Teaching in the age of gangster rap: Educators balancing risk,cultural freedom,and moral education

Abstract

The Swedish hip-hop landscape has changed with the emergence of the subgenre “gangster rap,” marked by drill-influences and references to criminality. While Swedish hip-hop historically has been used in education to promote empowerment and social engagement, the growth of gangster rap has introduced new educational tensions. Considering this, the aim of this study is to investigate how educators across the Swedish educational field navigate the presence of gangster rap within their respective practices. The empirical material consists of interviews with nine educators from three education settings. The interviews are analyzed using Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts of field, capital, and habitus. Findings show that educators orient their actions around three coexisting logics: a juridical logic foregrounding risk and legal considerations; a social logic centered on moral and relational implications; and a cultural logic emphasizing artistic expression and freedom.

Introduction

In this article, we explore the educational implications of the popular Swedish youth culture commonly – at least in public discourse and traditional, “adult” media – referred to as “gangster rap” (Söderman and Söderman, 2025). This “new wave” of Swedish hip-hop is characterized by lyrical and visual references to gang networks, street violence, and drug economies, often delivered in a raw, drill-influenced sound. Artists such as Einàr, Dre Low, and 1Cuz exemplify this subgenre, which combines an array of local urban narratives with global hip-hop esthetics. While media and policy debates frequently emphasize the genre’s associations with contemporary criminality, it simultaneously functions as a key site for identity formation, belonging, and cultural expression for young people. In this study our empirical focus and point of departure is directed toward Sweden, but similar developments toward a more nihilistic expression in hip-hop culture have been noted in the United States (see Stuart, 2020) and across Europe (see for instance Ahlers, 2019; Fatsis, 2023; Sanders and Mutsaers, 2025). In these contexts, hip-hop has likewise been intertwined with educational practices aimed at young people (see Hill and Petchauer, 2013; Laforgue-Bullido et al., 2024), and internationally, “hip-hop Education” has emerged as a growing research field concerned with issues at the intersections between hip-hop music and culture, and education. The scholarship is largely signified by an emphasis on the potential of hip-hop to support learning, agency, and engagement among marginalized children and youth (Campbell, 2022) rather than problematizing educational aspects and implications of hip-hop culture. The Swedish research context reflects the same tendencies (see Dankiç, 2019; Joosten, 2024; Sernhede, 2002; Snell and Söderman, 2014; Söderman, 2007, 2011), and much of Swedish hip-hop education has historically taken shape within popular and civil society education (Söderman, 2007, 2023). However, the shifting expressions and dynamics of youth culture also affect settings across the Swedish educational field, such as compulsory and upper-secondary schooling. This is partly due to the fact that national curricula premiers’ students’ participation in education as a democratic value. The curricula therefore stipulate that education should draw on students’ experiences, enable them to develop their cultural identities, and support their ability to express themselves through a variety of esthetic and cultural forms (see Englund, 1970). In this context youth culture therefore tends to be an integral part in the educational landscape. Consequently, the prominence of gangster rap in young people’s everyday lives is something that teachers in within the school system and throughout the educational field are likely to encounter and must find ways to relate to in their professional practice.

Aim

This study addresses the broader educational challenge of engaging with cultural expressions that are both meaningful to young people and socially or morally controversial. The specific aim is to investigate how educators across the Swedish educational field navigate the presence of gangster rap within their respective practices.

The research questions guiding the study are:

• i. What tensions and dilemmas do Swedish gangster rap generate for educators in different educational contexts?

• ii. How do educators navigate these tensions and which strategies do they employ to integrate or respond to gangster rap in their pedagogical practice?

Hip hop in the U.S., Europe, and Sweden

Before we delve into previous research at the intersection of hip-hop studies and education, we want to begin by deepening the understanding of hip-hop culture and the changes it has undergone in its local Swedish form since around 2018; as well as how it is intertwined with earlier forms of hip-hop as well as with crime and violence (see Söderman and Söderman, 2025).

Hip-hop culture first emerged in the United States in the 1970s in response to crime and violence in stigmatized areas of New York City, functioning as a counter-movement and a means for youths to articulate their experiences of urban hardship (Chang, 2006; Söderman and Sernhede, 2010). The four esthetic elements of hip-hop – rap, DJing, graffiti, and breakdancing – developed as socially responsive practices, with rap in particular serving as a medium through which young people expressed and negotiated experiences of violence, social marginalization, and survival (Rose, 1994, 2008). This perspective has later been reflected in both academic analyses and popular culture (e.g. the Netflix series The Get Down). Historically, this politically oriented “East Coast sound” is signified by its emphasis on social commentary and collective struggle, whereas the later West Coast variant of the late 1980s often embraced more nihilistic and gang-related narratives without necessarily being aimed at empowering or emancipation (Chang, 2006; Chuck, 1997). In the 2000s, subgenres such as “drill” have emerged, shaped in urban disadvantaged centers such as Chicago and Atlanta (Stuart, 2023), continuing the close, complex relationship between hip-hop, gang culture, and expressions of urban violence.

