Slackness refers to vulgarity in West Indian culture, behavior and the music. It also refers to a subgenre of dancehall

Dancehall

Dancehall is a genre of Jamaican popular music that originated in the late 1970s. Initially dancehall was a more sparse version of reggae than the roots style, which had dominated much of the 1970s. In the mid-1980s, digital instrumentation became more prevalent, changing the sound considerably,...

 music with straightforward sexual lyrics performed live or recorded. Its form and pronunciation varies throughout the Caribbean.

With the decline of roots reggae

Roots reggae

Roots reggae is a subgenre of reggae that deals with the everyday lives and aspirations of the artists concerned, including the spiritual side of Rastafari and with the honoring of God, called Jah by rastafarians. It also is identified with the life of the ghetto sufferer, and the rural poor...

 music, sound systems regained popularity. DJs performed over extended grooves produced by a new mixing style of selecting

Selector (disc jockey)

Selector is the term originally used for a reggae/dancehall disc jockey ....

 called "juggling." The energy in the dance halls became very sexual, with increasingly revealing clothing, scandalous dance styles, and cruder lyrics from the DJs. Previously, sexual lyrics had been merely suggestive, but the new "slack" lyrics, part of the rebellion against fading Rastafarian ideals, left nothing to the imagination.

The rise of dancehall music coincided with important shifts in Jamaican society. Politically, the Jamaican people had rejected the originally revolutionary democratic socialist regime of Michael Manley

Michael Manley

Michael Norman Manley ON OCC was the fourth Prime Minister of Jamaica . Manley was a democratic socialist....

 and the People's National Party

People's National Party

The People's National Party is a social democratic and social liberal Jamaican political party, founded by Norman Manley in 1938. It is the oldest political party in the Anglophone Caribbean and one of the main two political parties in Jamaica. Out of the two major parties, it is considered more...

, placing their hopes instead on Edward Seaga

Edward Seaga

Edward Philip George Seaga ON PC was the fifth Prime Minister of Jamaica from 1980 to 1989 and Leader of the Jamaica Labour Party from 1974 to 2005. He served as leader of the opposition from 1974 to 1980 and again from 1989 until January 2005...

 and the Jamaica Labour Party

Jamaica Labour Party

The Jamaica Labour Party is one of the two major political parties in Jamaica, the other being the People's National Party. Despite its name, the JLP is a centre-right, conservative party.-Background:...

. Since Bob Marley

Bob Marley

Robert Nesta "Bob" Marley, OM was a Jamaican singer-songwriter and musician. He was the rhythm guitarist and lead singer for the ska, rocksteady and reggae band Bob Marley & The Wailers...

's death there has been little mainstream media representation of disadvantaged Jamaicans and Rastafari in popular culture. Political and cultural changes along with shifting public tastes led to a new dance hall culture which became an increasingly important institution for West Indians, Jamaicans in particular.

Yellowman

Yellowman

Yellowman is a Jamaican reggae and dancehall deejay, widely known as King Yellowman...

proclaimed, "I never know why they call it slackness. I talk about sex, but it's just what happens behind closed doors. What I talk is reality".