appropriation
Questlove Gives Definitive Take on Iggy Azalea's Hip-Hop Posturing
Rich Juzwiak · 07/23/14 02:30PMIs platinum-certified, platinum-haired Australian rapper Iggy Azalea a racist, or a harmless drag queen? Is she a racist drag queen? Are all drag queens racists? Are all racists drag queens? Who knows! Well, one man does, certainly: Roots drummer/author/curator Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson. Questlove is just about the wisest music expert pop culture currently has, and in an interview with TIME, he weighs in on the woman who has set so many social-justice-inclined fingers aflutter this summer.
James Franco Explains Why He Ripped Off Those Nudes of Seth Rogen
Rich Juzwiak · 05/14/14 08:10AMJames Franco's paintings of a nude Seth Rogen are not exactly his — they're based on a series of drawings by Pinups magazine editor Christopher Schulz that were released in 2011. On today's Today show, Franco admitted that the renderings were not his idea, but explained that they should have been, so he felt justified to take them for his own.
In Defense of Miley Cyrus
Rich Juzwiak · 08/26/13 02:27PMPeople in Harlem Confirm That the Harlem Shake is Not the Harlem Shake
Rich Juzwiak · 02/19/13 06:45PMAnyone with eyes and a memory that goes back at least to the early '00s advent of Bad Boy Records knows that the meme or whatever it is of people convulsing arhythmically that is currently masquerading as the "Harlem Shake" is not the Harlem Shake. A filmmaker named Chris McGuire took to Harlem for man-on-the-street reactions and what starts as a jokey sort of montage gains intensity for the impassioned anti-appropriation sentiment the nu-Shake provokes. "It's not no dance, it's really a lifestyle," says one guy. "It's actually an art form, a dance art form that doesn't have the respect it deserves," says another. "Injustice," says yet another.
Go Ahead and Throw All the Shade You Want, Straight People
Rich Juzwiak · 01/30/13 05:40PMJoy Behar Really Gets Radar, Whoopi and Sherri Offended
Joshua Stein · 10/16/07 01:55PMThe on-again-off-again magazine Radar recently put out an issue. Surprising, we know! But there was more. The cover featured Rudy Giuliani, Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama au natural in an homage to Vanity Fair's Tom Ford cover. Some of the ladies on 'The View' were offended. Others weren't. At one point Ms. Behar appeared to read from Sherri Shepherd's cue card. "Rudy looks like a pimp, Hillary looks like a ho and Barack is on the DL," she said, looking as if she had learned the line phonetically. A more accurate limn might be that Rudy is the well-dressed gay one, Hillary has the ability to rebound from clunkers (Domino, Healthcare plan) and Barack is the ingenue. But, of course, that would rob Behar of the Judith Butlerian thrill of appropriating the patois of sexual and racial minorities. That is fierce!