Artistic Comparisons of Art Forms Through The Nutcracker: Legitimizing Hip Hop

Abstract

Hip Hop is an art form that has spanned the past few decades, imbued with rich culture, history, and movement. Yet, the art form is not as appreciated in society and in academia as art forms such as ballet. The aim of this study is to evaluate the qualitative and artistic aspects of Hip Hop and ballet to determine the success of both art forms and thereby argue for the legitimacy of Hip Hop as an art form. The comparison was analyzed through a content analysis of different versions of The Nutcracker, a highly esteemed dance production. The first phase of this study examined the development of Hip Hop and ballet, current research touching on the legitimacy of both art forms, and the development of The Nutcracker and past practices used to evaluate movement. The second phase involved the development of a rubric based on past performance evaluations to analyze a Hip Hop version and a traditional ballet version of The Nutcracker. Both versions were assessed through an online format because of the reachability of such a medium. The rubric was separated into three categories: dynamics, expressiveness, and technique, and findings showed that both dances received an overall score of 2.72 out of 3 points, with both dances falling short on different criteria in the rubric. It was concluded that the content analysis could help to advance the legitimacy of Hip Hop to match that of ballet due to the equivalent artistic successes of both art forms.