Following this American history of hip-hop music and culture, European hip-hop has emerged as a locally reinterpreted variant, producing hybrid national narratives and sounds that blend elements of American hip-hop with local identities and cultural traditions (Bennett, 1999a, 1999b; Nitzsche and Grünzweig, 2013). In Sweden, hip-hop’s development initially paralleled the East Coast narratives in its emancipatory focus, particularly during the 1990s when artists such as the Latin Kings and Petter popularized rap in Swedish. Like in 1970s Bronx, New York City, this allowed youth, particularly those with immigrant backgrounds, to identify with broader social struggles articulated in U.S. hip-hop and positioned the genre as both a medium of cultural expression and social commentary. Scholars have highlighted the role of hip-hop in reflecting the experiences of marginalized youth, facilitating identity formation, and engaging with social issues such as racism, inequality, and urban youth culture (Sernhede, 2002; Söderman, 2007). The contemporary Swedish hip-hop landscape has, however, undergone a notable esthetic and thematic shift with the rise of a subgenre often labeled “gangster rap,” gaining prominence since the late 2010s. New artists have popularized lyrical and visual styles that reference criminal networks, violence, and drug economies, raising concerns among the public as well as policymakers and educators (Arvidson, 2023; Ramic, 2019).

While media narratives emphasize risks associated with the music and culture, the label “gangster” is contested. Musically, the genre is closer to beforementioned “drill” than to the American West Coast tradition (Arvidson, 2023; Chang, 2006; Stuart, 2023). Nonetheless, the association between the subgenre and social issues such as gang activity makes it a culturally and politically salient phenomenon to navigate, not least for both formal and organic educators across the Swedish educational field. Scholarly attention to Swedish gangster rap however still remains limited; instead notable contributions include journalistic accounts such as Emil Arvidson’s Svensk Gangster Rap: Ett Reportage (2023) (Swedish gangster rap. A reportage, our translation); Diamant Salihu’s Tills alla dör (2021) (Until everone dies, our translation), and Sjors Joosten’s dissertation that partly focuses on the same genre (Joosten, 2024). All these texts distinguish between newer artists’ depictions of criminality and the emancipatory features of earlier Swedish hip-hop.

Previous research has highlighted how the important hip-hop cultural value of authenticity is constructed through artists’ proximity to criminal worlds (Dollinger, 2024; Dollinger and Rieger, 2023). This intersection is particularly relevant for understanding youth experiences, as the proximity to criminal worlds represented in gangster rap often resonates with and shapes the social realities of young people in marginalized areas. In Sweden, gangster rap has thus become central to youth culture, particularly in disadvantaged neighborhoods, shaping both identity and belonging. Studies show that youths in juvenile detention centers form strong attachments to these narratives, fostering solidarity yet sometimes conflicting with institutional goals (Silow Kallenberg, 2016). Parkkonen and Wiksell (2025) deepen this understanding by showing how Swedish gangster rap lyrics promote collective moral ambiguities that may counter possibilities for both individual and collective emancipation. Against this backdrop, educators must navigate the genre’s pedagogical potential while also managing institutional pressures, fears of administrative prohibition, and concerns about reputational risk (Kelly and Sawyer, 2024).

Hip-Hop pedagogy as a framework for youth education

This study is situated at the intersection of research on hip-hop pedagogy, gangster rap, and youth criminality, with a particular interest in the educational practices and conditions that emerge around them. Previous research has demonstrated the potential of hip-hop to engage young people academically, for instance in language learning (Chesley, 2011) and science education (Emdin, 2010). Hip-hop simultaneously functions as a key identity marker for marginalized youth and as a vehicle for social commentary and resistance (Brooks et al., 2015; Lock, 2005; Travis, 2013). Some scholars emphasize the educational benefits of hip-hop, while others highlight its potential to foster cultural awareness of social and racial inequalities (Tatum, 1999), connecting back to the lived realities of urban American youth that gave rise to the genre (Chang, 2006).

