That's My Heart

That’s My Heart uses hip-hop culture to illustrate how Black men refashioned their perceptions of intimate relations—that is, relationships with family, friends, and romantic partners—in the post–civil rights era. Here, Antonia Randolph argues that hip-hop culture emphasizes male bonding through male “platonic couples” instead of normative intimate bonds, like heterosexual marriage and the nuclear family. This homosocialization creates “illegible intimacies” that mark men as the appropriate source of care and support—all while creating rules of feeling that perpetuate misogyny toward Black women. Examining an archive that includes interviews, songs, album covers, and videos, Randolph illustrates how hip-hop produces a queer but crucially male-centered sociality—and one whose claim to normativity relies on a fundamental misogynoir and rejection of Black women and femininity.