Hip Hop Law

Just Out: "Hip Hop and the Law"

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Tue, 01 Sep 2015 17:52:00 +0000

The Carolina Academic Press has just published Hip Hop and the Law, edited by the late Pamela Bridgewater, Donald Tibbs and andré douglas pond cummings. The Book is available at the CAP website and on Amazon. Enjoy!

Lil' Wayne Sues Cash Money

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Thu, 07 May 2015 15:30:00 +0000

public domain

"What I'm Doing, Getting Money; What We Doing, Getting Money;
What They Doing, Hating On Us; But They Neva Cross;
Cash Money Still a Company and B***h, I'm The Boss"

-Li'l Wayne in "Stuntin' Like My Daddy"

Recently, Lil' Wayne filed a $51 million lawsuit against Cash Money Records, for allegedly failing to pay him millions of dollars in royalties due. Cash Money is still a company but, apparently, a very unscrupulous one; at least, according to Little Wayne, who has now changed his tune about his affinity for the record label. In a 21-page lawsuit filed by Wayne (real name: Dwayne Carter, Jr.), the rapper brings to light the shady dealing of his "daddy" Birdman and Cash Money. Wayne alleges that:

-He does not even own his own label, Young Money Entertainment. Birdman is 51% owner.

-Cash Money failed to provide accounting statements to Young Money for years.

-Cash Money has failed to provide monthly accounting statements and/or failed to pay Young Money its share of receipts with regard to Drake’s recordings, who is signed to Young Money.

-Cash Money has failed to pay Young Money any royalties for recordings owned by Young Money.

-Cash Money failed to properly register the copyright in the Young Money Label recordings as jointly owned by Cash Money and Carter/Young Money LLC.

-Cash Money refused to sign artists that Wayne brought to Young Money.

-Cash Money failed to pay third parties (i.e. producers) involved in Young Money projects.

After some back and forth following the filing of the lawsuit, Lil' Wayne dismissed the suit originally filed in New York and refiled in Louisiana where Wayne was originally signed by Cash Money. Cash Money threatened to challenge the venue if the case remained in New York. The dispute continues with Lil' Wayne determined to get out of his contract with Cash Money.

It seems Wayne is the one hating on Cash Money now, to the tune of a $51 million lawsuit. That's a lot A Millis.

co-drafted by Grant Stupeck, 2L, Indiana Tech Law School and andré douglas pond cummings

Executed for a Broken Taillight

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Fri, 10 Apr 2015 02:25:00 +0000

Walter L. Scott, U.S. Coast Guard Photo

Hip hop has long decried police brutality and the hyperpolicing of black communities. In 2015, it appears that the problems of police killing and racial profiling are continuing and perhaps growing, not dissipating. When jaywalking, selling loose cigarettes, and driving with a broken taillight end up in the death of the African American citizens, we have a compelling need to reform policing.

Take for example the killing of Walter Scott in North Charleston, South Carolina. Before the video became public, the story told by police officer Michael Slager was one of justified killing. "He took my taser" was his tagline and "I was in fear for my life" would have been the testimony, just as it was for a carefully-coached officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson. However, here, the video simply cannot support a story of "stolen taser" and "fear for life." The video shows Officer Slager shooting a slowly running away Walter Scott in the back eight times. Any reasonable viewing of the video shows a calm and callous Slager not only firing eight times without giving further chase, but then that Slager later picks something up that was at his feet when shooting, carries it to the prone Scott and drops it down next to the body (the taser?). Officer Slager has been charged with murder. Video is here.

Law Professor and Vice-Provost Dorothy Brown discusses the events above and deconstructs them for CNN in "Did Cops Learn From Mistakes of Ferguson?" posted earlier today. Professor Brown writes:

"This time the stage was set in North Charleston, South Carolina, a city of about 100,000 people. Walter Scott was stopped by Officer Michael Slager for a broken taillight, and within minutes Scott was dead. According to the incident report, Slager said: "Shots fired, and the subject is down. He took my Taser." His attorney at the time, David Aylor, said that Slager "felt threatened and reached for his department-issued firearm and fired his weapon."

But then came the video.

