İzmir rap scene within the context of underground - mainstream interaction

The difficulty of defining the concepts of underground and mainstream applies to many culture/music terms. In general, the mainstream is used to refer to music genres or styles that have gained visibility in the recording industry and mass media through the music industry, especially major record companies. Underground, in contrast, is "do it yourself", that is to say, refers to the genres/styles in which the artists produce and distribute by their own means and meet with the audience independently of the music industry. Rap, which emerged as an underground music practice in the ghettos of the United States, especially in New York, in the early 1970s, attracted the attention of the international music industry in the 80s and began to take part in the mainstream. Therefore, it is possible to say that Rap music, which is the most important component of Hip Hop culture, has gone through a historical process from underground to mainstream. A similar situation has been true for Turkey. Turkish Rap music, which was underground in the mid-90s, can be considered as mainstream since the mid-2010s. However, it is also possible to conclude that a music genre can remain both mainstream and underground simultaneously. In other words, despite referring to the opposing positions, mainstream and underground are always open to symbiotic interaction with each other, contrary to their contrast. Music texts produced at the local scale are open to interaction both locally and globally, in line with the opportunities offered by today's media technologies. This interaction makes it possible to use the scene as a conceptual framework. From this point of view, this thesis focuses on the dynamics of the interaction process within the framework of the İzmir Rap scene.