Chuck D is one of the great storytellers of our time, and a true hip-hop OG with a scholarly knowledge of the genre. A polymath creative, Chuck first came on the scene in 1985 when he and fellow Long Islander Flava Flav formed Public Enemy, signing with Def Jam the following year, and releasing their critically acclaimed debut album, Yo! Bum Rush the Show, in 1987. 

Public Enemy would go on to release many important rap records with hard-hitting, poignant lyrics, like 1989’s "Fight The Power." Chuck has remained an active and uncompromising voice in hip-hop and social justice, offering his deeply resonant voice and far-reaching wisdom to rock and rap collaborations, documentaries, books and more.

In 2017, he shared his extensive expertise in his engaging rap bible, This Day In Rap And Hip-Hop History. Chuck's recently released debut fine art book, Livin' Loud: ARTitation, reveals another element of his creative power, with over 250 of his paintings, sketches and drawings along with a reflection on his creative journey.

Chuck also just dropped a four-part PBS and BBC docu-series called "Fight The Power: How Hip-Hop Changed The World," featuring interviews with a star-studded list of rappers, DJs, graffiti artists and more. The powerful series reexamines the history of hip-hop in the aftermath of the United States' racial and social justice movements of 2020, looking at injustice and resistance in the country through the experiences of its Black and Brown communities.

To celebrate the new documentary and book, Los Angeles' GRAMMY Museum held "An Evening With Chuck D," moderated by the GRAMMY Museum Education Coordinator Schyler O'Neal. The event opened with a screening of the first episode of "Fight The Power," which led into a conversation about the episode, series, and power of hip-hop and telling its stories thoughtfully, with Chuck and the show's Co-Executive Producer, Lorrie Boula. While Chuck dropped enough wisdom throughout the evening to fill another book, we've selected five big takeaways from the impactful and inspiring evening. The GRAMMY Museum conversation will be streamed online from Feb. 16 - 26, and tickets can be purchased here.

“Everybody has art in them, but not everybody can get art out of them. There’s no bad move, but you have to be able to get it out of you…today…people listen with their eyes,” Chuck said during the in-depth conversation, underscoring the importance of art in the visual age we live in. “Art is who you are. It’s your pulse. You have art in you, just be you. You can never get more perfect than a machine….The art is the human error, the mistake.”

Hip-Hop Was Born Out Of A Deeply Collaborative & Resilient Energy

The first episode of "Fight The Power: How Hip-Hop Changed The World" transports viewers back to New York City — the birthplace of hip-hop and its various cultural expressions — in the ‘60s through ‘80s, where challenging social and environmental factors proved to be fertile creative ground. 

In 1975, New York was on the verge of bankruptcy. As quality of life declined, a sizable portion of the wealthier population fled to  the suburbs, and more working-class people migrated to the Big Apple in search of opportunity. Residents of the Bronx, who were primarily people of color, suffered the worst from the city's qualms, including austerity cuts and harmful policies. 

Amidst the dire circumstances, young people found ways to express themselves and come together. Because there were fewer cops patrolling the Bronx in the '70s, the city became the canvas for graffiti artists, and parties wouldn't get shut down. And this was how hip-hop was born; the early hip-hop parties were discos in the streets. "Hip-hop was disco's bastard child," one of the artists in the episode says with a laugh, explaining that turntables were the only instruments they had access to, since music programs were cut from schools.

“There were no constraints at this time, it was like a pot of cultural get down,” Chuck said of these foundational years of hip-hop, later adding, "As you see in episode one, it’s a collective movement…so we have more people than the usual suspects in our show.”. 

Boula added that it was important to them to not only focus on the struggles, but to also show the side of the Bronx that wasn't televised. "We didn’t want to just focus on the oppression… You can try to oppress people, but they will find their f—ng joy. And we wanted to tell that story too."