We watched in horror as we saw Slager shoot Scott in the back multiple times. Then we saw Slager pick up something from one location and place it near Scott's lifeless body. On Tuesday, the officer was arrested on murder charges. North Charleston police Chief Eddie Driggers told reporters, "I have watched the video, and I was sickened by what I saw." Apparently so was Slager's attorney, who announced after the video was made public that he was no longer representing the officer."

As we argue repeatedly in this blog space, the United States must get it right by reforming carceral policy in this nation and figuring out a different and better way to police our citizens. We have suggestions . . .

cross-posted on the Corporate Justice Blog

In Memoriam - Pamela Bridgewater

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Sat, 17 Jan 2015 20:30:00 +0000

Pamela Bridgewater - RIP

On December 27, 2014, our community lost a fierce and devoted legal scholar, activist, teacher, and friend when Professor Pamela Bridgewater passed away after battling cancer for several years. Pam lived a life full of giving mentorship and dedicated activism. She was an innovator and a creative thinker. She believed that the law could give voice to the powerless. Pam was a feminist who wrote about reproductive rights. Pam was a hip hop head that wrote about hip hop's impact on law and culture. She co-founded this blog, HipHopLaw.com. She founded Roots and Reality at American U. Law School. She is the co-author of the forthcoming, first-of-its-kind casebook, Hip Hop and the Law (Carolina Academic Press).

Pam Bridgewater was all of these things and more. To me, she was a soulful human being. She cared about peace and justice. She cared about the success and potential impact of her colleagues and friends. She was gentle yet forceful when pushing for innovative change in the law or important revisions on book manuscripts. Pam fought for affirmative action, recognition of equal marriage rights, reproductive rights for women and particularly women of color, and urged all who knew her to get behind these equal rights.

At base, Pam loved well, lived well, and left a legacy of mentorship, equality, and fierce activism. She will be greatly missed by all who knew her. She was loved by many. Pamela Bridgewater's passing leaves a void in the legal academy that will be difficult to fill.

A memorial service will be held on Sunday, February 1, 2015, at the Women's National Democratic Club in Washington, D.C.

Hip Hop's Role in Teaching Communication Skills

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Sat, 02 Aug 2014 00:34:00 +0000

Nick Sciullo

Hip Hop Law Blog contributor Nick Sciullo has a compelling piece up at Communication Currents entitled All I Really Need to Know I Learned from Hip-Hop: Hip Hop’s Role in Teaching Communication Skills. In the post, Sciullo states:

"My argument is that hip-hop music is an increasingly effective tool for teaching communication. This is because many of today’s undergraduate and graduate students, as well as new professors in rhetoric, communication, and media studies grew up listening to hip-hop. Hip-hop music conveys myriad messages about love, life, law, ethics, and politics. Music has long played a central role in our lives, from the first album we bought with our own money to our prom songs, wedding songs, and the like. Many significant events and time periods in United States history, including the Civil Rights Movement, the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, become tied to music."

Check out the rest of the piece here.

Gangsta Rap Lyrics as Evidence of Guilt?

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Thu, 27 Mar 2014 02:45:00 +0000

Today, the New York Times caught up with what Professors Donald Tibbs and Andrea Dennis have been talking about, even sounding a warning bell against, for years. In the Times story "Legal Debate on Using Boastful Rap Lyrics as a Smoking Gun," reporter Lorne Manly describes the growing trend amongst prosecutors across the nation to use gangsta rap lyrics in charging crimes and trying young black men primarily for crimes allegedly committed based on gangsta rap lyrics scribed by the young men charged.

Manly writes of the "more than three dozen prosecutions in the past two years in which rap lyrics have played prominent roles. The proliferation of cases has alarmed many scholars and defense lawyers, who say that independent of a defendant’s guilt or innocence, the lyrics are being unfairly used to prejudice judges and juries who have little understanding that, for all its glorification of violence, gangsta rappers are often people who have assumed over-the-top and fictional personas."

This story shines a spotlight on this "new," yet age-old practice of discriminatory prosecution, where primarily white prosecutors are seeking to convict primarily young men of color for hip hop lyrics used as evidence of guilt, when musical genres of all types engage in the same sort of specific violent and profane lyrics. Of course, rock, country, and metal receive no attention from law enforcement, but instead are viewed as first amendment expression, rather than literal behavior. Manly writes "Those who oppose the use of the lyrics say prosecutors have singled out rap as a literal evocation of reality when the lyrics in other musical genres have long been acknowledged as fictional."

