cultural exchange that impacted local ideas about race, diaspora, and nation. For example, several scholars write about representations of race, particularly blackness, in reggaetón. Many of the musical genres that influenced reggaetón, such as hip-hop or dancehall, come from predominantly black communities in the Americas. These genres not only influenced reggaetón’s sound, but also the fashion, style, vocabulary, and aesthetics associated with it that spoke to the experiences of mostly poor, urban, and non-white youth. A second major theme in scholarship about reggaetón is gender and sexuality. Critics have admonished reggaetón for its misogynistic representations of women in lyrics and music videos. Some articles also address how reggaetón reinforces or challenges certain notions of black and Latino masculinity. Related to broader issues of gender, scholars have explored race and gender in reggaetón across different communities and various time periods from the 1980s to the present. Most reggaetón scholarship focuses on Puerto Rico, home to many of the most popular artists and producers. Panama has also received some attention from scholars given the crucial role reggae en español played in reggaetón’s development. Another place that has been the focus of reggaetón scholarship is Cuba given the island’s unique music scene and, especially, the tensions between reggaetón’s unabashed consumerism and the ideals of the Cuban Revolution. While reggaetón circulated in Puerto Rico and elsewhere beginning in the 1980s, in 2004 the genre broke into the mainstream Latin music industry with Daddy Yankee’s hit, “Gasolina,” from his album Barrio Fino. Several scholars thus explore the representations of Latinidad in reggaetón, particularly in the United States, as well as the music’s crossover into Latin pop markets. Despite its international popularity, reggaetón has received relatively little attention from scholars, and many aspects of the music are ripe for research. However, generally, reggaetón scholarship emphasizes themes such as race, gender, nation, diaspora, and the politics of representation that speak to larger debates in ethnic studies, women’s and gender studies, and cultural studies, among others.
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  4. General Overviews
  5. Despite reggaetón’s longstanding popularity in Latin America and among US Latinos, it has received relatively little attention in scholarship. However, several texts provide a general overview of the music, its precursors reggae en español and underground, and contemporary debates about race, gender, socioeconomic class, and other social issues. Marshall 2006 provides an overview of reggaetón’s development from Panamanian reggae en español to contemporary Latin pop. Written during a time when reggaetón just started to break into Latin pop markets, Marshall’s article also attempts to predict the future of reggaetón at a moment when the music appeared poised to take over the mainstream. Rivera, et al. 2009 is an edited volume that contains chapters about different reggaetón scenes across the Americas, historical analyses of the music, and discussions about race, gender, and class. The editors’ introduction “Reggaeton’s Socio-sonic Circuitry” and Wayne Marshall’s chapter, “From Música Negra to Reggaeton Latino: The Cultural Politics of Nation, Migration, and Commercialization” are especially useful overviews of the genre’s history and cultural politics. Rivera-Rideau 2015 traces the development of reggaetón in Puerto Rico, home to many of the genre’s most popular artists. These texts thus put forward many of the fundamental themes in reggaetón scholarship.
  6.  
  7. Marshall, Wayne. “The Rise of Reggaetón: From Daddy Yankee to Tego Calderón and Beyond.” Phoenix, 19 January 2006.
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  10.  
  11. Provides an overview of reggaetón’s rise to pop status from its beginnings as Panamanian reggae en español and Puerto Rican underground. Discusses reggaetón’s sonic connections to dancehall, hip-hop, and other forms of Caribbean popular music. Offers predictions for the future of reggaetón in both Latin and US mainstream popular music.
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  13. Find this resource:
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  15.  
  16. Rivera, Raquel Z., Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, eds. Reggaeton. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
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  19.  
  20. Includes chapters about reggaetón in Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Panama, and the United States. Addresses diverse issues in reggaetón such as gender, race, transnationalism, cultural politics, and others. Contains a brief bibliography of early scholarly and popular sources about reggaetón.
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  25. Rivera-Rideau, Petra R. Remixing Reggaetón: The Cultural Politics of Race in Puerto Rico. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015.
  26.  
  27. DOI: 10.1215/9780822375258Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  28.  
  29. Examines the rise of reggaetón in Puerto Rico and the United States, with particular attention to the music’s racial politics, connections to diaspora and transnationalism, and gender and sexuality. Includes a chapter about Panamanian reggae en español and Puerto Rican underground, but focuses primarily on reggaetón in the 2000s. Ends with a discussion of reggaetón’s entrance into Latin music markets in the United States.
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  34. Panamanian Reggae en Español
  35. Regardless of where one stands in the debate over whether Puerto Ricans or Panamanians invented reggaetón, Panama remains an important site for the music’s development. Reggae en español (also called “plena” or simply “reggae”) developed in urban areas of Panama, particularly in the Canal Zone and cities like Colón. These locations were home to a substantial Afro-Panamanian population, many of whom descended from West Indian laborers who traveled to Panama in large numbers to work on the Panama Canal. The movement of people from both the United States and across the Caribbean basin in and out of these areas exposed many of these young people to different popular music styles such as R&B, funk, soca, and dancehall. Nwankwo 2009 and Twickel 2009b describe the various musical styles that influenced reggae en español artists like Renato and El General. Along with Twickel 2009a, these essays also examine the rise of reggae en español in Panama beginning in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and its subsequent international popularity. Nwankwo 2009 is based on an interview with popular artist Renato, one of the first successful reggae en español artists in Panama, and addresses the connections between Panama and Puerto Rico in the development of reggaetón. Watson 2014 also focuses on Renato, examining his lyrics in relation to Panamanian and Latin American identities. Twickel 2009a contains an interview of El General that also details the emergence of the genre in Panama and El General’s experiences performing and recording reggae en español in the United States. Beyond merely providing biographies of these pioneers in reggae en español, these essays also present important historical and social contexts for understanding the motivations behind the music as well as its impact in Panamanian society. In addition, they illustrate the importance of Jamaican dancehall in the development of reggae en español. Panamanian artists often translated Jamaican dancehall hits, or they performed new lyrics over existing Jamaican dancehall riddims. Both Marshall 2008 and Pereira 1998 consider how the social and cultural dimensions of dancehall influence the reggae en español scene in Panama. Furthermore, Marshall 2008 focuses on the sonic and lyrical connections between these musical genres, especially the influence of the Jamaican dancehall dembow riddim in the work of Panamanian artists Nando Boom and El General. While much work remains to be done about Panamanian reggae en español, as well as the contemporary reggaetón scene in Panama, these texts provide useful analyses of the origins of the music, its social, cultural, and sonic dimensions, and the impact of the Panamanian scene on contemporary reggaetón.
