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› Find signed collectible books: 'All Music Guide to Hip-Hop : The Definitive Guide to Rap and Hip-Hop'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'And It Don't Stop: The Best American Hip-Hop Journalism of the Last Twenty-Five Years'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Angry Black White Boy: or, The Miscegenation of Macon Detornay'
From the acclaimed author of Shackling Water comes the first great race novel of the twenty-first century, an incendiary and ruthlessly funny satire about violence, pop culture, and American identity.
Macon Detornay is a suburban white boy possessed and politicized by black culture, and filled with rage toward white America. After moving to New York City for college, Macon begins robbing white passengers in his taxicab, setting off a manhunt for the black man presumed to be committing the crimes. When his true identity is revealed, Macon finds himself to be a celebrity and makes use of the spotlight to hold forth on the evils and invisibility of whiteness. Soon he launches the Race Traitor Project, a stress-addled collective that attracts guilty liberals, wannabe gangstas, and bandwagon riders from all over the country to participate in a Day of Apologya day set aside for white people to make amends for four hundred years of oppression. The Day of Apology pushes New York City over the edge into an epic riot, forcing Macon to confront the depth of his own commitment to the struggle.
Peopled with all manner of race pimps and players, Angry Black White Boy is a stunning breakout book from a critically acclaimed young writer and should be required reading for anyone who wants to get under the skin of the complexities of identity in America. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Back in the Days'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Beastie Boys'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Behind the Beat: Hip Hop Home Studios'
The revealing photographs found within the pages of Behind the Beat expose the creative spaces of top DJ's and music producers from the UK and US. This book is an open invitation to step into the private world of the hip hop home studio and discover its inner workings. Featured are the studios and equipment of some of the most influential music creators working today including: DJ Premier, Madlib, J Dilla, DJ Spinna, Skitz, Nextmen, Taskforce, Dj Swamp, E- Swift, Beyond There, Kut masta kurt, Fat jack, Jehst, Beatminerz, DJ Shadow, DJ design, Dan the Automator, Chief Xcel, Young Einstein, Numark, Cut Chemist, Thes One, J Zone and Mario Caldato Jnr. INCLUDES AN AUDIO CD WITH TRACKS FROM FEATURED DJS AND LABELS - MIXED BY DJ RANSOM! [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Black Popular Culture'
A Village Voice Best Book of the Year, Black Popular Culture includes "spirited debate among African American artists and cultural critics about issues from essentialism to sexuality" (Publishers Weekly). Discussions in Contemporary Culture is an award-winning series copublished with the Dia Center for the Arts in New York City. These volumes offer rich and timely discourses on a broad range of cultural issues and critical theory. The collection covers topics from urban planning to popular culture and literature, and continually attracts a wide and dedicated readership. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Bomb the Suburbs'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Bomb the Suburbs'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Bomb the Suburbs : Grafitti, Race, Freight-Hopping and the Search for Hip Hop's Moral Center'
Should graffiti writers organize to tear up the cities, or should they really be bombing the 'burbs? That's the question posed by William Upski Wimsatt in his seminal foray into the world of hip-hop, rap, and street art, and the culture and politics that surround it. But to say that the book deals only with taggers and hip-hop is selling it short. Taking on a broad range of topics, including suburban sprawl, racial identity, and youth activism, Wimsatt (a graffiti artist himself) uses a kaleidoscopic approach that combines stories, cartoons, interviews, disses, parodies, and original research to challenge the suburban mindset wherever it's found: suburbs and corporate headquarters, inner cities and housing projects, even in hip-hop itself. Funny, provocative, and painfully honest,Bomb the Suburbsencourages readers to expand their social boundaries and explore the vibrant, chaotic world that exists beyond their comfort zones. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Book of Hip Hop Cover Art'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-hop Generation'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Check It While I Wreck It: Black Womanhood, Hip-Hop Culture, and the Public Sphere'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Classic Material: The Hip-Hop Album Guide'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Dead Emcee Scrolls: The Lost Teachings of Hip-hop and Connected Writings'
In the underground labyrinths of New York City's subway system, beneath the third rail of a long forgotten line, Saul Williams discovered scrolls of aged yellowish-brown paper rolled tightly into a can of spray paint. His quest to decipher this mystical ancient text resulted in a primal understanding of the power hip-hop has to teach us about ourselves and the universe around us.