Hip Hop, Mass Incarceration, and the Private Prison Industrial Complex

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Fri, 07 Mar 2014 02:40:00 +0000

Michigan Law School Panel

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Fri, 28 Feb 2014 20:30:00 +0000

On March 14, 2014, at the University of Michigan Law School, Professors Donald Tibbs and andré douglas pond cummings will present "Hip-Hop Mass Incarceration, and the Private Prison Industrial Complex" at 12 noon in Hutchins Hall, Room 100.

Happy New Year

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Wed, 01 Jan 2014 17:30:00 +0000

courtesy of Alex Simms/Wikimedia Commons

We at the Hip Hop Law Blog are grateful to our readers, commentators, and contributors. Thanks to all of you that support our work, challenge our insights, and work with us toward social and racial justice.

Happy New Year to all of our readers and supporters. We wish everyone a safe and prosperous 2014.

Hip Hop and the Law: The Key Writings that Formed the Movement

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Sat, 28 Dec 2013 01:00:00 +0000

Professors Donald Tibbs, Pamela Bridgewater and andré douglas pond cummings have agreed in principle to publish their anthology "Hip Hop and the Law: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement," with the Carolina Academic Press, slated to appear in Fall 2014. This book project is based primarily on the Hip Hop and the American Constitution course offered in 2012 at Drexel Law and West Virginia Law, and the "Evolution of Street Knowledge" symposium hosted at WVU Law School, keynoted by Cornel West and Talib Kweli in 2009.

Hip Hop and the Law will feature 30 contributing authors who have critically interrogated American law through the lens of hip hop and the hip hop generation. The subject matter ranges from constitutional issues such as search and seizure, copyright, trial by jury, prison policy, trademark to gender and hip hop and private prison corporate profit, and much more. The anthology promises to be pathmarking. Updates will be provided periodically here at the Hip Hop Law Blog.

Papers of the 2012 Tupac Amaru Shakur Collection Conference: Hip Hop, Education & Expanding the Archival Imagination

noreply@blogger.com (HipHopLaw.com) — Tue, 17 Sep 2013 01:54:00 +0000

The Papers of the 2012 Tupac Amaru Shakur Collection Conference: Hip Hop, Education & Expanding the Archival Imagination has now been published. The file is available here. Last Fall the Robert W. Woodruff Library at Atlanta University Center (Clark Atlanta University, Spellman College, Morehouse College, and Interdenominational Theological Center) hosted a conference that brought together scholars from across disciplines and across the world. This blogs very own, andré douglas pond cummings and Nick J. Sciullo both presented. Sciullo's paper can be found at pp. 32-37 of the conference proceedings.

This interdisciplinary exploration of Tupac, hip-hop, and the archival imagination should be of tremendous interest to hip hop, law, criminology, and librarianship scholars.

-- Nick J. Sciullo

Momentum Shift in the Failed War on Drugs

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Sat, 07 Sep 2013 14:18:00 +0000

Important news last week out of Washington D.C.: The Justice Department will not challenge state laws in Colorado and Washington that legalize marijuana and will abruptly change focus in the prosecution of the War on Drugs. In what is no doubt bad news to the private prison industry, federal enforcement will now shift focus from scooping up low level, non-violent drug offenders and instead prioritize stopping large drug cartels and kingpin operations.

From CNN: "Under the new guidelines, federal prosecutors are required to focus on eight enforcement priorities, including preventing marijuana distribution to minors,preventing drugged driving, stopping drug trafficking by gangs and cartels and forbidding the cultivation of marijuana on public lands. . . .

Nineteen states and the District ofColumbia allow some legal use of marijuana, primarily for medicinal

purposes. The attorney general told the Washington and Colorado governors that the Justice Department will work with the states to craft regulations that fall in line with the federal priorities, and reserves the right to try to block the laws if federal authorities find repeated violations."

As private prison profiteers have raked in billions of dollars of taxpayer money warehousing low level marijuana users, this shift in focus will now harm bottom line profitability. Private prison corporations, perhaps anticipating the impending sea change, have already re-focused efforts to fill prison beds and maintain profitability by lobbying furiously for detention policies that imprison immigrants. The next battle against the perverse incentives that motivate private prison corporations is shaping up to take place along immigration reform lines.