Since the early 2000s, Swedish scholarship has examined how hip-hop entered institutional and educational contexts (Sernhede, 2002; Söderman, 2007). Break-dancers, rappers, and DJs were often hired to teach their craft, and after-school hip-hop activities proliferated through state-funded study associations connected to civil-society movements, including labor, temperance, and evangelical organizations. These activities promoted hip-hop’s “each one teach one” ethos, resonating with Nordic welfare-state Bildung ideals, though some critiques have framed them as utopian social engineering (Trägårdh, 2018). Ringsager and Madsen (2022) caution that such programs may inadvertently reproduce marginalization, particularly among racialized youth. Similarly, the notion of “Folkhemsrap” underscores how global hip-hop messages intertwine with Swedish welfare-state ideals of equality (Bredström and Dahlstedt, 2002). In the U.S., critical hip-hop pedagogy has been framed as a Freirean strategy to engage students without academic traditions at home (Darder et al., 2003; Hill, 2009; Runell and Diaz, 2007). Practitioner endorsements range from Maxine Greene’s advocacy for curricula grounded in students’ lived experiences (quoted in Emdin, 2010) to Henry Giroux’s support for hip-hop in schools (Hill, 2009). Critiques stress the need for cultural competence and “engaged pedagogy” that encourages reflection on complex social issues (Gosa, 2010; Ross, 2012). Collectively, this body of research establishes hip-hop pedagogy as a fertile but contested terrain, foreshadowing the dilemmas educators face when gangster rap becomes the specific cultural form at stake.

Educational and youth-work dilemmas: Navigating controversial cultural expressions

Gangster rap’s association with criminality poses dilemmas for educators working across schools, youth programs, and juvenile detention settings. Historically, youth-culture research has also debated whether to engage with or reject controversial expressions. Concepts such as Krafeld (1996) “Akzeptierende Jugendarbeit” and Lindsay and Danner’s (2008) reflection on “accepting the unacceptable” advocate engagement over condemnation, a stance relevant to the educational negotiation of gangster rap. Ross’s (2012) engaged-pedagogy model similarly suggests that dialog around controversial content can foster critical reflection on inequality, identity, and the consequences of violence. Collectively, this literature illustrates a persistent challenge. Educators are expected to respect youths’ cultural worlds while safeguarding against potentially harmful influences. The present study is therefore directed toward exploring how educators across different settings navigate these competing imperatives in relation to their respective practice.

Theoretical framework

This study draws on Pierre Bourdieu’s sociological framework, particularly his concepts of field, capital, and habitus (Bourdieu, 2000) in order to analyze how teachers navigate the tensions surrounding Swedish gangster rap in their educational practices. Particularly we examine how educators’ responses to gangster rap reveal broader negotiations within educational settings that extend beyond traditional schools. Central to this analysis is Bourdieu’s notion of fields as autonomous social spaces structured by struggles over legitimate forms of capital (Bourdieu, 1984, 1990), where education generally navigates an inherent duality. On the one hand, education has been conceptualized as a relatively autonomous field with its own internal logics and stakes (Broady, 2011); on the other, it is simultaneously embedded in and intersecting with other fields. In relation to the musical field, educational institutions function not only as sites of learning but also as arenas of consecration, contributing to the legitimation of particular musical forms and hierarchies (Bouij, 1998; Eckerstein, 2025; Nylander, 2014). Educational institutions can also be understood as sites of investment in relation to other fields, where actors accumulate and convert capital in ways that extend beyond strictly pedagogical stakes (Lidegran, 2009). This multifaceted position complicates how cultural expressions such as gangster rap are received, as they are filtered through both pedagogical and esthetic regimes of value.

To deepen this field-theoretical perspective, the analysis particularly draws on Bourdieu’s notion of refraction – or field effects – which highlights how a field’s degree of autonomy shapes the way its agents perceive, interpret, and reconstruct external phenomena (Bourdieu, 1996a; Hilgers and Mangez, 2014). As the autonomy of a field increases, so does its tendency to filter external cultural expressions through its own internally generated logics, stakes, and evaluative criteria. In this context, teachers’ strategies for handling gangster rap may therefore be understood as refracted responses. They translate and reinterpret the genre through the specific principles, expectations, and struggles that structure the educational field. This perspective aligns with Bourdieu’s discussion of field autonomy and symbolic production in his work on the rules of art (Bourdieu, 1996b, 2000). Teachers’ strategies are therefore not to be understood as conscious or strategic choices; instead, they relate to Bourdieu’s conceptualization of habitus as dispositions shaped by one’s trajectory and position within social structures (Bourdieu, 1996b, 2000). Habitus serves here as a concept that explains how teachers’ responses to gangster rap are neither purely individual nor arbitrary but patterned by their professional histories and by institutional expectations tied to their specific roles. Furthermore, the concept of distinction (Bourdieu, 1984) helps illuminate how actors within the educational field mark boundaries – both internally and in relation to other cultural fields – regarding what counts as legitimate cultural expression. This provides a lens for understanding how teachers position gangster rap as a cultural form. By bringing together the concepts of field, habitus, capital, distinction, and refraction, this study analyzes how gangster rap becomes a site of negotiation within the educational field. This perspective makes visible how teachers balance competing expectations and how educational institutions, through their degree of autonomy and their role in cultural consecration, mediate broader cultural, and political discourses.