Chuck D Was An Illustrator & Never Meant To Be A Rapper…

“1960, I was born and raised to make art,” Chuck said in one of many smile-inducing, mic drop moments. Chuck always drew, and entered the New York-wide student art contest every year — and always won or placed. He went to Adelphi University in Long Island to study design and brush up on his illustration skills, and was the school's political cartoonist as a freshman.

Unfortunately, he got kicked out of school because he only attended his art classes. He appealed, and got permission from all of his professors to take their classes again, and got the chance to give it another go. He said that the reason he stuck with it was because of his vision to run a hip-hop arts department. He was unimpressed by the art on most rap records, and wanted to be the one to change it. In fact, Chuck didn't write his first poem until he was 20 years old. 

…But Rick Ruben Eventually Convinced Him To Rap With Def Jam

Chuck had a show at Adelphi’s radio station WBAU and rapped to fill the air time between records. In 1984, he recorded a promo tape with himself and Flavor Flav rapping, and it became a station favorite known as "Public Enemy No. 1." Rick Ruben heard the tape and spent two years trying to get  Chuck to record with the then-new Def Jam Records. 

Yet it was Def Jam's eye-catching logo that made Chuck actually take the offer seriously. “In 1986 I surrendered and signed my contract to become a damn recording artist,” Chuck said. 

Chuck didn't make much visual art for the next 30 years, only revisiting it when his father passed away seven years ago. "The arts led me to cover up the silence [left by my father]."

"I have so much art coming out of me, but I don’t want to just do art for art's sake," he explained. "If I see something crazy, I’m going to illustrate it," he asserted. 

A War Was Stopped For A Public Enemy & Ice-T Concert

When asked by O'Neal how hip-hop has changed the world, Chuck responded: “Hip-hop has made people change their languages around…to bring them together.” Hip-hop fashion over the years and rap vernacular continue to dominate pop culture, and rap music has become the most popular genre.

Chuck then told an incredible story about how fighting during the Balkans war in Eastern Europe was paused so that Public Enemy, Ice-T (who was in the audience), and Ice Cube could bring their AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted World Tour to war-torn Croatia. For one night in 1994, locals of different beliefs and religions came together to find solace at a hip-hop show. Once the rappers and their crew crossed the border, the bombing continued, but officials felt that the concert was important enough to call for a temporary cease fire.

Chuck D Is Launching A "TikTok For Hip-hop x35"

One of the highlights of the 2023 GRAMMY Awards was the epic GRAMMY Tribute to 50 Years of Hip-Hop, a powerhouse 15-minute medley featuring some of rap’s greatest, including Chuck and Flava, who performed Public Enemy’s "Rebel Without a Pause." When O'Neal asked how it happened, Chuck responded, "Questlove called everybody," which worked because "he's like the Quincy [Jones] of hip-hop." 

Speaking about the magic of all those artists spending time together, Chuck noted that he built  online mp3 depository  RapStation in 2001 (before MySpace!) to expand listeners’ horizons and expose them to talented rappers. RapStation still exists, offering rap news and internet radio shows, but Chuck revealed]that he will be launching a new rap app called Bring The Noise, which he described as "TikTok for hip-hop x35." 

Bringing together all his epic stories, threads and themes of the evening like only Chuck D can, he said: "We curate man. That’s what I’ve always wanted to do, curate art."

"We learn how to be spectacular. Spectacle gets you in the building, but spectacular keeps you in the building," Chuck said to close things out on an inspirational note, and to a standing ovation. "Spectacular keeps you coming back from more…so that when you disappear there’s a mark left that’s missed…so make your mark, take it seriously."

How Hip-Hop Took Over The 2023 GRAMMYs, From The Golden Anniversary To 'God Did'

The GRAMMY Museum is celebrating the 50th anniversary of hip-hop this fall with the newly announced Hip-Hop America: The Mixtape Exhibit, an immersive, interactive, 5,000-square foot experience celebrating the multifaceted world of hip-hop and the global impact and influence of the genre and culture. Launching Saturday, Oct. 7, and running through Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2024, the exhibit will feature expansive exhibits exploring hip-hop music, dance, graffiti, fashion, business, activism, and history as well as artifacts from hip-hop pioneers like Tupac Shakur, the Notorious B.I.G., LL Cool J, and many more.

