How The Pulitzer Jury Opened Its Doors To Hip-Hop
In the annals of American culture, Kendrick Lamar's unprecedented Pulitzer win in music for DAMN. will stand alongside a recent influx of hip-hop firsts: Jay-Z's 2017 induction into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame, LL Cool J's 2017 Kennedy Center Honors and the entire slew of artists who — to paraphrase a George Clinton classic — helped paint the White House rap during Obama's presidency.
But Lamar's Pulitzer win may constitute the first time a high-minded institution has seen fit to place an insurgent and equally popular rap artist, in the prime of his career, within America's canon of heralded music composers. It comes at a time increasingly defined by unapologetic blackness, from the cinematic phenomenon of Black Panther (which Lamar coincidentally soundtracked) to last weekend's epic festival black-out now known as Beychella.
Monday's announcement may have irked some in the world of classical music, the Pulitzer committee's perennial fave () but it's also given hip-hop heads plenty to ponder: What other rap classics, for instance, might be Pulitzer worthy in hindsight and what does this recognition mean for the future of the genre?