Methodology and design

The project is based on semi–structured interviews conducted with regular school-teachers and teachers in juvenile detention centers as well as hip-hop educators in after school programs, capturing relevant segments of the Swedish educational field. The empirical data is based on interviews carried out during year 2023–2024 including three school-teachers in the 9th and 10th grade, three teachers working in the school section of juvenile detention centers and finally three youth leaders (hip-hop educators) who are engaged in hip-hop activities for youth in civil society organizations.

To analyze the interview data, we employ a theoretically informed cultural analysis approach inspired by ethnologists Ehn and Löfgren (2001). This analytical method encompasses various specific ways of approaching empirical material to construct a valid interpretation of meaningful practices within a specific context (see Fornäs, 2012), in this case, the interview quotes surrounding gangster rap. Cultural analysis aims to achieve detailed, documentary–like descriptions (see Williams, 1958) that capture ongoing and contemporary changes in a defined context.

We specifically utilized the analytical steps proposed by Ehn and Löfgren (2001): perspectivization, contrasting, dramatization, and homologization. These steps allowed us to manipulate the empirical material analytically, leading to the identification of core values underpinning the narratives about gangster rap. Perspectivization is the first analytical step, wherein researchers distance themselves from and defamiliarize the everyday and familiar, allowing for new interpretations of the interview quotes (Ehn and Löfgren, 2001). For us, this meant striving to set aside our previous knowledge and interpretations of hip-hop to read the interview transcripts as independently as possible. We adopted a critical attitude toward prevailing perceptions, conducting several in–depth readings of the collected publications to uncover new angles in our analysis. Next, we applied contrasting, which involves testing different possible analyses and themes against one another to identify distinctive elements within the context. Previous research on hip-hop served as an important comparative framework, enabling us to analytically “see” new dimensions of our study. The third step, dramatization, involves adopting a playful attitude toward the empirical material. This entails engaging with the material creatively, considering what might be unthinkable within a given context. In this stage, comparisons to older popular hip-hop artists, songs, and other contemporary and historical Swedish genres were essential for broadening our perspective. Finally, homologization tests the coherence of our analysis across different themes, assessing whether the conclusions apply to various dimensions within the studied context, including specific types of publications. This step includes a critical evaluation of our conclusions, encompassing the question: Do the conclusions hold? This process continued until we distilled our findings into three final themes: Risk Awareness as juridical logic, Moral education and social logic and Artistic Freedom as cultural logic. These themes are elaborated under consequent thematic headings in the following.

Risk awareness as juridical logic

With the increasing presence of gangster rap in youth culture, educators and teachers who encounter the genre through their students express that they have become increasingly aware of its associated risks. All the teachers we interviewed, for instance, acknowledge the contemporary Swedish hip-hop scene’s connection to crime – either in relation to their own professional environment or as a broader awareness of the genre’s ties to and representations of gangs and youth criminality. In hip-hop educational youth programs, one of the educators, for instance, speaks about the risk of so-called “studio murders”: “The young people who participate in the program are usually well known to us, but not all of the hangarounds. That’s why one organization has decided that only two people may accompany participants at a time to various hip-hop activities.” The hip-hop educator also mentions that several well-known gangster rappers have previously attended the program, and in one of the rooms, a T-shirt hangs on the wall with their autographs. In light of the fact that some of these rappers are also involved in gang-related criminal activities, the symbolic value of the shirt can be interpreted as ambivalent. On the one hand, it represents a form of symbolic capital that resonates with the specific program; on the other hand, it serves as a reminder of the entanglement between music and criminality.

In hip-hop education programs, there also appears to be a particularly strong awareness of the genre’s connections to criminality, which can pose direct threats to participants.

And we shouldn’t deny that there are actual threats and real problems related to criminality, violence, drugs, and all sorts of destructive elements. We don’t want anything that is perceived as glorifying or celebrating negative emotions, and we certainly don’t want discriminatory lyrics or hate propaganda. (Hip-hop Educator)

As hip-hop increasingly becomes associated with risk, this also challenges the pedagogy of trust that such educators have traditionally relied on. Instead, they now express fear, anxiety, and concerns that they may be failing in their responsibility to protect young people, particularly in light of perceived generational gaps between themselves and the youth they encounter. To address these concerns, hip-hop educators are implementing preventive strategies and protective measures, aiming to manage the risks while still engaging with hip-hop as a cultural and educational resource. A teacher in a juvenile detention center also describes how he and his colleagues have adopted a “lyric policy” to counteract messages of hate and violence in lyrics produced by the youths:

We, as teachers, adopted our text policy because we felt that something was off. Should a guy who’s serving time for murder be sitting with me recording a song where he mocks the victims and says he’s going to shoot the rest of the family? This care costs 5,000 kronor per day, and I’m employed with taxpayer money to help this person move away from the destructive lifestyle. There is a real–world connection where this song, in a certain context, can lead to violence. The biggest gangs have rappers. It’s impossible to say that you should separate the music from the person because no one does that. The guys know exactly who is “real” and who is not. (Teacher at Juvenile Detention Centre)

In schools where hip-hop is not part of the curriculum, teachers still associate the genre with youth criminality and destructive life trajectories. At an inner-city high school, one teacher links a Swedish boy’s association with “urban” peers, his involvement in hip-hop, his sudden adoption of immigrant slang, and his eventual dropout from school.