Now, for the first time, Saul Williams shares with the world the wonder revealed to him by the Dead Emcee Scrolls.
I have paraded as a poet for years now. In the proc ess of parading I may have actually become one, but that's another story, another book. This book is a book that I have been waiting to finish since 1995. This is the book that finished me. The story I am about to tell may sound fantastic. It may anger some of you who have followed my work. You may feel that you have come to know me over the years, and in some cases you have, but in others...well, this is a confession.
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Dj-Culture'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Ego Trip's Book of Rap Lists'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Fight the Power: Rap, Race, and Reality'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Fortress of Solitude'
This is the story of two boys, Dylan Ebdus and Mingus Rude. They are friends and neighbors, but because Dylan is white and Mingus is black, their friendship is not simple. This is the story of their Brooklyn neighborhood, which is almost exclusively black despite the first whispers of something that will become known as "gentrification."
This is the story of 1970s America, a time when the most simple human decisionswhat music you listen to, whether to speak to the kid in the seat next to you, whether to give up your lunch moneyare laden with potential political, social and racial disaster. This is the story of 1990s America, when no one cared anymore.
This is the story of punk, that easy white rebellion, and crack, that monstrous plague. This is the story of the loneliness of the avant-garde artist and the exuberance of the graffiti artist.
This is the story of what would happen if two teenaged boys obsessed with comic book heroes actually had superpowers: They would screw up their lives.
This is the story of joyous afternoons of stickball and dreaded years of schoolyard extortion. This is the story of belonging to a society that doesn't accept you. This is the story of prison and of college, of Brooklyn and Berkeley, of soul and rap, of murder and redemption.
This is the story Jonathan Lethem was born to tell. This is THE FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Fuck You Heroes: Glen E. Friedman Photographs, 1976-1991'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Gorillaz: Rise of the Ogre'
"I tell you what, right, I can guarantee you're going to get some real juicy bits of Gorillaz info. I'll probably slag off loads of people, too. It'll be packed full of great shots from the sets of our videos, gigs, rehearsals, interviews...you name it. It's all in there. So place your order up front kids, this book going to be a scorcher!" - Gorillaz bass-slayer Murdoc Nicalls. This stunning, full-colour hardback will be the most unique rock autobiography ever published. Gorillaz have always been as much about the visuals as they are about the music, and the autobiography will be a feast for the eyes. Featuring brand new art from and designed by Jamie Hewlett, this is the full story of Murdoc, 2D, Noodle and Russel Hobbs for the first time. Included will be their emailing with their motley crew of collaborators, from Ike Turner to Sean Ryder, and accounts of the gigs, the movie (for the first time), the videos and the website - including the low down on Kong Studios, their legendary HQ. It is an essential purchase for a legion of fans. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Hip Hop America'
Although it's been part of the cultural soundscape for over 25 years, hip-hop has been the focus of very few books. And when those books do pop up, they tend to be either overtly scholarly, as if the writer in question has just landed on some alien planet, or a bit too much like a fanzine. If there's anyone qualified to write a solid, informative, and entertaining tome on the culture, politics, and business of hip-hop, it's Nelson George. A veteran journalist, George is one of the smartest and most observant chroniclers of African American pop culture. Much as he broke down and illuminated R&B with his acclaimed book The Death of Rhythm and Blues, George now tackles hip-hop with the clarity of a reporter and the enthusiasm of a fan--which is fitting, because George is both. A Brooklyn native, he began writing about rap back in the late 1970s, when the beats and the lifestyle were not only foreign to most white folks, they were still underground in the black communities. Hip Hop America is filled with George's memories of the scene's nascent years, and it tells the story of rap both as an art form and a cultural and economic force--from the old Bronx nightclub the Fever to the age of Puffy. Highlighting both the major players and some of the forces behind the scenes, George gives rap a historical perspective without coming off as too intellectual. All of which makes Hip Hop America a worthwhile addition to any fan's collection. --Amy Linden [via]

› Find signed collectible books: 'Hip Hop Bass: 101 Grooves, Riffs, Loops and Beats'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Hip Hop Files: Photographs 1979-1984'
