Today's episode is an excerpt from a live stream with Edmund Adjapong, author of the forthcoming book, Teach Like An MC, Hip-Hop Pedagogy in the K-12 Classroom. Dr. Adjapong delves into the origins, evolution, and legacy of hip-hop as a voice for Black identity, resistance, and creativity. He also examines the genre's deep roots in the Bronx, its role in amplifying social justice movements and its global influence as a cultural force. Explore the importance of reflecting on your own teacher identity and how to authentically incorporate hip-hop in the classroom by valuing your students' cultural connections.
Transcript
Edmund Adjapong:
When we talk about hip-hop, and when I write about hip-hop off the bat, I always articulate hip-hop as a culture that is for Black and Brown communities that was created by Black and Brown communities, immigrant communities in the South Bronx. But hip-hop is a very inclusive culture, right? So anybody can find a connection to hip-hop and hip-hop is very welcoming culture. Hip-hop welcomes anybody as long as you engage authentically for the most part.
But when we think about hip-hop, the hip-hop history couched in the context of American history, I really like to bring up these points in our American history that have impacted the lives and realities of Black people and people of color across our country since the nation's birth. So when we think about slavery and the idea of bringing enslaved people from Africa to America as property to harvest crops, to engage in indentured labor, obviously not equitable, not supportive of Black folks in the country, if they're engaging in that way and they're being seen as property. When we think about the abolishment of slavery and the ratification of the 13th Amendment, that was a moment in American history where our government shared that we do not want to engage in slavery. We're going to abolish slavery. Black people and descendants of slavery should be free and be free and be able to engage in the world as they please without being deemed or viewed as property.
But the consequence of that within our society and our history is the establishment of Jim Crow. The government's abolished slavery, but then established Jim Crow, which meant separate but equal.This idea that Black Americans have lived in this country after slavery under Jim Crow laws where they weren't able to engage in the same banks, have the same opportunity, attend the same school, attend the same church, nothing could be shared. Living in segregation was devastating to the Black community.
But even in the midst of segregation, in the midst of slavery and other challenging events, Black people still found opportunities to express joy and also to resist the oppression that they were facing.
Jim Crow was abolished as a result of Brown versus Board of Education, which deemed that separate but equal, separate was not necessarily fair and we want to integrate schools. Black communities have fought for the school integration and integration of our society. But the result of integrating schools was the loss of a lot of Black community schools. When we integrated schools, Black students had a difficult time integrating within white schools, but historically white schools did not want to accept or hire Black teachers. Brown versus Board of Education did create opportunity for integration, but there weren't many opportunities for Black youth to really succeed in regards to curriculum, how they're seen in schools, how they're disciplined in schools, how they're supported in schools. There are still disparities as a result of school integration that we're still seeing in our schools today. But still there are community organizations and folks on the ground who are fighting towards more equitable schools and spaces. Again, resisting the challenges and disparities that come as a result of our government not really showing up in the way that really supports and provides equitable opportunities and advantages for Black communities.
Then we have hip-hop, the birth of hip-hop in 1974. Hip-hop comes in the context that's really devastated within the Bronx and New York City going through some really difficult socioeconomic times and challenges. But again, hip-hop is a response to the oppression that folks were experiencing at that time. Again, hip-hop demonstrates the resistance and how folks are showing up in these spaces and showing up collectively within community and experiencing joy amongst one another. At each of these points within American history, although there have been challenges that we'll argue for the Black community in America, there have often been times where Black folks were resisting and often moving towards liberation in their own ways without really recognizing or needing the American government to come through the whole way.
That's really what I wanted to think about as we're navigating, as we're thinking about this. When we get to hip-hop and hip-hop is this beautiful culture, it's a genre of music, of course, but I want us to think about hip-hop as a culture. We think about hip-hop and hip-hop history, hip-hop was conceived and birthed on August 11th, 1973, on 1520 Cedric Avenue. One of the first hip-hop parties in the Bronx where you got DJ Kool Herc and his sister Cindy Campbell, who threw us a party. The intent of throwing this party wasn't to be like, "Yeah, we're going to create a culture in a genre of music." But Cindy Campbell, she hosts a party and had her brother DJ because it's a back-to-school party. She wanted to host a party in the community center, and her intention was to raise money to buy clothes so she could be fly at school.
Hip-hop was created in this context where folks was hustling and innovating for themselves and putting on for themselves regardless of what oppression and societal factors that they're facing. It's important for us to think about the context in which hip-hop was birthed.
When we think about hip-hop history, hip-hop culture, hip-hop is more than just music. Hip-hop is multimodal expression, hip-hop is culture. Hip-hop has five creative elements. We have the MC, the b-boy, graffiti artists, the DJ, and knowledge of self. In my work, I leverage these creative elements and really think and consider how can we leverage these as teaching approaches and strategies.
One of my favorite elements is knowledge of self. Knowledge of self came later from Afrika Bambaataa, Zulu Nation, and this idea of how do we take a moment to really recognize and identify who we are? We are all descendants of Africa. We come from the African diaspora and we have some connection to the mainland. How do we connect ourselves to that? Always leverage and be critical of systems and always counter and fight oppression. Be confident in who we are as Black Americans, as descendants from Africa and the African diaspora. But also be proud of who we are in the face of oppression and find ways to always move towards resistance and liberation towards for ourselves. That's knowledge of self.