We have a music studio here where quite a few guys tend to ‘hang out’ and play hip-hop music during breaks and certain creative classes. We used to have a Swedish boy who started spending more and more time there, and then he began speaking more and more ‘urban Swedish,’ and eventually he stopped coming to school altogether. (10th-grade teacher)

At a primary school in a suburban area, another teacher speaks about the importance of balancing risks with the opportunities for alternative forms of expression and activities for youth who might otherwise be drawn into criminal paths. The teacher also notes that there are existing problems with criminality in the school’s vicinity.

Teachers working in juvenile detention centers describe the risk of overlooking young people’s connections to criminal groups, as these are often expressed through hip-hop in ways that educators may not always be able to interpret or understand. Such connections – whether based on friendship or rivalry – pose risks for the educational environment. As teachers, they must therefore navigate various security measures related to the potential affiliations between students.

They should preferably not be involved with either friends or enemies. They are not allowed to bring songs they have recorded here that could cause problems outside the Juvenile Detention Centre. (Teacher at Juvenile Detention Centre)

Within the prison system, where detainees can be as young as 15, access to music equipment presents security concerns. One teacher, who works in a youth correctional facility, mentions how security restrictions impose on educational possibilities: “We cannot have certain music equipment due to security reasons.” This points to the force of the juridical over educational logic.

In summary, statements from teachers in various educational contexts indicate that gangster rap brings forth aspects related to the juridical field. Teachers in 9th and 10th grade describe the genre as an external factor that, to some extent, affects their work with teenagers –raising concerns about students being drawn into criminal environments. For these educators, gangster rap and its associated criminality are primarily seen as outside influences that occasionally surface within the school setting, suggesting a weaker orientation toward juridical logic compared to educators in hip-hop programs or teachers in juvenile detention and correctional facilities. For the latter, the risks linked to gangster rap – both potential and immediate – are an everyday concern that must be actively managed. Their approach to education is shaped by an acute awareness of these risks, where juridical logic informs both security measures and teaching strategies. However, even in mainstream educational settings, a heightened focus on risk can be understood as a way of addressing gangster rap – indicating that juridical logic is not only present in institutional regulations but also internalized in how educators negotiate the relationship between culture, safety, and their professional responsibilities.

Moral education as social logic

On the one hand, gangster rap seems to foreground the educational responsibility of fostering youth, while on the other, it appears to disrupt the traditional narratives of empowerment that have previously characterized hip-hop education in Sweden. The form of moral education that emerges in response to gangster rap follows a top-down logic, in which the adult world assumes a particular responsibility for guiding young people. Hip-hop educators, for instance, highlight how it has become increasingly difficult for them to navigate their role in fostering a new generation of artists within a shifting musical landscape. This transformation challenges the previously straightforward use of hip-hop as an educational tool.

The values at stake include educators’ responsibility for shaping young people’s worldviews, the role of hip-hop within educational efforts, and the normative considerations that educators must take into account when engaging with the genre. In response, educators are developing strategies to redefine the more emancipatory-infused old-school hip-hop as a constructive and educational force, with clear boundaries distinguishing it from contemporary gangster rap. A teacher working with ninth-grade students, for example, describes how the evolving lyrical expressions necessitate a form of protective oversight:

When I was there [at hip-hop education, within after school program] and looked into the music studio, some of the youth leaders were present, and I said, ”Oh, how nice, here they get to record music!” They responded, ”Yes, but we constantly have to check their lyrics and stuff.” I asked, ”Oh, do you mean the language?” They said, ”Yes, but it’s more that there’s a lot of glorification [of gangster culture] and they use some rough language. So, the youth leaders are involved in asking the right questions about their song lyrics.” (9th-grade teacher)

Another strategy linked to maintaining moral order involves upholding specific security restrictions, which are also educationally legitimized as a way to mitigate risks associated with gangster rap. At a youth correctional custody, a teacher explains that the incarcerated youths are not allowed to stream music via the internet and therefore listen to CDs instead:

They [the incarcerated youth] listen to old-school hip-hop. There is no internet, so they listen to CDs. They are only allowed to have a certain number of CDs, so they trade and inherit each other’s albums. (Teacher, correctional custody)