  36.  
  37. Marshall, Wayne. “Dem Bow, Dembow, Dembo: Translation and Transnation in Reggaeton.” Lied und populäre Kultur/Song and popular Culture 53 (2008): 131–151.
  38.  
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  40.  
  41. Traces the beat of Jamaican dancehall artist Shabba Ranks’ hit “Dem Bow” in Panamanian reggae en español recordings and Puerto Rican reggaetón. Demonstrates the musical and social connections between Jamaican dancehall and Panamanian reggae en español. Considers the politics of gender and sexuality in the music, particularly expressions of homophobia and masculinity.
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  46. Nwankwo, Ifeoma C. K. “The Panamanian Origins of Reggae en Español: Seeing History through “Los Ojos Café” of Renato.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini-Hernández, 89–98. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
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  49.  
  50. Based on an interview with Renato, the artist credited with first singing reggae en español. Describes how reggae en español developed in Panama as well as influences from US popular music, Jamaican dancehall, and other Caribbean genres. Recounts connections between Panamanian and Puerto Rican artists.
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  55. Pereira, Joseph. “Translation or Transformation: Gender in Hispanic Reggae.” Social and Economic Studies 47.1 (1998): 79–88.
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  58.  
  59. Analyzes lyrics of popular “Hispanic reggae” songs from Panama, Costa Rica, and, to a more limited extent, Puerto Rico. Includes Panamanian artists such as El General. Argues that, while there is some direct translation of Jamaican dancehall into Spanish, many artists also reinterpret aspects of Jamaican dancehall to speak to local contexts, particularly gender dynamics.
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  64. Twickel, Christoph. “Muévelo (Move It!): From Panama to New York and Back Again, the Story of El General.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 99–108. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009a.
  65.  
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  67.  
  68. Interview with prominent reggae en español artist El General. Discusses reggae en español’s origins, its connections to local Rastafarian movements and racial politics, and the influences of Caribbean music on the genre. Describes how El General’s experience immigrating to New York City impacted his career and the trajectory of reggae en español.
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  73. Twickel, Christoph. “Reggae in Panama: Bien Tough.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 81–88. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009b.
  74.  
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  76.  
  77. Discusses the development of West Indian cultural traditions such as calypso and, especially, Rastafarianism in Panama and their impact on the development of reggae en español. Includes a brief account of women artists, particularly Lady Ann.
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  79. Find this resource:
  80.  
  81.  
  82. Watson, Sonja Stephenson. “‘Reading’ National Identity in Panama through Renato, a First Generation Panamanian Reggae en Español Artist.” alter/nativas: latin american cultural studies journal 2 (2014).
  83.  
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  85.  
  86. Considers how Renato reinterprets both Panamanian and Latin American identities in his songs. Analyzes lyrics to Renato’s songs “El D.E.N.I.,” “La chica de los ojos café,” and “América” in relation to Panamanian race relations, national politics, and Latin American unity.
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  91. Puerto Rican Underground
  92. In addition to Panamanian reggae en español, many people consider Puerto Rican underground to be an influential precursor to contemporary reggaetón. In underground, Puerto Rican DJ’s combined hip-hop from the United States with Jamaican dancehall and Panamanian reggae en español to produce a new genre. Several terms besides underground were used to refer to this music, including the word “rap” prevalent in much of the scholarship on the genre. In general, scholars stress underground’s connections to poor, urban, and black communities on the island. Rivera 1992–1993 provides an overview of underground, its connections to US hip-hop via the Puerto Rican diaspora in New York, and its ties to Puerto Rico’s urban poor. Giovannetti 2003, Rivera 1997a, Santos 1996, and Santos Febres 1997 all emphasize the music’s connections to the African diaspora, particularly Jamaica, as well as underground’s articulations of a local black identity in Puerto Rico. This is particularly important given that dominant discourses of Puerto Rican national identity emphasize the island’s race mixture (mestizaje) yet simultaneously valorize whiteness and Spanish heritage. Rivera 1998 and Rivera 1997b emphasize how underground’s connections to marginalized communities disrupt dominant narratives of Puerto Rican national identity and lay bare the structural inequalities maintained by Puerto Rico’s colonial relationship with the United States. Despite emphasis on underground’s contestatory politics, many scholars, in works such as Giovannetti 2003, Rivera 1992–1993, and Rivera 1997a, also point out that commercialization shifted artists away from more direct political critique to lyrical themes such as sex and parties. Santos 1996 argues that, nevertheless, songs about sexual prowess, marijuana, or illegal activity offer some underground artists and fans the opportunity to assert themselves in a place where neoliberal policies have stripped their communities of agency. Underground’s entrance into the commercial realm in the early and mid-1990s provoked extreme responses from detractors of the music, who were particularly concerned with its influence on Puerto Rican middle-class youth. In fact, in 1995 Puerto Rican officials raided record stores on the island to confiscate underground recordings and charged storeowners with peddling obscenities (charges that were dropped). Rivera 2009 explores the backlash against underground in which critics argued that the music threatened the morality and safety of Puerto Rican youth, claims that covered up the racist and classist motivations for targeting underground music. This early work on underground thus stresses the music’s ties to the black, urban poor, and the ways underground introduced new ways of thinking about Puerto Rican identities, laying the groundwork for future work on reggaetón.
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  94. Giovannetti, Jorge L. “Popular Music and Culture in Puerto Rico: Jamaican and Rap Music as Cross-Cultural Symbols.” In Musical Migrations: Transnationalism and Cultural Hybridity in Latin/o America. Edited by Frances R. Aparicio and Cándida F. Jáquez, 81–98. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.
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  96. DOI: 10.1057/9780230107441_6Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  97.  
