LAUSR

ABSTRACT In this paper, I explore how Hip-Hop enthusiasts in the Adelaide and Melbourne scenes related their practices to a romanticised ‘American’ or ‘South Bronx’ origin point. I draw on ethnographic research conducted from 2006 to 2008 to show that while some Hip-Hop fans and artists worked to connect their beliefs and behaviours to an idealised past, others sought to separate themselves from these historical narratives and to establish Australian Hip-Hop as a distinct cultural form. These differences created tensions as people debated how authenticity should be assessed in the Australian context and what it meant to be a Hip-Hop practitioner in Australia.