Rap, Reggae, and White Minoritization

Abstract

This chapter examines the significance of music in radical white nationalist activism in the Nordic countries. The focus of the chapter is a change in how nationalists look at the relation between their ideological dogmas and music. For decades, the consensus was that the music had to be white, but in the 2000s young activists started to challenge this norm, introducing genres such as hip hop and reggae. The analysis looks beyond the literature’s conventional focus on how the music supports activism to instead examine racial constructions through music, arguing that the introduction of black genres involved a new conception of whiteness. The case studies include the rappers Zyklon Boom and Juice from Sweden, as well as a song by Nordic Youth.