One hip-hop educator shares that they expect the young participants to always greet adults politely and shake hands when meeting visitors to the program. “You noticed that everyone shook your hand when you arrived,” he says, addressing the interviewer directly. This gesture reflects a social code of respectability that is actively cultivated within the program, in contrast to the aggressive postures often associated with gangster rap. The hip-hop educator further describes how he has personally grown weary of the increasing violence within the culture, a sentiment that intensified following the murder of rapper Einár. He explains how this shift has created a form of distancing between himself–once an ambassador for hip-hop–and the genre as it has evolved in recent years:

I have, in a way, been an ambassador for urban culture and urban rap and everything it involves. But now it has reached the point where gangs and crime control rap. I mean, almost every rapper is often a significant gang member. After what happened, with Einár’s murder and so on, I basically quit working with gangster rap and went public. Because everyone has seen me on social media everywhere, and you know, so I publicly announced that I’m stepping away from promoting gangster rap because I reached a point where: ”we’re doing hip-hop.” We’re not doing crime; I don’t want to have a bunch of criminals in a studio sitting around. (Hip-hop educator)

Gangster rap thus gives rise to educationally motivated distinctions. However, within hip-hop education, there is also an awareness that the extreme lyrical content is often temporary, something that may need to be expressed before young people can eventually move on from it:

There are 13- to 14-year-olds, sometimes even younger, who come up with lyrics during workshops and write about terrible things. In some way, they need to release that imagination and get it out of their system, but we try to help them shift their focus to something more constructive. (Hip-hop educator)

This statement suggests a strategy of framing gangster rap as part of youth development – something that will eventually lose its appeal as young people grow older. A teacher in the correctional system similarly notes that proximity to the realities portrayed in gangster rap often leads to disillusionment and maturation:

They come from the gangster rap culture, but they grow up and become a more mature version of themselves. The harshness fades; they become saturated with it. They realize that the lifestyle is not worth the cost. (Teacher, correctional custody)

In summary, statements from teachers and educators across different educational settings suggest that gangster rap not only foregrounds issues of moral education but also reinforces distinctions between authoritative and emancipatory educational logics. Within mainstream schooling, hip-hop education, and correctional facilities alike, educators navigate the tension between fostering creative expression and maintaining moral boundaries. The increased emphasis on adult responsibility and protective oversight suggests a shift toward a more top-down approach, where educators take on a gatekeeping role in determining what forms of cultural engagement are deemed appropriate for youth. This process can be understood as part of a broader negotiation of cultural legitimacy, in which educators seek to delineate the boundaries between “constructive” and “destructive” artistic expressions. In some cases, gangster rap is framed as a temporary phase – something young people will eventually outgrow – while in others, its perceived risks necessitate immediate intervention. The notion of moral education that emerges here does not merely involve teaching values but also constructing mechanisms of control that regulate access to culture, particularly within institutional settings such as schools, youth centers, and juvenile detention facilities. This highlights how gangster rap serves as a cultural site where social and educational distinctions are actively produced, reflecting broader struggles over authority, youth agency, and the role of education in shaping moral subjectivities.

Artistic freedom as cultural logic

Teachers’ approaches to gangster rap are, in several cases, characterized by an effort to align with the internal logics of culture and the autonomy of the artistic field, rather than with traditional pedagogical or moral ideals. This orientation is evident in several accounts that express a carefulness toward the young people’s own artistic expression when they write lyrics within the genre. This carefulness is manifested, among other things, in a reluctance to directly evaluate or correct the texts. Instead, emphasis is placed on fostering reflection and dialog, as a teacher in a juvenile detention center state: “It’s about creating a dialogue rather than just banning things outright. At the same time, we can’t let them walk out of here saying certain things – but banning it might just make it more tempting. . ..” Within hip-hop educational settings, this connects with a tradition of not interfering with the content of students’ lyrics, grounded in a belief in artistic freedom. However, this belief has come to be accompanied by concerns about whether the lyrics might include different forms of threats. This becomes particularly challenging when students rap in languages the educators do not understand according to a hip-hop educator: “If they rap about ugly or terrible things in Somali, I don’t understand it–and then I need someone to explain it to me. . ..” One hip-hop educator says that while he tries not to interfere too much with the participants’ lyrics, he does ask critical questions. Still, he emphasizes that it’s about striking a balance, because he strongly believes in artistic freedom.