Additionally, the exhibit features a one-of-a-kind Sonic Playground, featuring five interactive stations that invite visitors of all ages to partake in DJing, rapping and sampling, all essential elements comprising hip-hop culture. Additional virtual and in-person education and community engagement programs will be announced at a later date.

Exploring the countless ways hip-hop music and culture has dominated popular culture over the last 50 years, Hip-Hop America: The Mixtape Exhibit was curated by a team of four co-curators who bring a deep knowledge of hip-hop, academic rigor and creativity to the project. They include:

• Felicia Angeja Viator, associate professor of history, San Francisco State University, author of ‘To Live And Defy In LA: How Gangsta Rap Changed America,’ and one of the first women DJs in the Bay Area hip-hop scene

• Adam Bradley, Professor of English and founding director of the Laboratory for Race and Popular Culture (the RAP Lab) at UCLA, and co-editor of ‘The Anthology of Rap’

• Jason King, Dean, USC Thornton School of Music and former chair of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at NYU

• Dan Charnas, Associate Arts Professor, NYU Clive Davis Institute of Music, and author of ‘Dilla Time: The Life And Afterlife Of The Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm’

The co-curators worked in conjunction with GRAMMY Museum Chief Curator and Vice President of Curatorial Affairs Jasen Emmons as well as a 20-member Advisory Board.

Read More: 50 Artists Who Changed Rap: Jay-Z, The Notorious B.I.G., Dr. Dre, Nicki Minaj, Kendrick Lamar, Eminem & More

Hip-Hop America: The Mixtape Exhibit is an educational journey through several key themes:

• Origins: Discover the roots of hip-hop in the Bronx and New York City, where DJs were the original stars, and graffiti and breakdancing were integral to the culture.

• Innovation: Explore how hip-hop artists have innovatively used technology, from transforming turntables into musical instruments to pioneering sampling techniques.

• Sounds of Hip-Hop: Experience the diverse sounds of hip-hop in four themed studios, showcasing the evolution of production, the intersection of hip-hop and car culture, the craft of hip-hop lyrics, and the influence of R&B.

• Fashion: Dive into the world of hip-hop fashion, featuring iconic clothing, jewelry and style.

• Regionalism: Discover 14 hip-hop scenes across the United States, showcasing the importance of local and regional contributions.

• Entrepreneurialism: Learn about the transformation of hip-hop from a back-to-school party in the Bronx to a multi-billion-dollar global industry.

• Media: Discover the role of media in shaping hip-hop's development, from radio stations to pioneering shows like "Yo! MTV Raps."

• Community: Explore how hip-hop has brought people together over the last 50 years, with an interactive ‘Hip-Hop America’ playlist featuring 200 songs that trace the genre's evolution.

Highlights from Hip-Hop America: The Mixtape Exhibit include:

• The Notorious B.I.G.'s iconic 5001 Flavors custom red leather peacoat he wore in Junior M.A.F.I.A.'s music video "Players Anthem"

• Kurtis Blow's original handwritten lyrics for his 1980 hit single, "The Breaks," the first gold-certified rap song

• Black suede fedora hat and Adidas Superstars belonging to Darryl "DMC" McDaniels of Run-D.M.C.

