November 20, 2003
Organized C.O.U.P. & Fluid FM Newswire
www.voxunion.com

Africana Studies, Media Literacy and the Hip-Hop Mix-Tape
TurnedTables the Funkinest Journalist
 tables@mac.com

Thought the mix-tape was just for 50 Cent, Joe Buddens or Kay-Slay? Think again. At this year’s annual celebration of Africana Studies at Kean University in New Jersey journalist, academic and activist Jared Ball offered yet one more example of how the mix-tape can be used to build rather than destroy. Using the intellectual history of one of Africana studies’ foundational bedrock scholars, John Henrik Clarke, Ball offered a high-powered and entertaining presentation that sought to bring together the seemingly disparate fields of Africana Studies, Media Literacy, Hip-Hop and the Mix-Tape.

How does he make this blend work? Well, like any talented DJ with a crate full of tight records from a variety of musical styles Ball moves seamlessly from the tradition of African-centered activist scholarship that was crystallized in the 19th century, preserved and passed to and through John Henrik Clarke to inspire the Black Studies and Black Arts Movements, classrooms and independent study groups to funk, soul and hip-hop music all the way to the mix-tape. As Ball explains, despite its current struggles against the ever-present threat of co-optation, the mix-tape has the potential to be the contemporary manifestation of the underground communication among Black people that has been a constant in this nation and hemisphere ever since the trade in enslaved Africans began over 500 years ago.

The mix-tape has been a method by which Djs communicated to hip-hoppers without access to mass media outlets. It developed its own distribution network that, with the help recently of the internet, has reached a worldwide audience. Similarly, the Africana scholarship tradition developed among enslaved and oppressed African people throughout the diaspora using secret code, independent media and study groups before making its way onto some college campuses all without access to mass media outlets, including publishing houses. So what if, Ball asks, mix-tape distribution could be used to spread and preserve an African-centered tradition of warrior scholarship that like hip-hop is remains under attack by White supremacist capitalist commodity-makers. His work in Africana and Media Studies, along with Fluid FM: Original Mix-Tape Radio, Organized Community Of United People and DC’s new hip-hop activist crew Capitol Resistance, is proof positive that the tradition and hip-hop are both still breathing and Still Speaking.

Check them all out at www.voxunion.com and stay tuned for the remaining parts of this Africana Studies and Media Literacy video.