> Even the term hip hop—which Van Der Meer and Tate knew to be multifaceted—has mostly shrunk down to mean "the popular shit people saw on TV and heard on mains

> Even the term hip hop—which Van Der Meer and Tate knew to be multifaceted—has mostly shrunk down to mean "the popular shit people saw on TV and heard on mainstream radio." Rich Purcell, an English professor at the University of Mississippi, affirms this idea: “The hip hop I knew was a culture. It was capacious. It was unwieldy. It was more than rap. To conflate it with rap music is the easiest and most reductive way to discuss what hip hop is.” This is the key. Words create worlds. Hip hop - much like journalism and leadership - has morphed into something that has little if anything to do with its original meaning. Hip hop is used as a synonym with rapping, which immediate cuts out the DJ'ing, break dancing, and graffiti. A table going from multiple legs down to just one leg isn't going to stand very long.