  98. Explores the Jamaican reggae scene connected to middle-class blanquito audiences and the rap scene linked to the urban poor, many of whom are also black. Argues that cultural symbols from elsewhere become resignified to address social issues in local contexts. Considers how insertion into the market affects the politics of these music scenes.
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  103. Rivera, Raquel Z. “La música rap en Puerto Rico: Consumo, revisión y resistencia.” CENTRO Journal 5 (1992–1993): 31–51.
  104.  
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  106.  
  107. Discusses role of New York Puerto Ricans in developing rap in the United States. Examines how Puerto Ricans on the island have “islandized” (isleñización, p. 15) rap to speak to their unique circumstances. Includes interview transcripts with artists Vico C and Lisa M. Written in Spanish.
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  112. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Rap in Puerto Rico: Reflections from the Margins.” In Globalization and Survival in the Black Diaspora: The New Urban Challenge. Edited by Charles Green, 109–127. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997a.
  113.  
  114. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  115.  
  116. Argues that rap voices the experiences of marginalized youth in Puerto Rico. Foregrounds underground artists’ and fans’ ties to blackness and articulations of a racial discourse that conflicts with dominant narratives of Puerto Rican identity.
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  121. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Rapping Two Versions of the Same Requiem.” In Puerto Rican Jam: Essays on Culture and Politics. Edited by Frances Negrón-Muntaner and Ramón Grosfoguel, 243–256. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997b.
  122.  
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  124.  
  125. Examines how underground’s race and class dynamics respond to the marginalization of urban, poor, and black communities. Counters arguments from Puerto Rican nationalists that rap’s origins in the United States make it a form of cultural imperialism on the island. Demonstrates how colonialism produces conditions that gave rise to underground.
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  130. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Cultura y poder en el rap puertorriqueño.” Revista de Ciencias Sociales 4 (January 1998): 124–145.
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  133.  
  134. Focuses on the criticisms of underground from Puerto Rican nationalists, particularly that underground is a foreign genre imported into the island from the United States. Argues that rap is Puerto Rican, especially given the role of the Puerto Rican diaspora in New York in creating it. Written in Spanish.
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  139. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Policing Morality, Mano Dura Stylee: The Case of Underground Rap and Reggae in Puerto Rico in the Mid-1990s.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 111–134. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
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  142.  
  143. Critiques arguments against underground that emphasized the music’s alleged immorality, especially concerning issues such as sex and drugs. Argues that underground’s misogyny indicates a broader sexist culture in Puerto Rico. Contends that morality arguments leveled against underground mask racist and classist discrimination.
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  147.  
  148. Santos, Mayra. “Puerto Rican Underground.” CENTRO Journal 8.1–2 (1996): 219–231.
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  151.  
  152. Argues that underground expresses a distinct identity for marginalized communities on the island adversely affected by mid-1990s neoliberalism. Emphasizes underground’s ties to the larger African diaspora, particularly urban cultural expressions from Jamaica, and the music’s articulation of black identity. Analyzes expressions of hypermasculinity and marijuana use in underground.
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  156.  
  157. Santos Febres, Mayra. “Geografía en decíbeles: Utopías pancaribeñas y el territorio del rap.” In Primer Simposio de Caribe 2000: Re-definiciones; Espacios global/nacional/cultural/personal-caribeño. Edited by Lowell Fiet and Janette Becerra, 121–136. Río Piedras: Universidad de Puerto Rico Recinto de Río Piedras, 1997.
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  160.  
  161. Analyzes the spatial dynamics and urban black aesthetics of underground that link it to Puerto Rico’s urban centers, streets, prisons, and housing projects. Discusses the diasporic elements of these geographies that include New York City and Jamaica. Considers how these geographies center experiences of marginalized communities rather than respectable or state-sanctioned spaces. Written in Spanish.
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  166. Reggaetón in Puerto Rico
  167. Despite the debates about reggaetón’s origins, contemporary reggaetón is often associated with Puerto Rico due to the preponderance of popular artists from the island and underground’s role in the development of the music. As a result, many scholars have focused their work on reggaetón in Puerto Rico. Negrón-Muntaner and Rivera 2007 examines the rise of reggaetón in Puerto Rico and its shift from a maligned musical genre to one accepted by the island’s elites. Still, one common theme in scholarship about reggaetón in Puerto Rico is the ways that the genre contests dominant discourses of Puerto Rican identity that privilege respectability, cultural authenticity, and whitening. Rivera 2007 examines how music by artists such as Eddie Dee challenge the rigid definitions of Puerto Rican identity set by dominant cultural nationalists. In a more contemporary context, Lloréns 2008 describes how the group Calle 13 disrupts many of the normative conventions of race, gender, and nation in their performance. Rivera-Rideau 2015 foregrounds the racial politics of reggaetón to argue that the music’s ties to blackness and the African diaspora present new ideas about Puerto Ricanness that clash with dominant constructions of a racially mixed and whitened Puerto Rico. Dinzey-Flores 2008 also discusses the race and class dynamics of reggaetón in this analysis of how song lyrics express the music’s “urban spatial aesthetics.” Other scholars have analyzed Puerto Rican reggaetón’s aesthetics in order to stress the genre’s transnational roots and question the assumption of its Puerto Rican origins. Though Rivera-Servera 2009 focuses on Puerto Rican artists Tego Calderón and Calle 13, the author underscores the ways that reggaetón references both local Puerto Rican culture and the larger transnational circuits in which it circulates. Similarly, LeBrón 2011 cautions that narratives that stress reggaetón’s Puerto Rican origins as well as ideas about what constitutes “authentic” Puerto Ricanness leave out the important transnational exchanges that produced, and continue to impact, the genre. While the prevalence of scholarship about Puerto Rican reggaetón certainly reflects the historical dominance of Puerto Rican artists in the genre as well as the island’s critical role in producing the music, it also highlights important debates about the larger cultural, racial, gender, and national politics in reggaetón.
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  169. Dinzey-Flores, Zaire Zenit. “De la Disco al Caserío: Urban Spatial Aesthetics and Policy to the Beat of Reggaetón.” CENTRO Journal 20.2 (Fall 2008): 35–69.