Hip hop has long exposed the discrimination and racism inherent in the prosecution of the War on Drugs calling for its end.

The Failed War on Drugs and Hip Hop

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Sat, 17 Aug 2013 10:57:00 +0000

Attorney General Eric Holder

Terrific news this week for those interested in fairness and justice in connection with the failed War on Drugs in the United States. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Department of Justice will end its ridiculous prosecution of low level, non violent drug offenders as mandated for so long by the skewed sentencing guidelines, that locked up low level offenders for time periods one typically would associate with drug kingpins and cartel bosses.

Holder reasoned: "'Too many Americans go to too many prisons for far too long, and for no truly good law enforcement reason,' Holder told the American Bar Association's House of Delegates in San Francisco. He questioned some assumptions about the criminal justice system's approach to the 'war on drugs,' saying that excessive incarceration has been an 'ineffective and unsustainable' part of it. Although he said the United States should not abandon being tough on crime, Holder embraced steps to address 'shameful' racial disparities in sentencing, the budgetary strains of overpopulated prisons and policies for incarceration that punish and rehabilitate, 'not merely to warehouse and forget.'"

From the New York Times: "In a major shift in criminal justice policy, the Obama administration moved . . . to ease the overcrowding in federal prisons by ordering prosecutors to omit listing quantities of illegal substances in indictments for low-level drug cases, sidestepping federal laws that impose strict mandatory minimum sentences for drug-related offenses."

The Hip Hop Law Blog has often reported on the massive failures associated with the War on Drugs, including the perverse involvement of the private prison industry on the continuing incarceration of American citizens for "no truly good law enforcement reason," but instead to increase profits for executives and shareholders. The private prison corporation regime has for years lobbied for draconian mandatory minimum sentences in order to increase the length of time that low level prisoners would remain incarcerated.

Artists like Talib Kweli, Lil' Wayne, Mos Def, Common, and many others have repeatedly pointed out the failures in the War on Drugs and the perversity of the prison industrial complex.

cross-posted on the Corporate Justice Blog.

Lauryn Hill Reports to Prison

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Thu, 18 Jul 2013 21:00:00 +0000


Lauryn Hill - Wikimedia Commons/Brennan Schnell

Last week, Lauryn Hill's tax issues landed her in a prison cell. Hill was sentenced to three months in federal prison for failing to file tax returns on earnings of more than $1.8 million purportedly collected on royalties between 2005 and 2007. She will serve her three months in the low security female facility in Danbury, Connecticut.

Hill's prison sentence highlights the disparities that exist between artists and the music industry. Hill has sold more than 16 million records, but "lives modestly considering the amount of money her music has earned for others." When she appeared before the court in May 2013, she stated: "Someone did the math, and [record sales] came to around $600 million, . . . And I sit here before you trying to figure out how to pay a tax debt? If that's not like enough to slavery, I don't know."

According to CNN Entertainment: "The U.S. attorney's office said that the income in question was earned mainly from music and film royalties that were paid to companies she owned from 2005 to 2008. According to the prosecutor, the sentence handed down 'also takes into account additional income and tax losses for 2008 and 2009 -- when she also failed to file federal returns -- along with her outstanding tax liability to the state of New Jersey, for a total income of approximately $2.3 million and total tax loss of approximately $1,006,517.'"

Following her three months in federal prison, Hill will serve three months of home confinement followed by a year of supervised probation. Reportedly, Hill has signed a new record deal agreeing to produce new music in order to pay the fines, penalties and back taxes.

Hip Hop and the Law Isn't Just for the Academy: A Practitioner's Take on Kanye West and Family Law

noreply@blogger.com (HipHopLaw.com) — Tue, 28 May 2013 18:00:00 +0000

From the email files...

Attorney Joshua E. Stern recently emailed HipHopLaw.com to tell us about some work he had done on Kanye West and Illinois family law. Have a question about child support? Kanye's got your answers according to Stern in this post.

Joshua Stern works in Evanston, Illinois, not far from Northwestern University. He received his J.D. from Emory and B.S. from DePaul. While at Emory he worked on the Emory International Law Review. And, aside from this impressive pedigree, he's a bit of a hip hop aficionado.