When we think about the birth of hip-hop and the context in which hip-hop was birthed, think about the 1970s. When I think about my mom, my parents are immigrants from Ghana, West Africa, and my mom came to New York in the late 1970s. I remember when she would talk about when she first got to this country, she would say, "I came to New York and I came to America, but I remember buildings burning."
I'm like, "What are you talking about, Mom? Why are buildings burning?" In the Bronx during the 1970s, buildings were burning quite literally. There was this really challenging socioeconomic challenges across the city during the 1960s and '70s. There was development across Bronx Expressway. This is the I-95 that connects New Jersey to New York to Connecticut. Literally tens of thousands of people were displaced from their homes during this time. We're seeing the decay of the community. We're seeing displacement. We're seeing increased violence, and we're seeing lack of resources for social programs for those who need it, youth seeking connection which breeds hustle innovation. How do we hustle and how do we innovate?
When I think and talk about the inceptions of hip-hop, I really like to show these images of young people who were engaging in the Bronx and participate in the Bronx during the 1970s. This is how they showed up in this space. We have this image on the left, a building burning, and you have a group of kids who are just watching the firefighters put out the fire, but you also have a group of young men who are playing basketball. This demonstrates to me that this is normal. We see these buildings burning quite frequently, it's a normal thing in our community. But in the face of what's going on, not to normalize it, but we're going to still experience joy. We're going to do the things that we want to do, similar to this young man right here who's flipping off this mattress. Who's flipping on this mattress here. Maybe not ideal, but this idea of, "We're going to experience joy regardless of the circumstance and the context in which we're engaging in and which we're living in." I just love the images because it demonstrates the Bronx during the times, and it highlights the social context of the Bronx during the 1970s. But then just demonstrating that young people are going to always find opportunities to connect and find joy. They're not going to stop just because things are challenging. That's important for us to recognize.
When we think about hip-hop, I want us to consider hip-hop as social justice. How do we acknowledge this culture and this genre of music as one where it's highly constructive? It leverages its platform as a contested space for historically oppressed groups and historically marginalized groups to resist and challenge social ideologies. Hip-hop really provides folks with a voice, and that's one of the beautiful things. Regardless of who you are, where you come from and your background, you can leverage music to share your story and share your narratives. That's what we see a lot in the beginnings and still today in hip-hop culture. I argue that hip-hop was born in the challenging and dilapidated conditions in a culture of poverty in New York City, but this culture is what sparks creativity, innovation, and hustle.
I also want us to consider hip-hop as liberation. Hip-hop, when we think about it as social justice, I want us think about resistance, hip-hop as resistance and hip-hop as Black resistance in particular. Hip-hop is a tool where young folks are able to share their experiences, share their challenges, share what's on their mind and what's their heart, and use it as a tool for resistance and whatever's going on in their lives in society at that time. But also use it as a tool to move towards liberation. As an educator, I don't think that me as a teacher or facilitator, I'm not coming in to liberate anybody or to support anybody in that. I can support your liberation, but I can't do it for you. As educators, how do we support our young people in thinking critically and being constructive and being able to contest systems of oppression and move towards liberating themselves?
Hip-hop as liberation, supporting our opportunities for social awareness, supporting opportunities to share experiences, to share identities. To connect with one another and highlight these identities and experiences on a large platform today. Hip-hop as liberation. In schools, how do we support young people towards liberation in relationship to the content? What social injustices are in relationship to the things that you're learning in your class? What can you do as a teacher and as a student to address those social injustices with your understanding of content knowledge?
I want us think about hip-hop as pedagogy. My book, Teach Like an MC, which comes out on March 20th, so be sure to go cop that, really focuses on hip-hop history. I offer frameworks for teachers and reflecting on teacher identity. I think the part that I'm really excited for folks to dive into is the teacher identity part. I think that engaging in your teacher identity, introspective work, understanding who you are, exploring your various and multiple identities, regardless of who you are, where you are, how old you are, is important for anybody and any educator regardless of the context, but especially for folks who want to leverage hip-hop. You will have a lot of educators who are like, "Well, I grew up to hip-hop and I know everything about hip-hop." But it's not about how we, the educator and the adult, in the space interact can engage in hip-hop. While that can be important, it's not the most important when we're thinking about teaching and learning. What's most important is trying to connect with our students and gain a deeper understanding of what they're liking hip-hop, and trying to find ways to authentically connect to that. If we allow our students to lead, we can gain an understanding of how they are participating in hip-hop and bring those approaches into the classroom.
The book has a number of strategies that are informed by hip-hop and the multimodalness of hip-hop. They will support but it's really important for us to consider how young people are engaging in participating in hip-hop and their connections to the culture. Because it's different from ours. It's different from how we were raised and how we engage in the culture. It's okay if we don't have similar tastes in hip-hop music. I think what's important is that we respect and value how our students are showing up and their connections to hip-hop as well.
Edie:
Thanks for tuning in today. To pre-order Edmund's book, visit blog.heinemann.com, that's where you can read a full transcript as well and use promo code TEACHMC for 20% off, plus free shipping at heinemann.com.
About the Author
Edmund Adjapong is Director of the Hip-Hop Culture, Equity, and Excellence Academy and an Associate Professor in the Educational Studies Department at Seton Hall University. A former middle school science teacher in New York City Public Schools, he is also the founding editor for the Journal of Hip-Hop Education and editor of the #HipHopEd Compilation Book Series. Edmund is a native of the Bronx, New York.