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  172.  
  173. Uses urban sociological theories to examine representations of urban Puerto Rican experiences and, especially, spaces (e.g., street, prison, barrios, etc.) in reggaetón lyrics. Defines an “urban spatial aesthetic” (p. 48) in reggaetón songs that incorporates violence, poverty, race, and gender. Analyzes how reggaetón represents urban spaces as “redemptive places” (p. 59) typically disenfranchised by Puerto Rican authorities.
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  178. LeBrón, Marisol. “‘Con un Flow Natural’: Sonic Affinities and Reggaetón Nationalism.” Women and Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory 21.2 (2011): 219–233.
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  180. DOI: 10.1080/0740770X.2011.607598Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  181.  
  182. Argues that representations of reggaetón as exclusively Puerto Rico or pan-Latino run the risk of obscuring transnational exchanges and social histories that link various communities together. Focuses on music by artist Deevani as well as bhangraton (a combination of Indian bhangra with reggaetón) to show how these performances complicate assumptions about Puerto Rican reggaetón.
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  186.  
  187. Lloréns, Hilda. “Brothels, Hell, and Puerto Rican Bodies: Sex, Race, and Other Cultural Politics in 21st Century Artistic Representations.” CENTRO Journal 20.1 (Spring 2008): 193–217.
  188.  
  189. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  190.  
  191. Demonstrates how Calle 13’s performances satirize dominant notions of Puerto Ricanness, especially normative expectations about race, class, and respectability. Points out contradictions of Calle 13’s performances given their own privileged positions as white males in Puerto Rico.
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  195.  
  196. Negrón-Muntaner, Frances, and Raquel Z. Rivera. “Reggaeton Nation.” NACLA Report on the Americas 40.6 (November–December 2007): 35–41.
  197.  
  198. DOI: 10.1080/10714839.2007.11725387Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  199.  
  200. Explores the rise of reggaetón in Puerto Rico from underground to the mainstream. Argues that as reggaetón grew more popular internationally, it became more accepted by the island’s elite even as reggaetón maintained its social critiques about race and class inequalities.
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  204.  
  205. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Will the ‘Real’ Puerto Rican Culture Please Stand Up? Thoughts on Cultural Nationalism.” In None of the Above: Puerto Ricans in the Global Era. Edited by Frances Negrón-Muntaner, 217–232. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.
  206.  
  207. DOI: 10.1057/9780230604360_17Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  208.  
  209. Incorporates music by artists Vico C, Eddie Dee, and Sietenueve to demonstrate how rap and reggaetón, among other cultural practices on the island, counter dominant forms of Puerto Rican cultural nationalism that routinely neglect race, class, and the Puerto Rican diaspora.
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  213.  
  214. Rivera-Rideau, Petra R. Remixing Reggaetón: The Cultural Politics of Race in Puerto Rico. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015.
  215.  
  216. DOI: 10.1215/9780822375258Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  217.  
  218. Examines reggaetón’s links to the larger African diaspora and expressions of blackness on the island. Argues that reggaetón’s racial politics challenge dominant discourses of racial democracy that present Puerto Ricans as whitened via race mixture. Considers intersections of race and gender in Puerto Rican reggaetón from underground through the mid-2000s.
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  222.  
  223. Rivera-Servera, Ramón H. “Musical Trans(actions): Intersections in Reggaetón.” Trans Revista Transcultural de Música 13 (2009): 1–13.
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  226.  
  227. Analyzes the music videos “La jirafa” by Calle 13 and “Tradicional a lo bravo” by Tego Calderón to point out how reggaetón links to local Puerto Rican cultures while also acknowledging the global circuits of exchange in which it operates. Proposes concept of sincerity rather than authenticity as the most effective approach to understanding reggaetón.
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  232. Reggaetón in Cuba
  233. While reggaetón is most often associated with Puerto Rico, Cuban reggaetón (sometimes referred to as Cubatón) has also received attention from scholars. Indeed, many scholars have already written about the Cuban hip-hop scene often lauded for its overt racial politics; Baker 2011 provides an overview of the literature about Cuban hip-hop. However, in the mid-2000s, reggaetón began growing in popularity in Cuba, particularly in the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba and, eventually, in Havana. Like reggaetón elsewhere, and as all of the following texts point out, Cuban reggaetón initially emerged from marginalized, predominantly black populations in Cuba, and it includes lyrical themes such as sexuality and consumerism. Nevertheless, analysis of Cuban reggaetón requires a substantially different approach given the unique social, political, and economic context on the island. For example, as Baker 2011 documents, Cuban state institutions are responsible for officially sanctioned forms of cultural production, including music. In this context, Boudreault-Fournier 2008 describes how home-based recording studios became critical to the development and popularity of Cuban reggaetón outside of the purview of the state. Many Cuban reggaetón artists also espouse values such as capitalist consumption that directly contradict the Cuban Revolution’s ideology. Boudreault-Fournier 2008, Torres 2012, and Baker 2011 all address materialistic values in Cuban reggaetón. As Boudreault-Fournier 2008 and Fairley 2006 demonstrate, Cuban reggaetón also incorporates transnational networks and influences typically disavowed in discussions of Cuban popular music. Another major theme in scholarship about Cuban reggaetón is its expressions of hypersexuality, described in Baker 2011, Fairley 2006, and Torres 2012. These authors describe how, similar to Puerto Rico, such expressions of hypersexuality have precipitated a backlash against reggaetón, particularly from state agencies. Cuban reggaetón thus presents similar issues as reggaetón scenes in other sites in the Americas, particularly on the question of sexuality; however, the distinct context in which Cuban reggaetón circulates also brings up other questions about the relationship between consumerism and reggaetón, the distribution of the music, and its larger integration into music industries, among others, that complicate many of the typical narratives about reggaetón more broadly.
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  235. Baker, Geoffrey. Buena Vista in the Club: Rap, Reggaetón, and Revolution in Havana. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011.
  236.  
