From legends and icons to underground trailblazers, hip-hop artists weaved a rich, uniquely American art form that not only documents inequities and racism in America, but the movements and leaders that rose up in the face of oppression.
These lyrics show how some hip-hop artists weave activism and protest into their music.Decades before"Black Lives Matter" became a global hashtag touted by celebrities and leading politicians, hip-hop artists were profiled, targeted and vilified for broadcasting those same systemic injustices that plagued Black America -- a reality that for decades was shut out of mainstream media.
From 1982 to 2020, here are 15 memorable records and lyrics that reflect hip-hop's roots in activism:"A child is born with no state of mind/ Blind to the ways of mankind/ God is smiling on you, but he's frowning too/ Because only God knows what you'll go through/ You'll grow in the ghetto living second-rate/ And your eyes will sing a song of deep hate."Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five pose for a portrait in New York, December 1980.
Dr. Dre, MC Ren, Eazy-E and Ice Cube from N.W.A. perform during the Straight Outta Compton tour at the Genesis Convention Center in Gary, Ind., July 1989. "To me like, as a young kid, I was just like, 'Wow, they curse really good. They curse better than my dad, they say 'F--- the police,' that's crazy,'" he added."I didn't know you can get on a song and say that, you know, right. It was like, almost liberating -- liberating in a way to a young kid who isn't used to really having a voice or being heard or people or feeling like anything about him matters.
"When I came out with my music at that time there was a major crack cocaine epidemic in New York," the Bronx rapperCNN in 2015."The music that I would do would speak to these issues, would speak to why are we living in these conditions. It's like no one has any power to lift us from these conditions."
"We had allies who are just as rebellious," the rapper said, crediting Lee with the song's success."'Fight the Power' really doesn't exist in the same way if you don't have a lot of Black movies, and everybody went to see this one Black movie by a Black filmmaker -- Spike Lee ... so that right there just dissolved a lot of the difficulties.
Before becoming a prominent Hollywood actress and producer, Queen Latifah demanded respect and asserted herself as hip-hop royalty."U.N.I.T.Y." challenged everyone to make room for the queen, and gave women permission to be powerful, graceful and strong, and to expand, not shrink.
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