• Tupac Shakur's handwritten essay "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death," circa 1992

• Two outfits designed by Dapper Dan, Harlem fashion icon: 1) a half-length black leather jacket worn by Melle Mel (Melvin Glover, b. 1961) in performance at the 1985 GRAMMY Awards; and a black-and-yellow leather bucket hat and jacket worn by New York hip-hop artist Busy Bee (David James Parker)

• Egyptian Lover's gold Roland 808, the beat-making tool

• LL Cool J's red Kangol bucket hat 

Hip-Hop America: The Mixtape Exhibit is a key event taking place as the world is celebrating 50 years of hip-hop this year. The origins of hip-hop can be traced back to Aug. 11, 1973, when DJ Kool Herc DJed a birthday party inside the recreation room of an apartment building located on 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the South Bronx, New York City. This history-making date marks the birth of hip-hop and is the reason why we're celebrating hip-hop's 50th anniversary this year. The 50th anniversary of hip-hop means artists, fans, and the music industry at-large are celebrating the momentous milestone via hip-hop concerts, exhibits, tours, documentaries, podcasts, and more around the globe across 2023.

Visit the GRAMMY Museum website for more information regarding advanced ticket reservations for Hip-Hop America: The Mixtape Exhibit.

50 Artists Who Changed Rap: Jay-Z, The Notorious B.I.G., Dr. Dre, Nicki Minaj, Kendrick Lamar, Eminem & More

Just after Charlie Puth wrapped his North American tour on July 11, the pop hitmaker treated 150 fans to the ultimate fan experience: brunch with a side of Puth.

Part of The GRAMMY Museum's Sunday Brunch With… series, the event — a fundraiser for the organization's GRAMMY In The Schools program that was sponsored by City National Bank and Porsche — invited fans to enjoy a three-course brunch followed by an intimate 45-minute acoustic set from Puth. 

From the stage at his friend (and 17-time GRAMMY Award-winning mixer) Manny Marroquin's restaurant, VERSE LA in Toluca Lake, California, Puth told stories about his days at Berklee College Of Music and his journey to stardom. He also let attendees in on his songwriting process, performing some of his most beloved tracks in the process. 

For those who weren't able to make it to the sold-out event, here are six takeaways from Sunday Brunch With Charlie Puth.

He May Just Become A Music Teacher In The Future

Early on in the show, Puth made a point of shouting out one of his old Berklee professors from the stage. Turns out it was Prince Charles Alexander, a multi-GRAMMY Award winning mixer and engineer who has worked with Mary J. Blige, Destiny's Child, P. Diddy, Usher, and Aretha Franklin. 

Puth said he'd often pop into Alexander's office to run ideas by him, with Alexander offering up tips in return. Puth told the crowd he still thinks about Alexander's advice when he's making his own records all these years later, and shouted out not just his professor but all music educators, saying that he's a firm believer in the value of music in our schools. He even joked that he'd like to become a music teacher himself "if this whole music thing doesn't work out."

One Of His Songs Was Inspired By A Rainy Walk…

When Puth wrote "How Long" back in 2017, it was on a long walk. He was strutting around the town wondering why there weren't more tracks written at a perfect walking tempo when it started to rain. The sound of his feet combined with the wet concrete and suddenly, he told the crowd, "it was like the chords fell out of the sky." 

Puth then kicked into a smooth and resonant performance of the song — which sounded excellent on whatever sound system Marroquin installed in his restaurant — prompting one attendee to shout out in glee, "ooh, you better sing!"

…And Another Was Inspired By Ed Sheeran

Puth says he started writing "We Don't Talk Anymore" when he was on the road in Osaka, Japan. He'd fallen in love with the percussive guitar on Ed Sheeran's song "Bloodstream" and wanted to use that same sort of tone on his own track. 

Puth says he also wanted to write what he called "the worldliest sounding record," or "a record that would take me around the world." Given that "We Don't Talk Anymore" hit the top 10 in 20 different countries and the video has more than three billion views on YouTube to date, it's fair to say he did just that.

He Likes To Use "Light Switch" To Inspire Up-And-Coming Musicians

When the freshly signed Puth was first in LA in the early 2010s, a producer suggested they take his newly recorded tracks to a club, where they'd play them for the crowd and see what hit. It was a novel idea for Puth at the time, but something he's adapted a bit for the modern age, when he throws bits of songs and ideas up on his TikTok, hoping to see what flies. 

