The State of Rap: Time and Place in Hip Hop Nationalism

Abstract

We're gonna treat you like a king, threatens a white cop from the LAPD on the Side of Ice Cube's 1991 album, Death Certificate. What goddamn king? inquires the indignant from South Central Los Angeles. Rodney King! Martin Luther King! And all the other goddamn kings from Africa!' As the premier rapper in hip hop (whose credits include the gangsta anthem tha Police),2 Ice Cube emerges on the Life Side of this album, to the astonishment of many, as a born-again black nationalist. In the sleeve of Death Certificate, Ice Cube makes his transformation explicit: We have limited knowledge of self, so it leads to a nigga mentality. The best place for a young black male or female is the Nation of Islam. Soon as we as a people use our knowledge of self to our advantage we will then be able to become and be called blacks.

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