Bakari Kitwana ('90, M.A.T.), a former music reviewer for National Public Radio's All Things considered, a nationally known cultural critic, and author of the 1994 book The Rap on Gangsta Rap, spoke at the River Campus on February 28. His lecture was sponsored by the Black Students' Union and the Office of College Advancement. Kitwana characterizes the key crises he believes face African Americans today: The "inferiorization" of black children through the primary use of standardized tests to gauge learning progress, unemployment, disproportionately high rates in incarcerating black men, the "War of the Sexes" economic competition between black men and women, and an intergenerational gap in cultural understanding.

"Hip Hop [he uses the term as synonymous with the culture of rap music] . . . provides the infrastructure a major political movement needs," says Kitwana. While corporate media moguls have defined it as the language of a violent urban subculture, Kitwana sees the culture as, more accurately, a strong grassroots movement. "Rap is a $3 to $4 billion per year industry that has changed the (power) equation for black youth." The culture has an active, widespread local base, he further notes. The medium has also brought more African-American youth to international attention than any other.

The Hip Hop movement, he says, can be used to construct a national organization like the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) of the 1960s and to move toward a national political convention. "White kids," he also exhorts, "have a greater responsibility than to just be 'cultural bandits.' " While he thinks Hip Hop should encourage the older generation's involvement, he warns that elders need to help, not control, the agenda. Kitwana urged his mainly-student audience to move beyond local political issues and to recreate an environment of student activism. "You are our black intellectuals now, whether you accept that or not."