That's exactly how his 2022 hit "Light Switch" came to be: The simple percussive sound that you hear when you turn the lights on and off. 

In videos he's posted on TikTok, he's tried to show fans that, like that song, music can come from anywhere. "You don't need a multi-million dollar recording studio to make a record," he told the crowd, reminding everyone that Soulja Boy's "Crank That" was self-produced on the rapper's home computer before breaking big on social media. 

Anyone, Puth said, can make and release their own music, even if they're not currently in possession of the dream recording set-up. It's just about passion and perseverance, and a desire to make something new.

He Likes To Blend Classical Riffs With Perfect Pop Melodies

When Puth started to write "Attention," it was with a little classical riff he was fooling around with on the piano. He decided to take the classical bars and throw them into a pop song, reminding the room that it's not all that uncommon. For instance, he said, Toni Wine and Carole Bayer Sager's "A Groovy Kind Of Love" contains the Rondo from Muzio Clementi's Sonatina, Opus 36, No. 5. In Puth's view, classical music and pop can live in perfect harmony, feeding off each other and building toward something even bigger than the sum of their parts.

He's Proof Of The Power Of Being Yourself

In 2012, at the height of "weight for the drop" style EDM hits, Puth felt discouraged as he was trying to break into music himself. As he recalled, he'd moved home to his parents house and was laser focused on the pop charts, tailoring his songs to whatever was No. 1 at the moment — but they were all getting turned down by labels. Finally, he said, an A&R person gave him a piece of advice, saying, essentially, "We've heard all this before. We want to hear something from you." 

That's how, on his way to record a dance track at some studio in LA, Puth decided to lay down a piano ballad instead. He says it was like "See You Again" fell into his lap and attributes its success to the fact that he wasn't trying to be anyone but himself. 

"See You Again changed my life," he told the brunch crowd, noting that he'll be proud and lucky if he gets to perform it for the rest of his life. As he played it live, the whole room joyfully sang along — hinting that Puth may have crafted a lifelong hit.

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The adjective "vulnerable" is something of a music press cliché. Margo Price is capital-v. Because before she released her 2022 memoir, Maybe We'll Make It, she was in a state of abject terror over how her family would react to her confessions therein.

"I was having panic attacks, thinking about all of this being out there," Price told The Guardian. "I know what people do on the internet, and I was imagining the names they were gonna call me. They're gonna say I'm a horrible mother, that I'm a drunk."

But then, there's that word again: "I also [hope] that people are going to appreciate my vulnerability."

This attribute — married to sterling craft — has launched Price into the stratosphere; none other than Willie Nelson provided a blurb for Maybe We'll Make It's front cover. ("Margo's book hits you right in the gut — and the heart," he wrote. "Just like her songs.")

As she details in the book, the masterful Nashville singer/songwriter knocked around town for more than a decade in search of a record deal, and dealt with poverty, alcohol abuse and numberless other calamities. But Price was stubborn and persistent; her ascent began with her exceptional 2016 solo debut Midwest Farmer's Daughter, released on Third Man Records. 

She continued her winning streak in 2017 with All American Made; the following year, she was nominated for a GRAMMY for Best New Artist. That streak continued with 2020's That's How Rumors Get Started, produced by Sturgill Simpson. In 2023, she released another excellent album, the Jonathan Wilson-produced Strays, which she's promoting alongside Maybe We'll Make It.

At a recent edition of the GRAMMY Museum's "A New York Evening With…" interview and performance series at the Greene Space at WNYC and WQXR in New York City, Price sat down with moderator Craig Finn of the Hold Steady. Together, they discussed the counterbalances of Strays with Maybe We'll Make It, and her wild, tragic, joyful story that's contained in both; the result was a window into Price's psychology. 

Here are six takeaways about this GRAMMY-nominated master of words and melodies.

