The Return to HIP HOP

Hey Fellow HIP HOP HEADS,

It's Megan C. and I know we kind of took a break from Hip Hop, but we are back and ready to take over again. I really don't want to turn this into a Who's doing what in HIP HOP gossip blog. So I have decided that I am going to have our readers kind of guide the shape of this blog.

So for now I just want to give you a quick update on the writers.. Natasha G. & I just graduated in Dec. 2009 with a B.S. in Journalism (Public Relations) from the ILLUSTRIOUS FLORIDA A&M UNIVERSITY. And Dorian P. will be finishing up this Spring, we are very happy for her. Now while I am not so sure that the other girls will be able to participate in the blogs, hopefully we can get them to drop by soon.

So there are a lot of things going on in the world of HIP HOP and I am excited to being exploring some of them. So I just want to give you a little taste of what is to come from our next couple of post.

1. FAMU Forum for Black Men: Panelist: Dr. Steve Perry (from CNN's Black in America 2 & Educator), Panama Jackson (Morehouse Alum & co-founder of Very Smart Brothas), Wale (Hip-Hop Artist) & Enitan Bereola (FAMU Alum and Author of Bereolaesque)

2. Rappers--Their NOT Role Models... Their Entertainers

3. HIP HOP v. OBAMA

And maybe we will revisit some of the topics in early blogs like Women in Hip Hop

So just stay tuned for what's to come from FAMU HIP HOP HEADS


Let Us Know how you feel.. What do you want to hear about HIP HOP?

Just Checking in with HIP HOP

Hey Fellow HIP HOP Heads,

Well its been a while since Team Hip Hop has made a post, but as you know our summer class has ended and we all began other courses. Dorian P., NaTasha G., and I (Megan C.) all ended up in the same PR Research & Strategies course.

NaTasha G. & I were placed on a team together which we named Team Water Works-- Follow us on Twitter @teamwaterworks and check our blog www.teamwaterworks5.blogspot.com, with tips on how to save water and reusable water containers.

OK so back to HIP HOP, the entire world was moved to tears when the King of Pop Michael Jackson died, and tributes began popping up all over the web, and news fronts. Hip Hop made sure that they were not left out. On the online music social network Imeem, there was a list of songs that either had MJ back beats, or MJ lyrics in them on the home page. I listened to the tracks and realized just how much of a cross over artist MJ really was.

Its crazy, here is a list of songs in which Imeem named "Hip Hop--I Sampled MJ"
1. H to the Izzo- Jay-Z
2. Don't Stop the Music- Rhianna
3. You Ain't a Killer- Big Punisher
4. Good Life- Kayne West
5. Hey Lover- LL Cool J
6. Thug Nature- Tupac
7. Move- Q-Tip
8. Got Your Money- O.D.B.
9. Right Here- SWV

Now remember to sample doesn't mean that they took the music and and put different words on it; it could mean that they used a portion of the beat and re-tuned it for their song, a phrase. But we all can see how this one man made and impact on the entire world.

R.I.P: Michael Jackson, may your career and your music be the legend that lives on.

We Finally Found HIP HOP

Hey Fellow Hip Hop Heads,

It's Team Hip Hop, and we just wrapped up our PR Methods class, and this means for the this will be our final post. We have decided that if any of us; Megan C., Dorian P., or even Natasha G. have a run in with hip hop we will be sure to update you. But we would really like that thank those who have been following us, and keeping up with how our fictitious events have been going. You have a been a tremendous help to us. We agree that your comments gave us a little more insight into the world of a hip hop lover. The questions that we asked you were to help us figure out what could and couldn't work for our projects, my (Megan) question about positive role models, help me choose other hip hop stars to be honored at the FAMU HIP HOP HONORS. Dorian used some of what you said about how women are represented in Hip Hop to add a little more to her speech that she wrote for Russell Simmons for the Book Signing and Listening Party.

Megan C.: What I learned through these postings that helped me with my project? The biggest thing was that you have to make sure that your target public are well represented in the things that you do. A lot of the people that commented on our blog were students them selves, and even though my fictitious event was to honor hip hop community members, I needed to make sure I was still trying to get the students of FAMU to attend the event to. So I listened to what you guys had to say regarding particular artist, and I made sure to included some of them.

Dorian P.: What I learned through these postings that helped me with my project? I am kind of on the same boat as Megan C., it was a real help to see what others thought about the portrayal of women in hip hop, so it made it easier to write both my backgrounder and my speech for Russell Simmons. I learned a lot about blogging, since this was my first time really doing it, I realized its not that easy to go into cyberspace a just post a blog and wait for feedback, we really had to go out and "publicize" our blog.

So our final question to you is a two part...

-Based on our previous entries do you think we have FOUND HIP HOP?

-If our events were real, would you attend?

If You Only Knew HIP HOP

Hey Fellow Hip Hop Heads,

Its Megan C., once again, unfortunately our teammate Natasha G. won't be with us anymore so you guys won't get to here about her amazing event. But we wish Natasha the best of luck on her newest journey. We are nearing the end of our class, and we are all excited to see how each of the events have turned out, so I am going to take this time to tell you what new developments have occurred with my event. Remember guys this is a fictitious event, so Diddy and Jay-Z won't be on campus soon.

So the FAMU Hip Hop Honors show is moving ahead full steam, and we are proud to announce that Russell Simmons and Def Jam are please to award 2 of the Institute's seniors with a chance to intern with them this summer. They have told us about another surprise, but we won't leak that one just yet.

