Record the track and track the record: On the call‐and‐response dynamics in Hip Hop practice

Abstract

Call-and-response has primarily been studied in Black Atlantic artistic traditions. We transpose call-and-response dynamics to the writing and recording process of a Hip Hop studio session. Combining collaborative autoethnography with formal analysis and using Communication Accommodation Theory's conceptual parameters of conscious and subconscious convergence and divergence, we explore how our output and expression as practitioners are relationally affected in terms of rhyme, content, and flow. We argue this focus on intersubjectivity offers a window into how identities—here via Hip Hop practice and its engagement with language, music, and history—are in a process of “becoming” in real time.