  237. DOI: 10.1215/9780822393931Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  238.  
  239. Explores the relationship between Cuban rap and reggaetón, the state, and globalization. Chapter 2 focuses specifically on the rise of reggaetón in Cuba, including government backlash, lyrical themes, dancing, and the “Cubanization” (p. 119) of reggaetón. Situates reggaetón in relation to other forms of Cuban music. Discusses the contrast between reggaetón’s materialism and Cuban revolutionary ideology.
  240.  
  241. Find this resource:
  242.  
  243.  
  244. Boudreault-Fournier, Alexandrine. “Positioning the New Reggaetón Stars in Cuba: From Home-Based Recording Studios to Alternative Narratives.” Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology 13.2 (November 2008): 336–360.
  245.  
  246. DOI: 10.1111/j.1935-4940.2008.00041.xSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  247.  
  248. Focuses on reggaetón artists in mid-2000s Santiago de Cuba. Examines how reggaetón producers establish networks of Cubans and foreigners to create and distribute their music outside of state institutions. Contends that Cuban reggaetoneros express alternative narratives that celebrate Cuban nationalism despite their expressions of individualism and materialism.
  249.  
  250. Find this resource:
  251.  
  252.  
  253. Fairley, Jan. “Dancing Back to Front: Regeton, Sexuality, Gender, and Transnationalism in Cuba.” Popular Music 25.3 (October 2006): 471–488.
  254.  
  255. DOI: 10.1017/S026114300600105XSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  256.  
  257. Questions whether dance style empowers women or reproduces gender discrimination on the island in the context of the Special Period and the rise of prostitution. Considers government backlash to “regeton.” Argues that transnationalism of reggaetón brings Cuba within a larger Caribbean scene, but does not integrate Cuban reggaetón into US Latino formations.
  258.  
  259. Find this resource:
  260.  
  261.  
  262. Torres, Nora Gámez. “Hearing the Change: Reggaeton and Emergent Values in Contemporary Cuba.” Latin American Music Review/Revista de Música Latinoamericana 33.2 (2012): 227–260.
  263.  
  264. DOI: 10.7560/LAMR33203Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  265.  
  266. Contends that the government backlash against Cuban reggaetón partially stems from the music’s associations with a predominantly black underclass that has been left out of the island’s economic and political system. Examines issues such as consumerism and gender roles in reggaetón that conflict with values espoused by the revolutionary government.
  267.  
  268. Find this resource:
  269.  
  270.  
  271. Reggaetón and Crossover Markets in Latin Music and the United States
  272. In 2004, reggaetón artist Daddy Yankee released his hit “Gasolina” on his first major studio album, Barrio Fino. Like many reggaetón artists, Daddy Yankee began his career years earlier as part of the underground scene in Puerto Rico. “Gasolina” not only became tremendously popular within Latin music, but also made inroads into mainstream US pop with rotation on English-language radio stations and television outlets. Industry leaders took notice, and reggaetón was declared the next big thing with new radio stations, endorsement deals, and record labels springing up around the United States. Several scholars have addressed reggaetón’s move into mainstream Latin music and US pop. Marshall 2009 maps out the trajectory of reggaetón from its beginnings as underground to its insertion into the mainstream Latin music industry. Pacini Hernandez 2010 situates reggaetón’s success in the United States within the broader history of the Latin music industry. This included the development of a new “Hurban”—or “Hispanic urban”—radio format targeting bicultural Latina/o youth interested in a new sound that reflected both their Latin American roots and their connections to US urban life and hip-hop culture. Rossman 2012 examines the development of Hurban radio stations in relation to larger trends in creating and modifying radio markets. Of course, not everyone reacted so positively to reggaetón’s crossover success. Rivera 2011 traces the rise of anti-reggaetón fan websites that actively promote the music’s demise. The creation of such websites thus demonstrates the perceived power of reggaetón, not only musically, but also in terms of its social messages and constructions of Latinidad. Given the popularity of reggaetón across various music industry markets such as Latin pop, hip-hop, and Top 40, more scholarship is needed on how reggaetón’s crossover has shifted the music’s sounds, aesthetics, and social location.
  273.  
  274. Marshall, Wayne. “From Música Negra to Reggaeton Latino: The Cultural Politics of Nation, Migration, and Commercialization.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 19–76. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
  275.  
  276. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  277.  
  278. Outlines the development of reggaetón from Puerto Rican underground and Panamanian reggae en español in the 1990s to the crossover reggaetón of the mid-2000s. Considers both shifts in the music’s sound as well as the cultural politics and social aspects of the music.
  279.  
  280. Find this resource:
  281.  
  282.  
  283. Pacini Hernandez, Deborah. Oye Como Va! Hybridity and Identity in Latino Popular Music. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2010.
  284.  
  285. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  286.  
  287. Analyzes racial and cultural hybridity in the development of various Latin music genres in the United States. Chapter 4 incorporates reggaetón into a larger discussion of Latino musical practices produced on turntables. Chapter 7 examines marketing practices in the music industry to attract bicultural Latinos, including the creation of the “Hurban” category.
  288.  
  289. Find this resource:
  290.  
  291.  
  292. Rivera, Michelle M. “The Online Anti-reggaeton Movement: A Visual Exploration.” In Seeing in Spanish: From Don Quixote to Daddy Yankee; 22 Essays on Hispanic Visual Cultures. Edited by Ryan Prout and Tilmann Altenberg, 281–299. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars, 2011.
  293.  
  294. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  295.  
  296. Argues that the crossover of reggaetón included the music industry’s conflating reggaetón with a quintessential urban Latino subject. Anti-reggaetón websites countered this portrayal through national and global alliances that criticized reggaetón’s commercialization and sexual politics, and embraced other genres instead.
  297.  
  298. Find this resource:
  299.  
  300.  
  301. Rossman, Gabriel. “But Which Chart Do You Climb?” In Climbing the Charts: What Radio Airplay Tells Us about the Diffusion of Information. By Gabriel Rossman, 71–90. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2012.
  302.  
  303. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  304.  
  305. Examines the development of different formats in radio station programming and their relationships to various genres of music. Uses the rise of reggaetón in the United States and the innovation of the “Hurban” format as an example of how radio stations create new formats to target diverse audiences.
  306.  
  307. Find this resource:
  308.  
  309.  