This teacher’s approach can be understood as a strategic positioning at the intersection of different fields – where an acknowledgment of the intrinsic value of art (l’art pour l’art) allows for a distancing from direct moral or educational responsibility. At the same time, students’ artistic engagement is framed as a potential alternative to destructive life paths. In the following example, a teacher interprets students’ music-making as a process of cultural meaning-making, rather than as a reflection of actual criminality:

In the area where I live and work, things are calmer now. I don’t know. . . When Einár died, people realized that there was a connection between the music and gang crime. But my students. . . I mean it might be that they present themselves as the ”school’s gangsters,” but when they go to the youth center and record their own music, they come back here the next day and are like, “Listen to my song” and “I sang this” and “Listen!” And then I listen, and I hear the words they use, but they become so engaged in this, in recording music, that it becomes a path away from. . . because if they’re not at the youth center recording their music, they’re out on the street. (9th–grade teacher)

Even within juvenile care, artistic freedom is emphasized as an educational ideal. Here, discussions about content policies are described as encountering resistance from teachers who instead highlight the importance of allowing young people to express themselves freely through music – regardless of lyrical content:

Many teachers have more traditional teaching methods, but I don’t. Here, you can record whatever you want, which is usually hip-hop. I don’t interfere if they rap about guns. When other teachers want a policy, I call it censorship. Can’t they have freedom? When it goes too far, I usually tell them to write about their mom, and then a song comes out where they rap, ”Mom, I’m sorry!” (Teacher at Juvenile Detention Centre)

Several of the interviewed hip-hop educators express a strong belief in the intrinsic value of culture and the right to narrate painful, provocative, or taboo experiences. They stress that gangster rap is often perceived superficially, but that the expressions themselves contain artistic and existential dimensions that are sometimes overlooked. One teacher in the youth correctional custody states that this can be done through economical logics and dictions from others; “Many of the inmates face resistance on the “outside” when they want to create hip-hop. They’re met with things like: ‘You won’t be able to make a living from this’, and so on.” The juvenile care homes therefore become an artistic sanctuary of sort, where it is possible for interested youths to engage in artistic creativity. In light of this one hip-hop educator aligns with cultural logics by referring to the Swedish public gangster rap debate as childish and superficial:

I find the debate (about gangster rap) childish in a way, and incredibly superficial. It’s like shooting the messenger! Many of these rappers are messengers. They describe a tragic reality and provoke, and people don’t understand that just because they write in the first person, it doesn’t necessarily mean they endorse those stories themselves. (Hip-hop educator)

A similar reasoning appears in conversations with a teacher within the correctional custody, who neither views the content of the music as a direct incitement to crime nor as a causal factor behind criminal behavior. Instead, gangster rap is seen as an artistic form of expression – albeit one often met with skepticism or resistance from adult society according to teacher in correction custody who stated that “I’ve never met anyone who was convicted of a crime because they listened to gangster rap.” This indicates the perceived absurdity of assuming that there is a direct link between gangster rap and actual criminal behavior. The statement thus function as legitimizing gangster rap as an artistic form of expression. By refraining from taking a normative stance toward the content as educator can consequently be interpreted both as an educational strategy and as an expression of a habitus shaped by proximity to the logics of the cultural field. Teachers’ ways of relating to young people’s artistic expressions can thus be interpreted as a form of symbolic positioning within the educational field. Rather than representing deliberate choices, these approaches may be understood as manifestations of habitus – the often unconscious dispositions shaped by individuals’ social and professional backgrounds (Bourdieu, 2000). In this light, the emphasis on artistic freedom is not only an educational commitment but also a way of navigating the tension between competing normative systems: between the school’s socializing mission and the autonomy of culture.

In summary, these interview excerpts illustrate how teachers in various educational settings align with cultural logic, prioritizing values like authenticity, creative freedom, and artistic expression over normative pedagogical perspectives. Rather than controlling students’ gangster rap texts, educators emphasize understanding and affirming these expressions as artistic, offering spaces for students to create on their own terms. This approach legitimizes gangster rap as art, positioning students’ meaning-making as valuable in itself, rather than something to be reshaped to meet institutional goals. While earlier examples demonstrated an alignment with juridical logic – seeing gangster rap as a risk to be managed – these excerpts suggest a shift toward cultural logic. However, these strategies often coexist with social logic, which views education as a means for socialization and personal development. This creates a tension between cultural formation, where artistic freedom is valued, and social pedagogical formation, where youth expressions are seen through frameworks of need or risk. By positioning gangster rap as art, teachers shift focus from social pedagogy to viewing youth cultural production as meaningful in its own right. These strategies reflect efforts to create spaces where students’ social positions are not barriers to participation, but potential grounds for recognition.

Discussion

The educational dilemmas raised by gangster rap highlight broader, potentially unresolved tensions within the Swedish educational field. The encounter between various educational practices and gangster rap brings into the classroom not only aspects of youth culture, but also associations with crime, gang dynamics, and violence. That these issues gain visibility and traction, as our study has demonstrated in segments of the educational field, points to the fragility of education as an autonomous field. This fragility can be understood as a reduced degree of field autonomy, where external logics are less refracted and more directly imposed on educational practice. When youth culture is intertwined with criminality, logics from other fields – both legal/judicial and cultural – are introduced into educational practice. This illustrates how struggles over legitimate capital are temporarily displaced, as juridical and social forms of capital gain priority over pedagogical ones. This intersection also evokes normative and socializing aspects of education, yet it is less concerned with facilitating learning in areas such as language, cultural analysis, or principles for civic participation. As a result, teachers often assume professional roles focused on adapting to circumstances, rather than instructing in ways that enable students to independently evaluate which logics guide their interpretations of the music.