Councilor Stern's post highlights a key point we at HipHopLaw have been trying to make, namely that hip hop has influenced and will continue to influence lawyers, law students, legal activists, and legal scholars. The point is not that hip hop solves all of the world's problems, or that only hip hop can help us understand the law, but is instead that hip hop is an important way many people come to understand the law and that to understand law we must be cognizant of the influences popular culture has on popular conceptions of law. In short, hip hop can help us. If clients or students come into our office, sometimes it's easier to explain things using Kanye or Jay-Z than talking about Blackacre or a "bundle of rights."

How are other practitioners thinking about hip hop? We'd like to know...

Photo credits: Law Offices of Joshua E. Stern and UPROXX.com.

-- Nick J. Sciullo

New Article: Tryon P. Woods in Social Text on postracialism and punishment

noreply@blogger.com (HipHopLaw.com) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 22:22:00 +0000

Tryon P. Woods has published "'Beat It like a Cop': The Erotic Cultural Politics of Punishment in the Era of Postracialism" in Social Text (Volume 31, Issue 1, Spring 2013, pp.21-41). From the beginning of the article:

My concern in this essay is with how those of us involved with problems of black revolution—that is, with the crux of what it means to liberate humanity—can further develop a critical stance that deals honestly with the ethicopolitical context in which black art, black performance, black social movements, and black popular culture find expression. I am, in other words, interested in configuring the critical study of hip hop within an accounting of the materiality of antiblack sexual violence in which the modern world is grounded, especially as hip hop emerges through the transmutation of the state’s terroristic repression of black revolution in the 1960s and 1970s into the sexualized violence of the present prison industrial complex. My focus, then, is on how the context of a world in which, since the dawn of the African slave trade, black people are structurally positioned outside the human family, and its claims to integrity, honor, and visibility can inform how we read black expressive cultures. I suggest that rigorous adherence to this context is rare in cultural critique.

-- Nick J. Sciullo

Copyright Fair Use Panel

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 13:30:00 +0000

Hip hop and copyright law are intimately connected. Professors K.J. Greene and Andre Smith have argued that copyright law acted in the past and continues to act to stifle freedom, creativity and originality in hip hop music. A symposium is being held at Thomas Jefferson School of Law on April 12, 2013, that will serve to enlighten all on recent changes in copyright law, particularly the fair use doctrine.

Will Hip Hop Solve Mass Incarceration?

noreply@blogger.com (HipHopLaw.com) — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 14:37:00 +0000

We've all heard about the evils of mass incarceration, made perhaps most salient by Michelle Alexander's book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. Reactions to the book have largely been positive and you need not look far to find a review of this important text (SocialistAlternative.org, New York Times, Boston Review, International Socialist Review, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Yale Daily News, Washington Lawyer, Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare, and my own in the Texas Law Review Dicta are but a few of the many reviews). Savvy Internet searchers that you are, I am sure you've also come across numerous reading groups, discussion board threads, and local meetings organizing people around the important issue of mass incarceration. These are all great.

But, now what? Alexander suggests we need a mass movement to end mass incarceration. Russell Simmons and Dr. Boyce Watkins have joined forces to call on the White House to address mass incarceration. They remain relatively quite about their plans however. We do know that several hip-hoppers are involved including Lil' Wayne and Nicki Minaj. KultureKritic.com and BlackBlueDog.com have both reported this story.

Questions remain... What should we expect from Simmons and Watkins and their associated stars? Will their work reach the masses who will need to join in the effort to end mass incarceration? When will we have a better idea what Simmons and Watkins want and what their strategy is for achieving it? Simmons and Watkins are surely doing important work, but we'll need to wait and see what becomes of their efforts.

-- Nick J. Sciullo

Criminal Justice in the 21st Century Conference

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 22:37:00 +0000

The Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development at the St. John's Law School is sponsoring a timely event regarding criminal "justice" in the 21st century. The event will be held Friday, April 5th, 2013 at St. John's School of Law in Queens, New York. The Conference Information is below:

Criminal Justice in the 21st Century: The Challenge to Protect Individual Freedoms, Civil Rights, and Our Safety

Hosts:

Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development
The Ronald H. Brown Center for Civil Rights and Economic Development

Co-Sponsors

Society of American Law Teachers (SALT)
Asian American Legal Defense and Educational Fund
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF)
New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU)
Latino Justice/PRLDEF

Date, Friday, April 5, 2013

Time, 8 a.m. – 7:30 p.m.

