Currents of Militarization, Flows of Hip-Hop: Expanding the Geographies of Filipino American Culture

Abstract

This article demonstrates how Filipino American hip-hop performance reflects a history of U.S. militarization within Filipino diasporic communities. I argue that Filipino American emcee Geologic’s biography and poetics exemplify the cultural politics emanating from militarized Filipino American communities. I contend that these cultural politics are represented in a “Filipino American hip-hop vernacular,” a set of popular cultural practices emerging out of the shadows of U.S.-Philippine colonial and neocolonial encounter.