Hip hop culture emerged from an environment of extreme deprivation and decay in the South Bronx, New York City. The concept of pure invention-of creating something from nothing-was in full effect at the end of the 1970s as graffiti ("borrowed" spray paint), breaking (cardboard as dance floor), and outdoor jams (electricity source: the base of street lights) captured the attention of urban youth, coalescing into new forms of artistic expression. Fortunately, photographer Martha Cooper was at the right place at the right time to document the people that created the music, dance, and art that became known worldwide. Cooper followed people who would one day become icons: the Rock Steady Crew, Fab 5 Freddy, DURO and DONDI, LADY PINK, and Afrika Bambaataa, to name a few. Now, Martha Cooper has the reputation of being the first and foremost photographer of hip hop culture in New York City. While the publication of Cooper's photographs in the early 80s disseminated the culture both at home and abroad, her new book, Hip Hop Files: Photographs 1979-1984, makes a significant part of her extensive and unique archive accessible for the first time. From 1999 to 2003, the German hip hop head and music publisher Akim Walta tracked down the subjects in Cooper's legendary shots and conducted numerous interviews obtaining insightful quotes and statements to accompany and add voices to the photographs. Other members of the early hip hop scene, including ZEPHYR, Charlie Ahearn, FABEL, and Patti Astor, contribute text and essays, adding fresh data to the growing body of hip hop history. "Marty's pictures capture the exact moment when hip hop traveled from the Bronx uptown, downtown to the Manhattan nightclub and gallery scene. The photos and movies were suddenly in the works and (through her pictures) "discovered" by the press and then seen by the rest of the world." (Charlie Ahearn) [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Hip Hop Generation: Young Blacks and the Crisis in African American Culture'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Hip Hop Years: A History of Rap'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Hip-Hop High School'

› Find signed collectible books: 'Hip-hop Poetry And The Classics'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'It's Not About a Salary... Rap, Race and Resistance in Los Angeles: Rap, Race, and Resistance in Los Angeles'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Married to the Game: A Story of Love And Waiting'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'No More Prisons: Urban Life, Homeschooling, Hip-Hop Leadership, the Cool Rich Kids Movement, a Hitchehiker's Guide to Community Organizing, and Why Philanthropy Is the'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'On Beauty'
In an author's note at the end of On Beauty, Zadie Smith writes: "My largest structural debt should be obvious to any E.M. Forster fan; suffice it to say he gave me a classy old frame, which I covered with new material as best I could." If it is true that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Forster, perched on a cloud somewhere, should be all puffed up with pride. His disciple has taken Howards End, that marvelous tale of class difference, and upped the ante by adding race, politics, and gender. The end result is a story for the 21st century, told with a perfect ear for everything: gangsta street talk; academic posturing, both British and American; down-home black Floridian straight talk; and sassy, profane kids, both black and white.
Howard Belsey is a middle-class white liberal Englishman teaching abroad at Wellington, a thinly disguised version of one of the Ivies. He is a Rembrandt scholar who can't finish his book and a recent adulterer whose marriage is now on the slippery slope to disaster. His wife, Kiki, a black Floridian, is a warm, generous, competent wife, mother, and medical worker. Their children are Jerome, disgusted by his father's behavior, Zora, Wellington sophomore firebrand feminist and Levi, eager to be taken for a "homey," complete with baggy pants, hoodies and the ever-present iPod. This family has no secrets--at least not for long. They talk about everything, appropriate to the occasion or not. And, there is plenty to talk about.
The other half of the story is that of the Kipps family: Monty, stiff, wealthy ultra-conservative vocal Christian and Rembrandt scholar, whose book has been published. His wife Carlene is always slightly out of focus, and that's the way she wants it. She wafts over all proceedings, never really connecting with anyone. That seems to be endemic in the Kipps household. Son Michael is a bit of a Monty clone and daughter Victoria is not at all what Daddy thinks she is. Indeed, Forster's advice, "Only connect," is lost on this group.
The two academics have long been rivals, detesting each other's politics and disagreeing about Rembrandt. They are thrown into further conflict when Jerome leaves Wellington to get away from the discovery of his father's affair, lands on the Kipps' doorstep, falls for Victoria and mistakes what he has going with her for love. Howard makes it worse by trying to fix it. Then, Kipps is granted a visiting professorship at Wellington and the whole family arrives in Massachusetts.