Her Album And Memoir Influenced Each Other

Early in the conversation, Finn inquired about the dynamic between a book and an album, as the publishing process typically takes much longer than the writing and recording process.

"They definitely ended up kind of influencing each other, because I was working on them in tandem," Price said. "I did kind of lose myself in it for a moment. My husband would say things like, 'You haven't written a song in months.' I was like, 'I'm an author now.'"

Price Finished Her Memoir Through Routine

In 2018 — upon getting pregnant and coming off the road — Price needed to keep her mind busy.

Despite not having a book deal, she and her husband, fellow musician Jeremy Ivey, would take their son to school, go to an East Nashville coffee shop and write from "about 8 in the morning until maybe noon or 1. And I just did that for maybe five or six months." By her telling, there were "many, many, many drafts" prior to the one we can hold in our hands today.

Observing Herself From The Outside Proved Beneficial

In reading about her experiences in the way a consumer of her memoir would, Price identified a seam of compassion for herself that she didn't realize she had.

"You can suddenly give yourself a break. I feel like I'm my own worst critic," she said. "There was always a breadcrumb to keep us going — and then there was something to knock us back down." However, "if there wasn't a struggle, I wouldn't be Margo Price."

Patti Smith's Memoir Influenced Her Own

Patti Smith's 2010 book Just Kids, a document of her relationship with artist Robert Mapplethorpe, is a go-to rock tell-all; Maybe We'll Make It shares some of its DNA.

"I had heard some of her songs and things before, but I think once I really devoured her written works, I started digging into her albums," Price said of Smith. "And I just thought it was incredible the way that she used poetry and just felt unafraid to throw it all in the pot and mix it all up."

On the literary front, one cue Price took from Smith was her use of descriptive detail for everyday scenes: "She talks about living off of tomato soup," she says, connecting that to the $2 frozen tilapia filets and bags of edamame she and Ivey used to subsist on.

"When you can taste what's going on, it puts you there in the kitchen with us," she said. "You can starve with the artist."

Price Is Becoming More Open To Collaborating — Judiciously

Price is skeptical of some of the team-ups she sees in the music industry. "Sometimes, I see a collaboration happening," she says, and I'm like, 'That looks forced. I don't know, man. I feel like they're just doing that for the Spotify plays.' So, I really try to only do it if it's meaningful."

Somebody in her camp presented a list of potential writing partners; she didn't bite. But when her manager suggested GRAMMY-winning guitar great Mike Campbell, she changed her tune.

"I'm like, 'Duh, of course. We're trying to write Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers songs over here anyway, so if we can get him in on it, then it legitimizes the whole thing… he sang on ["Light Me Up" on] my record, and it was just very natural."

She Might Join Your Band

"I'd love to play more drums," Price said during a brief audience Q&A before performing tunes like All American Made's "Pay Gap" and Strays' "Country Road" for the crowd. "Just drums in a band sometime, where I'd just be in the pack. It'd be so much less pressure.

"I need to find a gig," she added mirthfully. "If anybody knows something, let me know after the show."

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In its 50th year, hip-hop is in a remarkable place of leadership. Despite the mainstream forces that long sidelined hip-hop its rightful impact for decades, what began as a cultural expression now has significantly impacted business, music and culture on a global scale. 

Beginning in the 1990s, hip-hop music and culture emerged as a key pedagogical tool in education at all levels. From dancing and rhyming in K-12 classrooms to university-level classes and archives, artist-centric studies and fellowships, the use of hip-hop in education has evolved significantly over the decades.

Teaching Hip-Hop As History

What hip-hop artists have been expressing about race, violence, economic class and beyond for the past 50 years is used as a powerful education tool in the present. Dan Charnas, Associate Arts Professor at New York University, suggests that hip-hop is crucial in overall education. His popular course on the late producer and composer J. Dilla — who produced for artists including A Tribe Called Quest, Common and Janet Jackson — inspired Charnas to write the New York Times bestseller Dilla Time. 