Instead of concentrating solely on education as the transmission of knowledge and culture, logics from the social field (such as social work or social pedagogy) are also employed, illustrating the adaptability of the educator role. Gangster rap further sparks discussions connected to the cultural field, historically intertwined with education and the accumulation of cultural capital. In this sense, pedagogy continues to hold a position relative to cultural capital, though it can also be understood as a strategy for individual teachers to navigate the educational field. Hip-hop educators, who often lack formal teaching credentials – which places them in a different position in the field, with alternative forms of cultural capital but limited institutional capital – tend to align more closely with discourses related to cultural capital, including freedom of culture and debates surrounding freedom of expression and censorship. Historically, moral education aimed at “promoting good character” has served as a means of guiding young people along socially desirable paths while instilling values aligned with the ideology underpinning the Nordic welfare state model (e.g. Trägårdh, 2010). Building on this, previous research has described hip-hop educational practices as incubators for youth creativity (Söderman and Söderman, 2020). Yet, as our findings suggest, in the context of gangster rap, hip-hop education increasingly emphasizes the creation of protective spaces for youth. This reflects how teachers’ adaptation to institutional and social logics often prioritizes risk management over purely pedagogical or cultural goals, indicating a shift in the field’s stakes from knowledge transmission toward social regulation.

These tensions – between acceptance and rejection, and between the risks and opportunities of engaging with youth culture – are long-standing, yet gangster rap brings them into sharper focus. In educational settings, concerns about promoting violence or reinforcing stereotypes often dominate discussions. However, this emphasis on risk can obscure the educational potential of hip-hop in the age of gangster rap, including its capacity to foster critical thinking, creativity, and engagement with social issues. Contemporary Swedish gangster rap also introduces challenges regarding authenticity, often expressed through narratives of “living the life” depicted in the music or being “part of the crime scene.” Such claims may complicate access to economic support for hip-hop educational programs, as media portrayals can overshadow long-term educational goals. Moreover, legal scrutiny of lyrics and videos – mirroring practices observed in other countries (see Kubrin and Nielson, 2014) – means educators must contend with the ways artistic expression is increasingly entangled with law enforcement. This further reduces the autonomy of both the cultural and educational fields, as juridical logics reshape the conditions for symbolic production. These conditions place educators in a delicate position: they must balance moral and protective responsibilities with the defense of artistic freedom. At the same time, it is important to recognize the limitations of gangster rap as a form of free artistic expression when its content is shaped, directly or indirectly, by criminal networks.

From a Bourdieusian perspective, these dynamics are shaped by the distribution of cultural capital and the recognition of certain cultural forms as valuable or legitimate (some scholars have noted that Bourdieu’s framework tends to presume inherent struggles over dominance within fields, though we use it here primarily as an analytical lens). Gangster rap, often associated with marginalization and rebellion, sits outside the established forms of cultural capital that dominate traditional educational settings, which amplifies the tensions educators face when negotiating its presence in the classroom. The distinction between “high art” and “problematic art” thus becomes a key factor in understanding these challenges. At the same time, these tensions around legitimacy and recognition can open avenues for pedagogical innovation. By engaging with gangster rap, educators have the opportunity to explore themes central to contemporary youth culture – such as identity, social inequality, and authenticity – while simultaneously grappling with the boundaries of acceptable cultural expression. The overarching educational dilemma thus focuses on balancing the risks of engaging with gangster rap while not limiting its potential for authentic youth engagement. It raises a critical question: how can educators create a space where both the risks and the educational possibilities of gangster rap can be explored, avoiding reductive or paternalistic approaches? Furthermore, gangster rap forces us to reconsider the nature of education itself: is education inherently risky? Does it not always involve a degree of risk, whether that be alienation, misunderstanding, or challenging dominant cultural norms? By confronting these risks, gangster rap pushes educators to reflect on their role, biases, and how they navigate between control and freedom in the educational process. These dynamics suggest directions for future research. Rather than documenting hip-hop in education in general, studies could examine how controversial cultural forms shape the autonomy of the educational field. Comparative analyses across contexts could reveal how varying capital configurations and field autonomy influence educators’ responses to youth culture. Furthermore, the growing entanglement of artistic expression with legal and risk-management logics warrants investigation into its effects on curriculum, funding, and teacher discretion.