  310. Reggaetón and US Latino Identities
  311. The crossover success of reggaetón into mainstream Latin music markets, as well as some US pop charts, sparked an interest among both industry executives and scholars on the relationship between the music and US Latino identities. Dominant constructions of Latinidad in the United States have historically emphasized pan-Latino unity that links together people of diverse national origins into one ethnic group. Pacini Hernandez 2010 includes a brief discussion of how the Latin music industry imagined a bicultural Latino audience that transcended ethnicities as the target for reggaetón. Cepeda 2009 and Kattari 2009 examine how reggaetón artists themselves often extoll pan-Latino unity. Still, Cepeda 2009 points out that, while some reggaetón recordings and music videos may express pan-Latino identity, they also can be exclusionary. Indeed, this is not surprising given that many of the general critiques of pan-Latinidad involve the ways that these constructions gloss over the ethnic and racial diversity of Latinos. Rivera 2011 points out that anti-reggaetón fan sites emerged in response to the music industry’s touting of a universal urban Latino subject as the symbol of Latinidad. More broadly, contestations concerning dominant constructions of pan-Latinidad involve the continued attachment to specific ethnic identities. For example, Rivera-Servera 2011 demonstrates how the integration of reggaetón into the queer Latino club scene in Phoenix, Arizona, allowed for the club to present itself as cosmopolitan while also maintaining its ties to regional Mexican identity. Another critique of Latinidad is that it marginalizes indigenous and Afro-Latino groups through attributing a racially mixed and whitened racial identity to Latinos. In this vein, Rivera 2011 focuses on Notch, a reggaetón artist based in the United States who uses his music to underscore the connections between Latinos, African Americans, and West Indians as African diasporic subjects in the face of a whitened perception of Latinidad. In sum, these texts demonstrate the ways that the music industry marketed reggaetón as a symbol of pan-Latinidad, and the subsequent rebuffs of this strategy that furthered the contestations surrounding pan-Latino unity more generally.
  312.  
  313. Cepeda, María Elena. “Media and the Musical Imagination: Comparative Discourses of Belonging in ‘Nuestro Himno’ and ‘Reggaetón Latino.’” Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 16.5 (2009): 548–572.
  314.  
  315. DOI: 10.1080/10702890903172702Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  316.  
  317. Considers the concept of cultural citizenship in “Nuestro Himno,” a Spanish-language version of the “Star-Spangled Banner” recorded during pro-immigrant protests in 2006, and Don Omar’s music video for “Reggaetón Latino.” Discusses how each song produces contradictory ideas of familia that appear to unite Latino groups, but also can prove exclusionary.
  318.  
  319. Find this resource:
  320.  
  321.  
  322. Kattari, Kim. “Building Pan-Latino Unity in the United States through Music: An Exploration of Commonalities between Salsa and Reggaetón.” Musicological Explorations 10 (2009): 105–136.
  323.  
  324. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  325.  
  326. Compares the development of salsa and reggaetón as symbols of pan-Latinidad in the United States. Focuses on their musical hybridity alongside lyrics that celebrate barrio life and Latino and/or pan-Latin American unity.
  327.  
  328. Find this resource:
  329.  
  330.  
  331. Pacini Hernandez, Deborah. Oye Como Va! Hybridity and Identity in Latino Popular Music. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2010.
  332.  
  333. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  334.  
  335. Examines the racial and cultural hybridity of Latin music, including how this hybridity speaks to bicultural Latino youth in the United States at different moments in history. Chapter 7 details how the crossover of reggaetón entailed the development of marketing strategies to target bicultural Latino youth audiences.
  336.  
  337. Find this resource:
  338.  
  339.  
  340. Rivera, Michelle M. “The Online Anti-reggaeton Movement: A Visual Exploration.” In Seeing in Spanish: From Don Quixote to Daddy Yankee; 22 Essays on Hispanic Visual Cultures. Edited by Ryan Prout and Tilmann Altenberg, 281–299. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars, 2011.
  341.  
  342. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  343.  
  344. Examines anti-reggaetón fan websites that promote alternative national and global Latino and Latin American identities to counter the urban Latino audience associated with reggaetón that the music industry represented as the symbol of Latinidad.
  345.  
  346. Find this resource:
  347.  
  348.  
  349. Rivera, Petra R. “‘Tropical Mix’: Afro-Latino Space and Notch’s Reggaetón.” Popular Music and Society 34.2 (2011): 221–235.
  350.  
  351. DOI: 10.1080/03007766.2010.510920Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  352.  
  353. Analyzes the music video “Qué te pica” by US-based dancehall/reggaetón artist Notch. Argues that Notch’s work expresses an Afro-Latino identity that counters the whitening bias of dominant constructions of US Latinidad, but that also reinforces problematic gender stereotypes.
  354.  
  355. Find this resource:
  356.  
  357.  
  358. Rivera-Servera, Ramón H. “Dancing Reggaetón with Cowboy Boots.” In Transnational Encounters: Music and Performance at the U.S.-Mexico Border. Edited by Alejandro L. Madrid, 373–392. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
  359.  
  360. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  361.  
  362. Analyzes how two queer Latino clubs in Phoenix, Arizona, represent diverse perceptions of Latinidad. Emphasizes the intersections of socioeconomic class and Latinidad through the various ways that reggaetón is incorporated or not into the clubs’ marketing and music.
  363.  
  364. Find this resource:
  365.  
  366.  
