Ink Cypher
Ink Cypher is the home of our commissioned writing; it's where you'll find exclusive, original features and long form writing on Hip Hop dance from a suite of international voices.
Published in August 2024, Ink Cypher - In Print is an exquisitely designed, limited edition, Hip Hop dance newspaper featuring all of the commissioned texts from rounds one, two and three, alongside a host of new features. Buy it here.
A cypher is a space of dialogue and a place to build energy; so for round two and three we wanted people to read the essays that we'd published and write something that answered, responded to or challenged what had been written from one (or more) of the previous rounds authors. This is an Ink Cypher.
Some of the people in Ink Cypher are established writers, some are writing in English for the first time and for others this is the first time they've been commissioned.
In round one there's 26 works from people based in Taiwan, Canada, Ghana, Scotland, Singapore, France, Greece, Dubai, USA, England, Germany, South Africa, Indonesia and Turkey.
In round two there's 15 works from people based in Nigeria, Argentina, Australia, England, Ghana, USA, Spain, Brazil, Cuba, Ireland and France.
In round three there's 14 works from people based in Colombia, Botswana, England, Sweden, Argentina, Cuba, Spain, USA, Germany and Ghana.
All of the commissioned essays will remain free to access via the Hip Hop Dance Almanac, however, there are very real costs attached to commissioning, editing and publishing these works.
If you value the work we're doing and are able to contribute, then please donate. Ink Cypher is our publishing imprint, a platform to present thoughtful and critical responses.
The order in which you read information can affect the interpretation of what comes after it; if you want a route through these texts here's Reading Route 1 and Route 2.
Round 3
Published May 2023
Astrid Aristizábal
Kalima Mipata's Leap From Botswana to Broadway
Bakang Akoonyatse
Transforming Our Own History
Belu Arendt
Afrikan Dancers as Embodied Archives: Contemporary Movements as Evolving Archives
Dodzi Aveh
Hip-hop Dance for Joy and Liberation
Edmund Adjapong
“Hip Hop is my Country”: Breaking on the Move between Istanbul and Berlin
Funda Oral & Danielle V. Schoon
In F(l)avour of Masculine: The Disbalance of Power in the European Street Dance Battle Scene
Gabija Cepelyte
Invisible Resistance: Hip Hop and the East of Cuba
Gladed Brown
An Interview with Grudge Oneski - The Realest Bboy in the UK
Iain Bleakley
Lucy Crowe
Sharing and its Limits: A Non-Anthropological Perspective on Barcelona Freestyle Dancers
Malvina Tessitore
The Necessity of Care: A Guide to Radical Accessibility Within Hip Hop
Saskia Horton
Hip Hop Hair: How Hairstyles Influence Movement
Starla Carr
Living Hip Hop in Uruguay: A Portrait of Bgirl China
Wendy Pedroso Martinez
Round 2
Published May 2022
Dodzi Aveh
Hip Hop: The Mirror of Society in Cuba
Elier A. Alvarez
Episodes of a Muscle Memory: Hip Hop Music Videos and 00s Adolescence
Ellen O'Donohue Oddy
"You will never be a dancer with that body" The Erasure of Big Bodies in Hip Hop Dance
Evelyn Ramirez
Feras ‘Fez’ Shaheen & Rachael ‘Raygun’ Gunn
The Duty of Care in Hip Hop Theatre
Isaac Ouro-Gnao
Afrikan Dancers As Embodied Archives
JC Niala
Dear Mr Marzipan
Lucy Crowe
The Economies of Freestyle Dances and the Construction of a Community: an anthropological case study of dance in Barcelona
Malvina Tessitore
This Lotus is a Rabbit: 10 Poems as Tribute
Ojo Taiye
The Hip Hop and Disability Problem: why do dancers ‘overcome’ it when they could be ‘celebrating’ it?
Porcelain Delaney
La Danse Hip-Hop as Paradox: Artification and Sportification
Roberta Shapiro
The Scarcity of Information Within Hip Hop Culture and the Neglect of Notorious Knowledge
Rudá Gonçalves
Queer Club Culture in 1990s Kansas City: A Chance Encounter with Soakies
Starla Carr
Democracy On The Move: How Young People In Argentina are Using Hip Hop Dance to Build Future Democracies
Virginia Fornillo
Round 1
Published November 2021
DANCING GODDESSES: African American Women Hip Hop Dancers - Cultural Contributors
Ariyan Johnson
This Dance Is Not Our Own
Brian Toh
How Dislocated Minorities in Turkey turn to Hip Hop to Build Community and Resist Marginalisation
Danielle V. Schoon and Funda Oral
Deanne Kearney
The Woo Dance vs Kete: Tradition Recycled or Coincidence?
Dodzi Aveh
Where is Disability in Hip Hop Dance?
Emily Tisshaw
Emma Ready
Dancing Giving A Voice: the power of voguing in Colombia protest
Evelyn Ramirez
Self Teaching In Street Dance
Fabrice Pika Taraud
“Make Some Noise for the Ladies…” Sexism in European Hip-Hop Dance Battles
Francesca Miles
Dance As Hard As A Man: how female Hip Hop dancers have had to man up to try to get a place in the hip-hop scene
Godlive Lawani
The chance encounter as the fifth element of Hip Hop
Iain Bleakley
The Commodification of Trauma in Hip Hop Theatre
Isaac Ouro-Gnao
Club and Street Dances: An Art of Remembrance
Larissa Clement Belhacel
Jackanory meets Diversity: Hip Hop culture - when dance becomes theatre
Lucy Crowe
Maïko Le Lay
Letter to an OG
Marcus Marzipan
Episodes of a Hip Hop Memory
Michael Joseph
Cisfemininities as bodies-without-organs in hip hop, street and urban dance styles
Natalia Koutsougera
Natasha Jean-Bart, aka Tash
From Localities to TikTok: Hip-Hop Dance in Indonesia
Nia Agustina
Cairo Calling: A Profile of Layla Ghaleb
Samia Qayium
The Recognition of Streetdance in Germany
Takao Baba
FROM SCARIFICATION TO KRUMP - How body adornment has transformed dance across the diaspora
Temitayo Ince
A Story of B-Boying in South Africa
Tseliso Monaheng
The Social Impact of Monday School and Battle Jam - Les Petites Choses Production
YingLv Wang
Alongside commissioned writings we also present in depth interviews and primary accounts of people who are active and an integral part of the broad diaspora of the UK Hip Hop dance community.