Expert Bakari Kitwana to discuss hip-hop’s meaning, impact

Hip-hop expert Bakari Kitwana will ask IU students to challenge the true meaning of hip-hop and question its impact in the political realm. \nThe Union Board’s Black History Month lecturer will deliver a speech titled “Can Hip-Hop Make the Transition from Cultural Movement to Political Power?” at 6:30 p.m. today in the IU Auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.\nThe lecture will be co-sponsored by IU’s Hip Hop Congress. This week is IU’s seventh annual hip-hop awareness week.\n“We thought he’d be different from the type of people we usually bring in,” said junior Kelli Zimmerman, director of the Union Board Diversity Performance Committee. “He’s a dynamic speaker and very well-educated and talks about a lot of interesting topics that affect today’s youth and college students.”\nKitwana frequently lectures throughout the country on a range of hip-hop related topics, from why white kids love the music to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s impact on the music culture today. His speech tonight will focus on the politics of hip-hop, Zimmerman said.\n“I think he’ll probably address the extent of people who are a part of the hip-hop culture who are often not represented in the political atmosphere or politics in general,” she said. “I think he’ll also address the potential that the hip-hop audience has to turn around politics and that the culture doesn’t necessarily fit to one race or type of people. \nKitwana is the founder of the National Hip-Hop convention. He’s also the former editor of The Source Magazine and has written articles for the New York Times, The Boston Globe and the Village Voice, among others. Kitwana has authored several books including “The Hip-Hop Generation: Young Blacks and the Crisis in African American Culture” and “Why White Kids Love Hip Hop: Wankstas, Wiggas, and Wannabes and the New Reality of Race in America.” \nThere will be a book signing for both of these books following his speech and a Q-and-A session.