Kwaito artists ahve persisently maintained that their genre has it's roots in hip hop. Though both genres owe their existence to similar and at certain conjuctures identical experiences, I'd argue that Kwaito's conception of that experience is landlocked, immobile, static, and transhistorical. Hip hop on the other hand is mobile, fluid, adaptable, transmodern, and embodies various forms of social and rhetorical flow that are fully realised within thenarratives of urban experience.... In layman's terms Kwaito is Hip hop gone RETARDED!
Another myth that needs to be dismantled is kwaito being an urban phenomenon. When one consideres the Land Areas Act and the subsiquent utalization and usage of urban spaces by black people, it becomes patently clear that Kwaito's origins are in apartheid's concentration camps, the townships NOT the city. Some might argue that the dichotomy I'm makin between the city and the township are cosmetic. But, I'd encourage yall to consider the different temperaments and energies that are produced by the two spaces.
Havin said all of this, if JAY-Z or NAS were to come live in South Africa for a year or two, they would definately identify wit Kwaito audience and artists more than the gentrified hip hop community in South Africa.