  367. Blackness and Reggaetón
  368. One of the key themes in scholarship about reggaetón is the music’s ties to blackness and racial politics, particularly in the Puerto Rican context. Reggaetón’s links to hip-hop and dancehall extend beyond the musical to the shared experiences of the urban African diasporic communities across the Americas that created these genres. Reggaetón artists and fans incorporate styles, fashions, vocabulary, and other aesthetics from the African diaspora. Nevertheless, much of the research about reggaetón’s racial politics specifically deals with Puerto Rico; indeed, reggaetón has served as a space to articulate critiques about racism in Puerto Rico. Rivera 1997 and Santos Febres 1997 consider expressions of blackness in underground music in the early to mid-1990s. Rivera-Rideau 2015 explores reggaetón’s ties to blackness and the broader African diaspora from underground through the mid-2000s. Reggaetón artist Tego Calderón has received much attention from scholars because of the explicit racial critiques in his music. Rivera-Rideau 2013 considers how Calderón extends a cultural politics of blackness expressed by earlier salsa artists Rafael Cortijo and Ismael Rivera, while Rivera-Rideau 2015 contains a chapter that addresses how Calderón navigates various constructions of blackness in his music, performance, and political critique. In Rivera 2004 and Calderón 2009, Tego Calderón describes his own experiences with racism, and his connections to Afro-Puerto Rican folklore and identity. Rudolph 2011 analyzes the work of reggaetón artist Don Omar, another singer known for his expressions of black identity in his music. The author discusses how both local Puerto Rican signifiers of blackness as well as ideas about blackness from US hip-hop culture inform Don Omar’s work. Rivera-Servera 2016 extends the discussion of race beyond Puerto Rico to argue that the black aesthetics of reggaetón provide opportunities for women dancers to express agency and sexuality that counter the respectability politics found in Puerto Rico and in other Latino communities. Overall, scholars’ attention to reggaetón’s racial politics reflects the broader ways that the genre has critiqued Puerto Rican race relations and provided possibilities for articulating new ideas about Afro-Puerto Rican (and, more broadly, Afro-Latino) identities.
  369.  
  370. Calderón, Tego. “Black Pride.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 324–326. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
  371.  
  372. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  373.  
  374. Describes Tego Calderón’s personal experiences with racism in Puerto Rico and elsewhere in Latin America. Argues against the perception that Latin America is a racial paradise. Calls for more education in Puerto Rico to combat racism.
  375.  
  376. Find this resource:
  377.  
  378.  
  379. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Rap in Puerto Rico: Reflections from the Margins.” In Globalization and Survival in the Black Diaspora: The New Urban Challenge. Edited by Charles Green, 109–127. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1997.
  380.  
  381. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  382.  
  383. Argues that underground of the mid-1990s is the voice of marginalized youth in Puerto Rico. Foregrounds underground artists’ and fans’ ties to blackness and articulations of a racial discourse that conflict with dominant narratives of Puerto Rican identity.
  384.  
  385. Find this resource:
  386.  
  387.  
  388. Rivera, Raquel Z. “Entrevista a Tego Calderón.” CENTRO Journal 16.2 (Fall 2004): 272–280.
  389.  
  390. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  391.  
  392. Interview with reggaetón artist Tego Calderón. Discusses his childhood, his musical training, his musical influences (including US rap, Afro-Puerto Rican bomba (a folkloric music and dance), and salsa), his family life, authenticity and identity in reggaetón, and other topics. Written in Spanish.
  393.  
  394. Find this resource:
  395.  
  396.  
  397. Rivera-Rideau, Petra R. “‘Cocolos Modernos’: Salsa, Reggaetón, and Puerto Rico’s Cultural Politics of Blackness.” Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Studies 8.1 (2013): 1–19.
  398.  
  399. DOI: 10.1080/17442222.2013.768459Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  400.  
  401. Analyzes music by salsa legends Rafael Cortijo and Ismael Rivera alongside the music of reggaetón artist Tego Calderón. Argues that a cultural politics of blackness characterized by a larger African diasporic politics as well as antiracist protest in Puerto Rico links salsa and reggaetón together.
  402.  
  403. Find this resource:
  404.  
  405.  
  406. Rivera-Rideau, Petra R. Remixing Reggaetón: The Cultural Politics of Race in Puerto Rico. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015.
  407.  
  408. DOI: 10.1215/9780822375258Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  409.  
  410. Explores how reggaetón’s connections to the African diaspora and expressions of black Puerto Rican identities point out the inconsistencies in Puerto Rican racial democracy that defines Puerto Ricans as whitened via a history of race mixture. Examines the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality in reggaetón from underground through the mid-2000s.
  411.  
  412. Find this resource:
  413.  
  414.  
  415. Rivera-Servera, Ramón H. “Reggaetón’s Crossings: Black Aesthetics, Latina Nightlife, and Queer Choreography.” In No Tea, No Shade: New Writings in Black Queer Studies. Edited by E. Patrick Johnson, 95–112. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016.
  416.  
  417. DOI: 10.1215/9780822373711-006Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  418.  
  419. Argues that reggaetón’s “black aesthetics” allow women dancers to express agency and pleasure in ways that underscore feminist and queer identities and politics. Demonstrates how reggaetón’s black aesthetics provide opportunities for Latinos to engage with their own blackness.
  420.  
  421. Find this resource:
  422.  
  423.  
  424. Rudolph, Jennifer Domino. “Pidieron Cacao: Latinidad and Black Identity in the Reggaetón of Don Omar.” CENTRO Journal 23.1 (Spring 2011): 31–53.
  425.  
  426. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  427.  
  428. Analyzes reggaetón artist Don Omar’s performances of various constructions of blackness, including Afro-Puerto Ricanness as well as the “gangsta” figure tied to rap. Considers how black masculinity and capital inform Don Omar’s constructions of Latinidad.
  429.  
  430. Find this resource:
  431.  
  432.  
  433. Santos Febres, Mayra. “Geografía en decíbeles: Utopías pancaribeñas y el territorio del rap.” In Primer Simposio de Caribe 2000: Re-definiciones; Espacios global/nacional/cultural/personal-caribeño. Edited by Lowell Fiet and Janette Becerra, 121–136. Río Piedras: Universidad de Puerto Rico Recinto de Río Piedras, 1997.
  434.  
  435. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  436.  
  437. Maps out the geographies associated with mid-1990s underground, including connections to the larger African diaspora, particularly Jamaica and New York City. Considers how the alternative geographies of underground provide spaces to celebrate marginalized communities normally neglected or stigmatized by the Puerto Rican state. Written in Spanish.
  438.  
  439. Find this resource:
  440.  
  441.  
