The Vinyl Ain't Final

Foreword by Robin D.G. Kelley Introduction by Dipannita Basu and Sidney Lemelle SIDE ONE: RAP AND HIP HOP IN THE US 1. 'For the People,' 'TRIBUTE,' and 'REDBONE.' by Umar Bin Hassan 2. 'A Rap Thing,' 'On Rapping Rap.' and 'For Mario: Homeland and Hip Hop,' by Mumia Abu-Jamal 3. Hip Hop: As a Culture and Generation by Dipannita Basu 4. Nobody Knows My Name and an interview with the Director Rachel Raimist: A Female Hip Hop Film Maker by Dipannita Basu and Laura Harris 5. From Azeem to Zion-I: The Evolution of Global Consciousness in Bay Area Hip Hop by Eric K. Arnold 6. Head Rush: Hip Hop and a Hawaiian Nation 'On the Rise.' by Adria L. Imada 7. War At 33 1/3: Culture and Politics Across the Afro-Asian Atlantic. by Sohail Daulatzai SIDE TWO: RAP AND HIP HOP GOES GLOBAL 8. Deathening Silence: The Terms of (Non) Political Commentary Rap by John Hutnyk 9. 'Keeping it Real' in a Different 'Hood: African-Americanization and Hip Hop in Germany by Tim Brown 10. Africa on Their Mind: Rap, Blackness and Citizenship in France by Veronique Helenon 11. Cuban Hip Hop: Underground Revolution by Annelise Wunderlich 12. Between Our Islands We Dance: Hip Hop and the Samoan Diaspora by April K. Henderson 13. Negotiating Ethnicity and Authenticity in Tokyo's Club Harlem by Rhiannon Fink 14. Globalization and Gangster Rap: Hip Hop in the Post Apartheid City by Zine Magubane 15. 'Ni Wapi Tunakwenda': Hip Hop Culture and The Children of Arusha by Sidney J.Lemelle Notes About the Contributors Index

Dipa Basu is and Associate Professor of Sociology and Black Studies at Pitzer College, Claremont, California. Her recent publications include 'Sociology of the Color Line' in Peter Ratcliffe, ed. The Politics of Social Science Research: Race, Ethnicity and Social Change (Palgrave Press, 2001). Sidney Lemelle is an Associate Professor of Black Studies at Pomona College, Claremont, California. He has co-edited with Robin D.G Kelley, Imagining Home: Class, Culture and Nationalism in the African Diaspora (Verso, 1994).

The Vinyl Ain't Final, is the latest attempt in the still growing field of hip hop studies to widen the scope of these discussions, amplifying this deep concern for the political to a global context. It is an insightful but largely humourless book, and therein lies the problem. If the exercise of deploring the bullet riddled 50 Cent's perforation as a marketing hook seems tired in a local context, consider what happens when we take these irresolvable questions to the world's stage. This book flits back and forth between Tanzanian national politics and local 'bongo flava' rappers with ease. -- Hua Hsu, The Wire This book explores hip hop as a global phenomenon' begins the blurb -reassuring if you're unfortunate enough to reside in those far off places where the residue of Grandmaster Flash's leather pants hasn't yet arrived. -- Hip Hop connection The early chapters of the book show how at street level a combination of low economic status, poor education and a racist criminal justice system keeps young talented MCs excluded from the music business. Success stories like artist 50 Cent with his thug to riches story emerge as the exception to the rule. Meanwhile at the top end, even the strong visibility of black entrepreneurship is still beholden to their larger, white owned major labels and distributors. In spite of this, for so many young people in the US, hip hop remains a creative postive force. Among the appalling homicide rates of Oakland and the Bay Area, we find a culturally diverse hip hop scene. In Hawaii - as in so many places around the world, hip hop provides the language of resistance for native Hawaiins fighting for self determination. -- Miriam Zadik Gold, Socialist Review