Is This the Future? - ACE422.2

People giving their definitions of rap and hip hop. Images of Africa, slavery, race riots, etc. Film of Elijah Muhammad, and of Malcolm X, National of Islam. Paul Gilroy, Writer/Sociologist, talking about The Last Poets as the most powerful expression of black politics in the cultural arena, and a forerunner of rap. Jalal Nurriddin, of The Last Poets, performing Beyonder. Nurriddin talks about The Last Poets articulating the legacy of four hundred years of oppression. Femi Biko, Lecturer in Black Studies, sees The Last Poets as part of a continuum of black culture giving a message of black awareness. Film of Malcolm X with pictures of the Poets superimposed. Nurriddin talks about the Poets combining traditional African culture with ideas coming out of the situation in the late 1960s. Nurriddin performing True Blues. He believes that much of the "Africaness" has been taken out of rap because of an "over-emphasis on technology". Rap appeals to young people but not the older ones because of the over-use of electronics in the music. Gilroy says that hip hop culture, deriving from American roots, provided a new political and ethical language. MC Mell’O’ performing Open Up Your Mind.