  442. Gender, Sexuality, and Reggaetón
  443. One of the main criticisms of reggaetón from fans, scholars, policymakers, and others is that the music is misogynistic and homophobic. Indeed, reggaetón contains many hypermasculine and heteronormative representations that further stereotypes black and brown hypersexuality. More specifically, representations of women in song lyrics and music videos have ignited tremendous controversy, including hearings in the Puerto Rican Congress in 2002. Reggaetón’s accompanying dance perreo that generally features a woman gyrating her hips provocatively back-to-front with her male partner provoked discussions about reggaetón’s moral influence on the sexuality of young Puerto Ricans. Fairley 2006 examines how the dance in Cuba impacts larger understandings of gender roles and sexuality on the island. In a different take on the possibilities of dance spaces, Rivera-Servera 2011 explores how dancing to reggaetón produces ideas about Latinidad and its intersections with socioeconomic class, regional (pan)ethnic identities, and sexuality in Phoenix’s queer Latino club circuit. On another note, Rivera-Servera 2016 argues for a feminist reading of perreo dance that centers women’s “erotic agency” (p. 104) rather than only rendering women dancers as objectified and submissive. While women are often overrepresented as sexual objects in music videos and song lyrics, few women artists have achieved the same level of international popularity as their male counterparts. One exception is Ivy Queen, who began her career as an underground artist with DJ Negro’s crew The Noise. Ivy Queen is known for her rapping skills, her lyrics from a woman’s perspective, and the change in her look. As the most visible woman artist in the genre, Ivy Queen has attracted the attention of several scholars in works such as Báez 2006 and Jiménez 2009. Other scholars focus more specifically on representations of masculinity in reggaetón; for example, Rudolph 2011 examines how artist Don Omar reproduces problematic gender tropes, while Nieves Moreno 2009 considers how Residente of Calle 13 disrupts many of the assumptions about masculinity associated with reggaetón. Ultimately, all of these texts point out the complex and contradictory representations of gender and sexuality within reggaetón, which, on the one hand, reinforce many problematic stereotypes of hypersexuality and, on the other, offer spaces of opportunity to foreground alternative notions of gender and sexual identities.
  444.  
  445. Báez, Jillian M. “‘En mi imperio’: Competing Discourses of Agency in Ivy Queen’s Reggaetón.” CENTRO Journal 28.2 (Fall 2006): 63–81.
  446.  
  447. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  448.  
  449. Examines the contradictions of Ivy Queen’s performances and persona that proclaim women’s agency within a male-dominated social context and remain constrained by heteronormative and sexist conventions in the music industry and Latin American cultures more generally. Argues that gender representations in reggaetón require a complex and intersectional analysis.
  450.  
  451. Find this resource:
  452.  
  453.  
  454. Fairley, Jan. “Dancing Back to Front: Regeton, Sexuality, Gender, and Transnationalism in Cuba.” Popular Music 25 (October 2006): 471–488.
  455.  
  456. DOI: 10.1017/S026114300600105XSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  457.  
  458. Explores gender and sexuality in regeton (reggaetón) dancing in Cuba. Questions whether the dance style empowers women or reproduces gender discrimination on the island in the context of the Special Period and the rise of prostitution and sex tourism. Considers backlash to regeton in Cuba by the revolutionary government.
  459.  
  460. Find this resource:
  461.  
  462.  
  463. Jiménez, Félix. “(W)rapped in Foil: Glory at Twelve Words a Minute.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 229–251. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
  464.  
  465. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  466.  
  467. Analyzes different performances of womanhood and sexuality by reggaetón artists Glory and Ivy Queen. Examines why Glory, known for her backup vocals for many male artists, could not achieve the same success as solo artist Ivy Queen, the most well-known female artist.
  468.  
  469. Find this resource:
  470.  
  471.  
  472. Nieves Moreno, Alfredo. “A Man Lives Here: Reggaeton’s Hypermasculine Resident.” In Reggaeton. Edited by Raquel Z. Rivera, Wayne Marshall, and Deborah Pacini Hernández, 252–279. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2009.
  473.  
  474. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  475.  
  476. Focuses on the lyrics, performances, music videos, and persona of Residente, lead singer of Calle 13. Demonstrates how Residente’s representation of masculinity troubles the figure of the “barriocentric macho” (p. 225) that dominates reggaetón. Argues that this offers Residente a space to make claims to a more ambiguous and complex masculinity.
  477.  
  478. Find this resource:
  479.  
  480.  
  481. Rivera-Servera, Ramón H. “Dancing Reggaetón with Cowboy Boots.” In Transnational Encounters: Music and Performance at the U.S.-Mexico Border. Edited by Alejandro L. Madrid, 373–392. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
  482.  
  483. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  484.  
  485. Explores the emergence of reggaetón in two Latino queer nightclubs in Phoenix, Arizona. Uses the choice of one particular club to integrate reggaetón into its repertoire in order to point out the ways that socioeconomic class, regional, and pan-Latino identities intersect with sexuality in diverse ways.
  486.  
  487. Find this resource:
  488.  
  489.  
  490. Rivera-Servera, Ramón H. “Reggaetón’s Crossings: Black Aesthetics, Latina Nightlife, and Queer Choreography.” In No Tea, No Shade: New Writings in Black Queer Studies. Edited by E. Patrick Johnson, 95–112. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016.
  491.  
  492. DOI: 10.1215/9780822373711-006Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  493.  
  494. Argues that reggaetón’s black aesthetics allow for women dancers to express agency, pleasure, and sexualities that counter assumptions that perreo always objectifies women. Acknowledges the contradictions inherent to these performances, but also emphasizes “erotic agency” (p. 104) as a significant form of queer and feminist politics within Latino communities.
  495.  
  496. Find this resource:
  497.  
  498.  
  499. Rudolph, Jennifer Domino. “Pidieron Cacao: Latinidad and Black Identity in the Reggaetón of Don Omar.” CENTRO Journal 23.1 (Spring 2011): 31–53.
  500.  
  501. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  502.  
  503. Considers how reggaetón artist Don Omar navigates various constructions of blackness and Latinidad via hypermasculine tropes such as the “gangsta” (p. 36), the Puerto Rican “negro” (p. 38), and the hip-hop “nigga” (p. 42). Explores how expressions of hypermasculinity both reinforce stereotypes of race and gender and assert power and pride in marginalized identities.
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