From this raw material, Smith has fashioned a superb book, her best to date. She has interwoven class, race, and gender and taken everyone prisoner. Her even-handed renditions of liberal and/or conservative mouthings are insightful, often hilarious, and damning to all. She has a great time exposing everyone's clay feet. This author is a young woman cynical beyond her years, and we are all richer for it. --Valerie Ryan [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Other People's Property: A Shadow History of Hip-Hop in White America'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Paul's Boutique'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Public Access: Ricky Powell Photographs 1985-2005'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Queens Reigns Supreme: Fat Cat, 50 Cent, And the Rise of the Hip Hop Hustler'
Based on police wiretaps and exclusive interviews with drug kingpins and hip-hop insiders, this is the untold story of how the streets and housing projects of southeast Queens took over the rap industry.
For years, rappers from Nas to Ja Rule have hero-worshipped the legendary drug dealers who dominated Queens in the 1980s with their violent crimes and flashy lifestyles. Now, for the first time ever, this gripping narrative digs beneath the hip-hop fables to re-create the rise and fall of hustlers like Lorenzo Fat Cat Nichols, Gerald Prince Miller, Kenneth Supreme McGriff, and Thomas Tony Montana Mickens. Spanning twenty-five years, from the violence of the crack era to Run DMC to the infamous murder of NYPD rookie Edward Byrne to Tupac Shakur to 50 Cents battles against Ja Rule and Murder Inc., to the killing of Jam Master Jay, Queens Reigns Supreme is the first inside look at the infamous southeast Queens crews and their connections to gangster culture in hip hop today. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Rap Attack 3 : From African Jive to Global Hip-hop'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Rhythm Science'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Rough Guide To Hip-hop'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Say It Loud!: The Story of Rap Music'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Seventh Octave: The early writings of Saul Williams'
The first book from one of the most gifted poets of the Hip Hop Generation. The Seventh Octave features some of this great young poets most revered poems. From "OHM," to "Sha Clack Clack," Saul's words are breathtaking and powerful with every read. The Seventh Octave is a must-have collection for any aspiring poet or seasoned writer. Lyrical and electric, full of brilliant imagery and truth. The Seventh Octave is for lovers of language and the magic poets can create. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Signifying Rappers: Rap and Race in the Urban Present'
The author of Infinite Jest and his co-writer discuss rap and popular culture, power, money, racial politics, and language in the first book to seriously consider rap and its position as a vital force in American culture. "Brilliantly written . . . (with) great wit, insight, and in-your-face energy."--Review of Contemporary Fiction. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Spectacular Vernaculars: Hip-Hop and the Politics of Postmodernism'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Spoken Word Revolution: Slam Hip Hop And The Poetry Of A New Generation'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Stand and Deliver: Political Activism, Leadership, and Hip Hop Culture'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Taking the Train: How Graffiti Art Became an Urban Crisis in New York City'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'A Time Before Crack'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Total Chaos: The Art And Aesthetics of Hip-hop'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Tuff'
Paul Beatty's eponymous protagonist, Tuffy, wouldn't seem the type to sidle up too close to the word adorable. At 300 pounds, this thug is a true heavyweight in his East Harlem neighborhood. He robs, he kills, he gets high. But by the end of Beatty's follow-up to The White Boy Shuffle, he is as complexly drawn, as funny, and as lovable as any character in recent memory. The author torques his man into an uncomfortable position: this mighty rose in Spanish Harlem decides to run for City Council. Tuffy--a.k.a. Winston Foshay--is having a tough time of it. Sick of selling drugs and "regulating" neighborhood scams, he wants a better way to support his wife and baby son. His first solution is to get himself a Big Brother (even though he's 22 years old). With the help of his new Brother--who turns out to be the rabbi Spencer Throckmorton, a Jewish black man who receives no end of torment from the Muslim contingent of Tuffy's crew--Tuffy runs.
Beatty nails the social nuances of East Harlem right down to the ground. When Tuffy acquires a gun, he considers telling his best friend Fariq about it, but "decided against it. Once people knew you had a gun, it was like having a car--everyone begging to borrow it, wanting you to use it to make their lives easier." Beatty locates irony constantly and quietly: Tuffy and his wife, Yolanda, go to the local school to vote, and the "flag over the entrance was flying at half-mast because the pulleys had rusted shut." Beatty also has a great eye for the way people move; this is a writer who has been paying attention. Spencer takes a late-night walk with Tuffy, through East Harlem. A group of teens approaches, frightening Spencer.
