« Getting the city on lock »: imaginaires géographiques et stratégies d’authentification dans le rap en France et aux États-Unis

Space has long been central to the analysis of rap music. Regarded as emerging from specific urban contexts, this genre is seen as conveying a strong spatial rootedness, as rappers are often willing to "represent" their city or region. On the contrary, this paper will show how they are constructed at the crossroad of different scales and contexts of practice. With case studies in Lille (France) and Atlanta (United States), I will observe how these representations are shaped both by pre-existing images of place and by strategies carried out by rappers, with the aim of asserting their authenticity.