Location, St. John's School of Law
8000 Utopia Parkway
Queens, NY 11439

Description:

Criminal justice in the 21st Century confronts a combination of novel and familiar challenges. New technology and new legislation purport to redefine individual rights, such as the right to privacy or the right to bear arms, in the name of greater public safety. While the past decade boasted a record low number of reported crimes, prosecutorial and police power continues to expand. These issues raise a question of whether there is any legal, constitutionally sanctioned manner to balance individual rights and safety concerns.

This symposium provides a balanced discussion about pertinent 21st Century criminal justice issues. It weighs broader societal interests, such as safety and public order, against individual interests, including civil rights and civil liberties, privacy and autonomy. This symposium confronts these difficult issues with an open, informed perspective that fosters dialogue with an end towards positing practical and effective solutions.

Symposium Themes Include:

The impact of technology on individual rights, such as privacy and government regulation
The constitutionality of current police practices, particularly in NYC, with respect to racial profiling
The legal realities for juveniles in the criminal justice system
Evaluation and analysis of recent federal and New York State responses to proposed gun safety measures and reforms
Exploration of contemporary issues facing prisons

Featured Speakers Include:

Sen. Eric Adams, New York State Senator, 20th Senate District (Brooklyn)
Hon. Harold Baer, Jr., United States District Judge, Southern District of New York
Juan Cartagena, President, Latino Justice/PRLDEF
Hon. Sterling Johnson, Jr., United States District Judge, Eastern District of New York
Sen. Jeffrey D. Klein, Temporary President and IDC Coalition Leader, 34th Senate District (Bronx)
Donna Lieberman, Executive Director, New York Civil Liberties Union

Continuing Legal Education (CLE):
The full-day symposium qualifies for 7 non-transitional CLE credit hours (1 ethics and 6 practice credits). No partial credit will be awarded. The CLE fee is $175. Hardship tuition reduction is available. To receive CLE credit, please complete the CLE Payment Form and return it as directed on the form.

Registration:
There is no fee to attend the symposium, but registration is required. Please complete and submit the online registration form.

More Information:
Ms. Jordan K. Hummel '13
Symposium Editor
Journal of Civil Rights and Economic Development
jordan.hummelJCRED@gmail.com
(718) 990-6074

Does Hip Hop Injure the Black Community?

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 16:00:00 +0000

Hip Hop Concert in Boston, MA

Hip hop writer Sebastian Elkouby asks "Is Hip Hop Destroying Black America?" in his RapRehab.com article published this week. Commercialized hip hop is castigated by Elkouby as he responds to the common refrain from some quarters that hip hop positively injures African American youth and communities. Elkouby writes:

"Is Hip Hop Destroying Black America? To answer this question fairly, we must first discard the distorted image of Hip Hop that mainstream media has passed off for the past 20 years. Hip Hop is a movement consisting of 4 main artistic elements: DJ’ing, Rapping, Breaking and Graffiti. But at its core, it is a philosophy based on the idea that self expression is an integral part of the pursuit of peace, love and unity. It was created by young visionaries who tapped into their greatest potential and gave birth to one of the most important cultural phenomenon the world has ever seen."

Elkouby rightly asks why critics so expressly point to artists for perpetuating negative stereotypes, glorification of violence, and disrespect of women, while ignoring the record executives, the "adults" in the room, who fill the nation's airwaves with banal messages and low-brow fare. "It’s easy to blame talentless top 40 rappers for dominating the airwaves of so called hip hop radio stations like L.A.’s Power 106 or New York’s Hot 97 while Rick Cummings, president of programming for Emmis Communications, which owns both stations, isn’t held accountable for his part in broadcasting filth to millions of listeners. Time and time again, the real decision makers get away with murder while rap artists are projected as the embodiment of everything that is wrong with Hip Hop and young Black males. Kind of how gangs are perceived as the lone cause of urban violence while those who bring guns and drugs into the community remain anonymous."

Further, Interscope President Jimmy Iovine gets called out as the real "gangster" in gangsta rap music, for propagating ridiculousness in hip hop, particularly after signing Chicago 16-year old Chief Keef, who does little more than extol the virtue of blunt smoking and snitch killing in his music.

