Hip-Hop is a cultural movement that was formed following the defeat of the African Revolution of the 1960s. Its poetics, aesthetics, and politics reflect African life under the US counterinsurgency.
The conditions that define the moment hip-hop arose were: increased privatization, mass unemployment and poverty, increased colonial violence and a decrease in mass mobilization. Hip-Hop shares these conditions with other African art forms such as the blues and calypso, of an earlier period, and reggae music of the 1970s.
Hip-Hop’s enduring character is attributed to its origins in the African working class.
Hip-Hop and rap music has, at times, offered political prescriptions to the African Working Class. More than often, rappers and other cultural workers have reflected the revolutionary upsurge amongst the masses.
Historically, the most remarkable rap group was Dead Prez. As this episode's guests noted, Dead Prez did not just rap about political topics, they had excellent skill and production but were also African Internationalist organizers. This year is the 20th anniversary of Dead Prez’s album Let’s Get Free.
In 2020, rappers and African cultural workers have entered into political debates over police violence and electoral politics. As we see in this episode, their conclusions are not always what we expect but, as our guest Professor Fanon Che Wilkins notes, we should continue to engage rappers and Hip-Hop as an arena of struggle.
In this episode, we do just that.
Hosts Dr. Matsemela Odom and Muambi Tangu talk with:
The People’s War Radio Show, Episode #48: “Judas and the Black Messiah”, COINTELPRO and African martyrs, part2
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #47: "Judas and the Black Messiah", COINTELPRO and African martyrs, part 1
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #46: "How the streets were made", interview with Yelena Bailey
The People's War Radio show, Episode #45: African women organizing collective childcare and resisting the colonial state
The People's War radio show; Episode #44: African workers of the world unite and organize.
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #43: All eyes on Louisiana, Justice for Reverend Errol Victor
The People's War Radio Show, Episode#42: 60th anniversary of the assassination Congo's Patrice Lumumba
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #41: Celebrate Haitian Independence Day, Vive Ayiti!
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #40: 2020 year in review with Chairman Omali Yeshitela
The People's War radio show, Episode #39: Sinterklass & Zwarte Piet, Jim Crow minstrels, black face and falling statues
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #38: FBI war on today's black activists
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #37: 50 shots fired, 38 pierced the body of another black man killed by police in St. Petersburg, Florida
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #36: Give us the land! Hands off the Bethesda African Cemetery!
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #35: The "white people's State"- pilgrims, proud boys, police
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #34: Culture, the "war of ideas" and the Black Power movement
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #33: Philadelphia - democracy for who?
The People's War radio show, Episode #32: Land, water, police violence and Black Power in the French West Indies
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #31: #EndSARS: Necolonialism vs. a united socialist Africa
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #30: Video gaming, black representation and capitalist exploitation
The People's War Radio Show, Episode #29: Breonna Taylor, Mike Brown and the role of the grand jury in protecting the police
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