Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
On Loop: Black Sonic Politics in Oakland

On Loop: Black Sonic Politics in Oakland

Werth, Alex

Hardcover

General World HistoryHip HopRegional: West

ISBN10: 0520416066
ISBN13: 9780520416062
Publisher: University of California Press
Published: Oct 21 2025
Pages: 376
Weight: 1.53
Height: 1.00 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
How struggles over Black sound have shaped Oakland's culture, politics, and geography.

Chicago has house. Detroit has techno. But Oakland slaps.

On Loop explores the role of Black dance music and sonic politics in recurring struggles over race and space in Oakland, California. Insisting on the centrality of sound in everyday social movements--from the mobilization of funk music and boogaloo dance during Black Power to the policing of the Hyphy movement in the 2000s--Alex Werth argues that Black dance music is not merely a soundtrack to or record of urban resistance. Rather, its very sound waves have animated looping clashes over development, dispossession, and Black freedom. Through studies of downtown nightclubs, Lake Merritt, and the Eastmont Mall--geographies rarely considered, yet critical to Oakland's culture and politics--Werth reveals how the liberatory sonic politics of funk, hip-hop, and hyphy rap have been met with a repetitive war on nuisance.

As both a means of empowerment and a magnet for policing, Black dance music has transformed not only Oakland's nightlife, but also its streets, parks, and neighborhoods. On Loop is a rousing encounter with the sound that moves urban life.

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