The boisterous youths were only two steps away from him--so close he could feel the chill emanating off their ice-cold scowls. Winston walked toward the group, reached out, and, without breaking stride, shook the hand of the lead gargoyle.And throughout, Beatty writes--records, it sometimes seems, so dead-on is his tone--incredibly funny dialogue. As is only right, he saves all the best lines for Tuffy. In order to better understand Spencer's Jewishness, Tuffy, a film buff, rents Schindler's List. He complains to Spencer: "I mean, the movie was terrible. I couldn't get past that there were no Jews as tall as Schindler. In all of Germany the tallest Jew went up to Schindler's belly button?" And this is the final, trumping pleasure of Beatty's book: it always returns to Tuffy. With its broad portrait of a fish out of water and its wicked, satirical tone, the novel sometimes threatens to careen into Tom Wolfe territory. Beatty wisely reins in and concentrates on his hero. The author seems a little in love with Tuffy, and by the end, we are too. --Claire Dederer [via]
› Find signed collectible books: 'United States Vs Hip Hop the Historical and Political Significance of Rap Music'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Uprock Headspin Scramble and Dive: Poems'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Whatever You Say I Am: The Life and Times of Eminem'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: A Hop-Hop Feminist Breaks It Down'
A new voice of the hip-hop generation speaks out about the reality of being a black woman in America today.
In this fresh, funky, and ferociously honest book, award-winning journalist Joan Morgan bravely probes the complex issues facing African-American women in today's world: a world where feminists often have not-so-clandestine affairs with the most sexist of men; where women who treasure their independence often prefer men who pick up the tab; and where the deluge of babymothers and babyfathers reminds black women who long for marriage that traditional nuclear families are a reality for less than 40 percent of the African-American population. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost: My Life As a Hip-Hop Feminist'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Where You're at: Notes from the Frontline of a Hip Hop Planet'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Why White Kids Love Hip-Hop: Wankstas, Wiggers, Wannabes, And the New Reality of Race in America'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Wu-Tang Manual'
Long awaited and much anticipated, The Wu-Tang Manual is The RZAs first written introduction to the philosophy and history of Hip-Hops original Dynasty, the Wu-Tang Clan.
Since the release of the revolutionary Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) over the course of four seminal group albums and a multitude of ambitious side projects the Wu-Tang Clan has constantly redefined what hip-hop can do and where hip-hop can go. Now, after a decade of dark beats and mysterious lyrics hinting at a larger whole, the RZA, the abbot of the legendary Staten Island hip-hop collective, fully reveals, for the first time, the complex, multilayered Wu-Tang Universe in The Wu-Tang Manual.
Written in a style that is at once personal and philosophical, The Wu-Tang Manual unravels the intricate web of personalities (and alter egos), warrior codes, numerological systems, and Eastern spiritual ethics that define the Wu-Tang dynasty. Packed with information that reflects the breadth and depth of the RZAs and rest of the Clans intellectual interests and passions, The Wu-Tang Manual is divided into four books of nine chambers each, for a total of 36 chambers. All together, the book provides the breakdown of essential Wu-Tang components, from basic information about each of the nine core members of Wu-Tang Clan to deeper explorations of the key themes of the Wu-Tang universe, a dictionary-like Wu-Slang lexicon, and an entire section of Wu-Tang lyrics with densely annotated explanations of what they mean.
Elegantly laid-out and richly printed, the book is designed to reflect the Asian influence on the Wu-Tang universe, which, as the book explains, began with a fascination with kung-fu movies but quickly led to serious study of martial arts and Eastern philosophy and spirituality. The book also includes a map of Shaolin; a trove of never-before-seen photos of the Wu-Tang Clan, including shots of RZAs trip to China with Sifu Shi Yan-Ming, live shots, and portraits-by Michael Lavine, Craig Wetherby, Sophia Chang, and Frank151; and original illustrations of many of the guiding lights of the Wu-Tang universe. For the hardcore Wu-Tang disciple and the recent initiate alike, The Wu-Tang Manual is the definitive guide to the essence of Wu, one of the most innovative hip-hop groups of all time.
The RZA's most recent book, The Tao of Wu, is also available from Riverhead Books.
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Zaatar Diva'
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