"Hip-hop is just part of a longer popular music tradition which sits very squarely in any history — cultural, music or otherwise. So teaching hip-hop is just teaching history," Charnas tells GRAMMY.com, adding that not incorporating hip-hop into his curriculum would "be an incomplete education of our world.

"It’s funny," he continues, citing an episode of [Rick Rubin's] podcast. "When I was on last year, he’s like, ‘So you teach hip-hop, what’s that like?’ It was such a weird question! He says when he was a student at Tisch, where I teach, hip-hop was the thing you did instead of school. He comes from a generation that had no context for it being somewhat academic."

Charnas certainly isn't the first academic to study hip-hop. He cites Brown University professor Tricia Rose’s 1994 book Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America as a key breakthrough to pave the way for hip-hop scholarship.

The study of hip-hop has also experienced significant development — from history-focused socio-cultural studies, to deep dives on specific artists. Decades after Howard University began talking about hip-hop studies in 1991 and the University of California, Berkeley created a course to study the late rapper Tupac Shakur in 1997, 17-time GRAMMY winner Kendrick Lamar is now the subject of dedicated college courses around the country. Lamar is among the artists who exemplify the way hip-hop culture transcends genre and form, whose work is a living document of society.

Good kid, m.A.A.d city has themes of "gang violence, you’ve got child-family development in the inner city, you’ve got drug use and the war on drugs, you’ve got sex slavery, human trafficking — a lot of the things that are hot-button issues for today are just inherent in the world of Compton, California," Georgia Regents University instructor Adam Diehl told *USA Today. 

Diehl introduced a course on Lamar in 2014, and today lectures on hip-hop at Augusta University. What if people had said, ‘we shouldn’t study Toni Morrison or Hemingway or Emily Dickinson because they’re too new?" he continued to USA Today. "Everything was new or too popular or too risqué at the time, but I just think that great stories last and the story of good kid, m.A.A.d city, is lasting."

"In my literature courses, music is considered a critical text," said Dr. Regina N. Bradley, an assistant professor of English and African Diaspora Studies at Kennesaw State University in Georgia. In one class, her students delve into Black protest songs. In another, they examine the music of Southern rap trailblazers like Outkast. Both help students connect the past to the present.

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"Music is pedagogy. It’s an archive and so real," she explained. "When you can show and prove to students that the history of civil rights for Black folks is not linear but cyclical, they understand and value that their experiences and what they are witnessing on a daily basis are reflections of the past in the present. History lives in the music; it lives in the culture… As a professor, it is my job to show students the dots, connect them a little bit and set them on their own journeys of discovery."

Hip-hop is also used as a tool for teaching K-12 students in a wide variety of ways, whether it’s learning and performing rhymes in math classes or analyzing current issues like police brutality and social justice. Nonprofits such as Oakland’s Hip Hop For Change work with local schools to teach foundational elements such as MCing, DJing, graffiti and breakdancing. Like colleagues around the country, their instructors also use the culture to share practical knowledge about the world.

Hip-Hop Archives And Fellowships Advance Studies Of The Form

The creation of hip-hop archives and fellowships at universities have been a significant educational development over the past 15 years, beginning when Cornell University opened The Cornell Hip-Hop Collection in 2007. The CHHC features over a quarter million digital and physical artifacts, including recordings, party flyers, graffiti art, magazines, books and personal archives. Media from artists and documentarians such as MC Grandmaster Caz, photographers Joe Conzo and Ernie Paniccioli, film director Charlie Ahearn (best known for the seminal hip-hop movie Wild Style) and former Def Jam publicist and author Bill Adler are all at CHHC.

A first for the West Coast, UCLA’s Hip-Hop Initiative followed the CHHC in 2022. The university’s Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies  is creating a digital archive and offering postdoctoral fellowships, among other missions. Public Enemy’s Chuck D is the Hip-Hop Initiative’s first artist-in-residence.

