Wotcher,
As we all know well, "Ayy Kaye forty seven is the rule/ don't make me act a motherfucking fool."
But need it be this way? From the creation of the AK-47 as a small arm weapons system in the late 1940s, could african american spoken word artists lionise a different small arm?
This is a difficult question. I believe we may take it as read that an african american tradition of spoken word musical arts will arise: it need not be hip-hop/rap/r&b but the deep vocal legacies of preaching, jazz and country will necessarily arise as a/many musics in the late 20th century in the United States. This is "sur" determined, an over determined cultural phenomena with too many antecedents to prevent without apocalypse or genocide. But why then the AK-47?
Between 1949 and 1980 many anti-imperialist struggles reinforced the AK-47 as the personal tool of "liberation." You may laugh. I too laugh while crying. But the phenomenon of the Soviet Union supporting apparently communist (no matter how tankie) will generalise the AK-47 in the use of apparently liberatory movements. And as an oppressed nationality african americans engaged in self-determination will reach out to tools around them, if only to the extent white idiots buy Maoist texts without reading or acting on them.
So where the ability to enculture another fire arm as a "freedom," weapon for african americans?
As a punk song sang, "Heckler and Koch, armourers of the free world: designed by nazi engineers who fled to Fraco's fascist spain…" any device can become freedom in ideology.
And the american market has so many select fire small arms available culturally. As contemporary general US culture proves, the AR-15 design can become a "freedom" arm to some.
At the core then is the issue of "white" america and "black" america and generally available small-arms that create an imaginary potential of freedom for african americans. To my mind availability and cultural recognition in anti-US struggle are the key. This includes any number of US manufactured small arms repurposed outside of the US. The garand, the m-14, the HK are all available. Indeed I'd suggest that retail availability in the 1970s during the (to my mind, inevitable) 1970s economic crisis is central. The Moist-Nugget is available here, culturally and for mass consumption.
Moist-Nuggets are the rule on the streets, I'll take your mother beneath my mother loving sheets.
yours,
Sam R.