Five Percent Nation (research related)

awallawall 673 Posts
edited October 2005 in Strut Central
can someone reccomend some good books/magazine articles to check about the Five Percent Nation (specifically in its relation to hip hop)? i'm doing a research paper for a class. i've already got felicia Miyakawa's book and a couple others (Noise and Spirit, Nation Conscious Rap) as well as a few random magazine articles. anything with relevant content would help. thanks in advance.

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  • There was a two part article written in The Source a couple months ago. But it is the Source, so don't be surprised if they mention Benzino in the article.


  • awallawall 673 Posts
    i've been wanting to cop this. now i have a good acedemic reason.

    anyone rememeber what magazine that article about john walker lindh's connections to hip hop was in? village voice maybe?

  • awallawall 673 Posts
    anyone else have any suggestions? i'm finishing up my prospectus right now.

  • A new book just came out that you can pick up at boarders or wherever. I forget the exact title but it's about 5 percenters and hip hop.

    Also I remember a long time ago on www.oldschoolhiphop.com some guy posted the most massive page on 5% i've ever seen. Go ask there again or try to do a search.

  • awallawall 673 Posts
    A new book just came out that you can pick up at boarders or wherever. I forget the exact title but it's about 5 percenters and hip hop.

    Felicia Miyakawa's book, Five Percenter Rap, right? i got that

  • A new book just came out that you can pick up at boarders or wherever. I forget the exact title but it's about 5 percenters and hip hop.

    Felicia Miyakawa's book, Five Percenter Rap, right? i got that


    How is it? I glanced at it very quickly but didn't know if it was anything worth getting.

  • There might be something in this. I posted a list of current books that were hip hop related on our mag's message board, including this one.



    Brothers Gonna Work It Out: Sexual Politics In The Golden Age Of Rap Nationalism (Paperback)[/b]
    by Charise L. Cheney
    222 pages

    Book Description
    Brothers Gonna Work It Out considers the political expression of rap artists within the historical tradition of black nationalism. Interweaving songs and personal interviews with hip-hop artists and activists including Chuck D of Public Enemy, KRS-One, Rosa Clemente, manager of dead prez, and Wise Intelligent of Poor Righteous Teachers, Cheney links late twentieth-century hip-hop nationalists with their nineteenth-century spiritual forebears.

    Cheney examines Black nationalism as an ideology historically inspired by a crisis of masculinity. Challenging simplistic notions of hip-hop culture as simply sexist or misogynistic, she pays particular attention to Black nationalists' historicizing of slavery and their visualization of male empowerment through violent resistance. She charts the recent rejection of Christianity in the lyrics of rap nationalist music due to the perception that it is too conciliatory, and the increasing popularity of Black Muslim rap artists.

    Cheney situates rap nationalism in the 1980s and 90s within a long tradition of Black nationalist political thought which extends beyond its more obvious influences in the mid-to-late twentieth century like the Nation of Islam or the Black Power Movement, and demonstrates its power as a voice for disenfranchised and disillusioned youth all over the world.

  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
    can someone reccomend some good books/magazine articles to check about the Five Percent Nation (specifically in its relation to hip hop)? i'm doing a research paper for a class. i've already got felicia Miyakawa's book and a couple others (Noise and Spirit, Nation Conscious Rap) as well as a few random magazine articles. anything with relevant content would help. thanks in advance.

    Well, from the looks of it, you pretty much have a lot of the best shit covered. Felicia Miyakawa's book is pretty thorough though like most academic books, her research is probably at least five years old now. the funny thing, if you ever met Felicia, she straight up would NOT strike you as a Five Percenter scholar. I once asked her where she got her surname - which is about as Japanese as you can get - and she does not look remotely Japanese...

    It's her ex-husband's surname...but he was a black guy...adopted by Japanese American parents.

    Only in America.

    Anyways, Nation Conscious Rap is another obvious one and you got that on lock. I'd look through Felicia's bibliography, see what she quotes.
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