"It’s been incredible to witness and mentor so many students as they reach into the histories and experiences of the communities that gave rise to hip-hop," UCLA professor and advisory board member Cheryl Keyes said in a statement. "There's a richness and depth and context that are yet to be discovered and revealed, and this initiative will support much more of that."

"As we celebrate 50 years of hip-hop music and cultural history, the rigorous study of the culture offers us a wealth of intellectual insight into the massive social and political impact of Black music, Black history and Black people on global culture — from language, dance, visual art and fashion to electoral politics, political activism and more," added Associate Director and Initiative Leader H. Samy Alim.

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One of the most prominent universities in the United States offers resident fellowships for the advanced study of hip-hop music and culture. In 2013, The Hiphop Archive and Research Institute (HARI) and the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research at Harvard University launched the Nasir Jones Hiphop Fellowship. Named after GRAMMY-winning hip-hop artist Nas, the fellowship is funded by an anonymous donor. Past recipients include Dr. Bradley of Kennesaw State. (Harvard’s HARI also offers an additional resident fellowship.)

"Hip-hop is important like computer science," Nas said in a press conference announcing the Jones fellowship. "The world is changing. If you want to understand the youth, listen to the music. This is what’s happening right underneath your nose." 

Having fellowships and archives help ensure the continued study of hip-hop and offer hope to solidify its legacy for the next 50 years and beyond.

Teaching The Elements

As hip-hop education broadens and deepens at every academic level, there may also be the formation of more dedicated schools and increased educational attention to the original elements of hip-hop: DJing, MCing, beatboxing, graffiti art and breakdancing.

The foundational history and practice of DJing is now taught in courses at major institutions, including Stanford University and New School in New York City, and incorporated into curricula at music production schools such as Berklee College of Music in Boston and Pyramind in San Francisco. One-off workshops and day classes are also sometimes offered at select record stores such as Superior Elevation in Brooklyn.

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Dedicated technical DJ schools are training future stars on and offline. After teaching DJ skills to private and college students for years, Queens, N.Y.-based DJ Rob Swift started his own Brolic Army DJ School to teach advanced skills, host masterclasses with other legends and host student challenges online.

Another excelling technical DJ school is Beat Junkie Institute of Sound (BJIOS), which trains students in DJing and production both online and at a brick and mortar location in Glendale, California. Like their friend and colleague Swift and his X-Ecutioners crew, the Beat Junkies DJs came to international prominence in the '90s as champions on the world battle DJ circuit. 

As with MCing, graffiti and breakdancing, women DJs have been both influential and underrepresented in rap culture, but that may be changing. BJIOS has a supportive division for women and girls called Ladies of Sound to serve over half of the student body and offers a yearly scholarship for women in honor of the late Pam The Funkstress, the DJ of choice for Prince on his final tour, in conjunction with Pyramind and the Purple Pam Foundation. 

A Future In Physical Education

The world is at the precipice of a new frontier in hip-hop influenced physical education thanks to breakdancing, which will be an official Olympic sport beginning with the Paris 2024 Games. This official recognition could foster the need for new learning opportunities all across the globe at K-12 schools, universities, dance studios and specialized sports schools. 

This is already starting to happen on the academic front on the East Coast. Philadelphia’s Hip-Hop Fundamentals brings professional breakdancing workshops into K-12 schools, using movement alongside academic and social teaching. 

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Princeton University lecturer and Hearst Choreographer-in-Residence Raphael Xavier offers a college course called Introduction to Breaking: Deciphering its Power that "gives equal weight to scholarly study and embodied practice, using both approaches to explore the flow, power and cultural contexts of Breaking."

Hip-hop has grown from being dismissed as a short-term fad to becoming a vital lens for studying the world. The acceleration of the latter over the past 15 years alone suggests much more to come for hip-hop and education.

The most important teacher of this culture is hip-hop music, and it will continue to evolve intellectually, spiritually and physically over time and all across the planet. In that respect, the educational potential has only just begun to be understood.

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