Speech Perception as a Function of Rap Expertise: Half-Rhyme Judgments in Expert Rappers Versus Laypersons

• In Event: Hip-Hop Roundtable 3

Abstract

Educating responsibly demands an asset-based accounting of the intellectual and cultural practices of marginalized communities. Such assets can be missed if assessed only in relation to narrowly defined standards of intellectual competence. The present study uses psycholinguistic methods to investigate the relationship between rap expertise and speech perception, examining a learning outcome associated with Hip-Hop culture, and assessing its value independently of the existing structures and/or priorities of schooling. According to a perception-based and a feature-based measure of psychoacoustic similarity, lyricists were distinct from non-lyricists in the rates at which they found half-rhymes acceptable as a function of psychoacoustic distance, suggesting that lyricists are more attuned to similar aspects of speech sounds. Implications for education are discussed.

Author

• Keith G. Cross, University of Hawaii - Manoa