Has the Record Industry Turned it Around?

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 21:00:00 +0000

For the first time since 1999, the record industry has seen growth. The first revenue increase in 15 years can be tied to a 9% increase in digital download sales. Perhaps the record industry has figured out how to monetize digital record sales. Approximately 10% of digital revenues are made up of paid subscriptions through avenues such as Pandora and Slacker radios. The entire global industry profited at $16.5 Billion in 2012, yet insiders still complain that growth could be more robust if not for the illegal downloading community. Hip hop and R&B artists drove much of the revenue in 2012, including top sellers Flo Rida, Nicki Minaj, Adele, Rihanna, and Pink.

Global Singles Best Sellers in 2012

	Artist	Title	Total (m units)

1	Carly Rae Jepsen	Call Me Maybe	12.5
2	Gotye	Somebody That I Used To Know	11.8
3	PSY	Gangnam Style	9.7
4	fun.	We Are Young	9.6
5	Maroon 5	Payphone	9.1
6	Michel Teló	Ai Se Eu Te Pego	7.2
7	Nicki Minaj	Starships	7.2
8	Maroon 5	One More Night	6.9
9	Flo Rida	Whistle	6.6
10	Flo Rida	Wild ones	6.5

Source: IFPI

CFP: Words Beats & Life

noreply@blogger.com (HipHopLaw.com) — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 16:12:00 +0000

Call for Submissions

Seeking submissions for three themes that will be presented at the 2013 Teach-In:

1. Hip Hop as an identity,

2. Hip Hop and capacity building, and

3. Legacy: Lessons learned from our elders and ancestors

Hip Hop as an Identity

What does it mean to say, “I am Hip Hop”? Knowledge of Self is considered the fifth element of Hip Hop, yet Hip Hop is rarely publicly discussed as an identity. By identity we are referring to that which contributes to an individual’s character, personal understanding, and worldview. We are currently accepting academic papers, poems, essays, and visual arts that speak to Hip Hop as an identity.

Hip Hop and Capacity Building

What began as a way to “keep kids off the street” is evolving from a movement into a unified and cohesive field. WBL is looking for examples of promising practices in Education (K – 16), Nonprofit, For-Profit, and the emerging For-mission space to include in a wide-reaching, information exchange. This will not only help other programs do a better job of connecting with youth, but also help develop standards of practice that will contribute to the advancement of the field. We are specifically interested in models of program design or case studies on leadership, grassroots advocacy, holistic approaches to education, and policies that support sustainability.

Legacy: Lessons Learned from our Elders and Ancestors

History provides numerous examples of art transforming communities in meaningful and tangible ways. So any effort to advance the field would be incomplete without taking a moment to look back and apply prior experience to new circumstances. WBL is looking for submissions that will allow us to learn from the wisdom of our elders and ancestors.

Please submit a 150-word abstract for your submission with an email address and telephone number by March 30, 2013. Panel proposals will be considered as well as short films, poetry, and artwork. The authors of those submissions that are selected for publication will be invited to present at the 2013 Teach In scheduled for July 12-14, 2013.

Submissions can take the form of the following: Scholarly research papers, critical essays, scholarly reviews, editorials, prose, poetry and artwork

For more details including word count, and process of submitting see the full call for submissions HERE

Submissions on other topics will also be considered.

Questions? Email: submissions@wblinc.org

Colleges Love Hip Hop, But Do They Love Black Men Too?

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Mon, 18 Feb 2013 15:00:00 +0000

Professor Travis Gosa at Cornell has just penned an important and insightful article in the Chronicle of Higher Education describing how colleges and universities around the country are adopting hip hop studies courses and programs, but are leaving behind those most responsible for hip hop, the young black male.

According to Gosa: "Hip-hop represents the latest attempt by contemporary universities to rebrand themselves, as competition for students, financial support, and star professors intensifies. This month the College of William & Mary followed in the footsteps of Cornell, Harvard, and colleges that are part of the Atlanta University Center [Morehouse, Spelman and Clark Atlanta] by establishing a hip-hop library collection. With more than 300 college courses related to hip-hop offered each year, full-fledged hip-hop degrees represent a niche repositioning in the education marketplace, even though hip-hop scholars have a hard time articulating the worth of those programs for future success in the labor market.

Institutions of higher learning are failing to address the most problematic irony of hip-hop studies: The explosion of hip-hop in the academy has not coincided with positive educational gains for black men. While colleges race to analyze the street-born music, body movements, art, and poetry, the people whose images are most associated with hip-hop—young black men—continue to be left behind."

Gosa touches on the prison regime in his piece, though it does not discuss the War on Drugs and the Prison Industrial Complex as major reasons that a paucity of young black male students exists at most universities across the country. Gosa argues persuasively that we must adopt affirmative measures to ensure that black male students focus on garnering a college education. In addition, we must strive to end the War on Drugs as currently constituted in order to free young African American and Latino males to reach their greatest educational potential.

Hip Hop Literacies Conference at Ohio State University

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 22:30:00 +0000

The Ohio State University Office of Diversity and Inclusion is hosting the Hip Hop Literacies Conference: Pedagogies for Social Change this weekend, on February 15-16, 2013, in Columbus, Ohio. and Panels and Roundtables on the following subject will be offered: (a) "Innovative and Critical Education for a Better World," (b) "Hip Hop's Pedagogical Imperative: What Hip Hop Teaches Us About Teaching the Law," (c) "Mass Incarceration, Community Re-entry and Hip Hop," and (d) "Bomb the Schools! Watch the Throne! Teach the Youth!" amongst many others.

Hip hop artist Yo Yo will conclude the weekend with a keynote address and concert on February 16, 2013, at the King Arts Complex. Attendance is free to the public, but registration is required at "http://2013osuhiphopliteracies.eventbrite.com."

The Chronic: 20 Years Later

noreply@blogger.com (dré cummings) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 14:30:00 +0000

Has it been twenty years since The Chronic dropped in 1993? Apparently this is true as National Public Radio (NPR) has undertaken to chronicle 1993, a "remarkable year in music." In looking back at this remarkable year in music, NPR begins by examining Dr. Dre and his Chronic record which "had roots in the cultural and social upheaval sparked by the Los Angeles riots the year before."

While hip hop had long enjoyed wide popularity and important social commentary status, The Chronic became an anthem album for millions of young people in the United States and across the globe. In responding in part to the L.A. Riots, The Chronic captured the anger, angst, and anxiety that encapsulated a city and community that considered itself, in some ways, at war with the police employed to protect them. Hip hop had critiqued police brutality aggressively before 1993 and The Chronic, particularly in Dr Dre's former group N.W.A.'s still fiery "F*#k tha Police, and Public Enemy's "Get the F*#k Outta Dodge," but The Chronic was the first to deal with police brutality following the world's introduction to the Los Angeles Police Department's brutalization of Rodney King, which precipitated the L.A. Riots.

Recall, that in the late 1980s when NWA released "F*#k tha Police" and Public Enemy recorded "Get the F*#k Outta Dodge," hip hop was acting as the "Black CNN" reporting on inner city community ills that were largely ignored by the mass media. NWA and Public Enemy came under intense criticism for their anti-police brutality songs in the late 1980s, as law enforcement officials and politicians simply denied such critiques. Only after the LAPD was captured on a grainy hand-held video beating the prone and subdued Rodney King was America clued in to the truth that NWA and Public Enemy had been claiming through narrative lyric: U.S. law enforcement commonly brutalizes the communities they are charged to protect.

Seizing on this moment, (i.e., America's eye-opening moment that police brutality continues against people of color), The Chronic bemoans the circumstances that attend life in the 'hood (through Lil' Ghetto Boy, Nuthin' but a G Thang, and The Day the N*#*#z Took Over, amongst others). The NPR story concludes: "[The Chronic] is an audio document, with a lot of creativity and art and entertainment going along with it. Some people might think that that's wrong, but it's art, it's poetry. And it's supposed to have pain in it. You can gather that from listening to The Chronic — about the L.A. riots — you can feel it, you can kind of understand. And a lot of people agree that they captured it incredibly well. . . . [The Chronic] doesn't have all the answers, and it didn't solve the problems of its time. It's low-riding party music, intended to provide an escape. It also gives voice to the frustrations borne of burned-out buildings, grinding poverty and a feeling that nobody cared."