We had a couple set backs, though the event was greatly supported by the FAMU administration, including President Ammons, a few of the professor slightly protested the honoring of any member of the hip hop community, because they felt they were all "thugs", "dead beat fathers", and "convicts." This wasn't something that I took lightly, I wanted everyone on FAMU's campus to be involved in this affair, and I needed the support of the entire faculty in order to have a good turn out. So I had to let them know what the purpose of this event was truly.

Here is the breakdown, yes its very true that many members of the hip hop community are not living the "role model" lifestyle, but its isn't up to us to decide exactly what it is that they should be doing in their own lives. We can only go off of what they have done and what they are doing, and no we aren't going to look past some of the deeds that some may have done, but we choose to award those who have done something in the community.

We have 4 awards:
-Community Involvement: which is given to the artist who has showcased concern for the neighborhood, that he/she may be from originally, or where they currently live.
-Children's Benefit: for the artist that has done amazing work for the children of the community, and has a strong belief in the power of education.
-FAMU Hip Hop Honors: which we already know is going to the wonderful RUSSELL SIMMONS for all of his work for education, children, and the community.
-FAMU Institute Honors: which is our surprise award given to a deserving Institute senior, who has excelled in their academic work, but still gives back to the community.

So in the end, the faculty did realize that the award show would be very beneficial to the university, and we finally in full support. AND THE PLANNING CONTINUES...

So here is the question I have for you this week...

Who do you think is a positive figure in the HIP HOP industry, and how do you feel about those (T.I, Trick Daddy, DMX, The Game) who seem to disregard the law on all levels?

WOMEN vs HIP HOP

Hello fellow Hip Hop Heads!

It's Dorian P.! Like my teammate Megan, I'm going to focus my post of my fictitious event for class as well because it is actually an issue that concerns me. My event is called, "Hip hop is Not Dead", which will be focused on hip hop mogul, Russell Simmons. FAMU's Hip Hop Institution has invited Russell Simmons to our school to promote his new book, My Life as a Hip Hop Mogul, and also to speak to the students about what hip hop means to him and how it is influenced him and been apart of his long journey to success.

As I was planning this event, i thought of a lot of interesting things I could do. On June 30, 2009, there will be a listening opportunity for aspiring hip hop artist at my event. Russell Simmons and a celebrity guest panel including P.Diddy and Jay-Z will listen, and choose a winner. The winner will be granted to prize of a meeting with Russell Simmons and DEF JAM recording company. FAMU's Hip Hop Institution will also be there to promote awareness of the new and up coming institution and to suggest enrollment.

As I was planning my event, my professor threw a curve ball at me. I was asked to prepare a backgrounder that would focus on a woman's concern of having this event on campus due to the negativity hip hop portrays in women. I instantly was interested in doing the research for this document because this is an issue that has been being dealt with for some quite time now.

When it comes to how women are portrayed in hip hop, the majority of people would say that hip hop belittles women, and portrays them in a disgusting and derogatory way. Most hip hop videos include women dancing around tow or three men with a bathing suit on or less. Lyrics in hip hop don't do women any justice either. Lyrics found in hip hop songs suggest women as "sluts" and people with low morals.

Women like Karrin Steffans (above)

During his speech, we asked Russell Simmons to address this issue and express his feelings on what he thinks of hip hop and women, and to give examples of how women are shed in a positive light in hip hop. I think that hip hop does embrace many positive women. I think that Queen Latifa, T-Boz of TLC and Kimora Lee Simmons are all positive hip hop figures who are women.

and women like Eryka Badu(above)

So, for this weeks question.......

How do you feel about the way women are portrayed in hip hop? Can you name some positive women in hip hop today?

Honoring Hip Hop

Hey Fellow Hip Hop Heads,

Its Megan C., and this entry is going to focus on my ficitious event, the awards show. Which I have titled "FAMU HIP HOP HONORS," after our first entry I realized that a lot of people have the topic hip hop confused. They look at people like Soldja Boy with his dance tracks(not saying they aren't good) and think that's real hip hop, so that is where I need your help.

Since the hip-hop culture has been "tweeked" a little, I am now trying to examine how to go about choosing people in the hip-hop community to honor and recognize.

The goal of my event is to award members of the Florida hip-hop community for their outstanding work, and help promote the FAMU Institute of Music Industry Studies. So this is the run-down of the event:

The FAMU Institute of Music Industry Studies will be hosting the first “FAMU Hip Hop Honors” award show on June 5, 2010 at 7:30 p.m. in the FAMU Multipurpose Center Teaching Gymnasium.

With the goal in mind I have decided that the main "Hip Hop Honor" will be given to Russell Simmons, media mogul, who used his name and marketing power to bring together some of the biggest names in the hip-hop and R&B communities together for a worthy cause. The 2008 Presidental Election, their city tour included voter registration drives and help get a number of African-American citizens, both young and old registered.

The show will be hosted by FAMU's 90.5 (radio station) personalities Sean D and Da Prince, which also will help with the promotion of the institute and university, by showcasing some of the many talents we have among our student population.

Performances are a must for an award show, and who better to perform at a FAMU show, but Tallahassee's own T-Pain. This Billboard topping, showstopper is a product of the great captiol city of Tallahassee, Fla., and it would only be right to invite him to give a performance at the first award show.


There won't be any voting categories for this award show, because we are simply giving them different awards based on their contributions to hip hop and the community. Like Trick Daddy, as much as he can make headlines, the media may forget the good that he does in Dade County. "Trick Loves the Kids" an ongoing project that delievers toys to thousands of Dade County children during the Christmas holidays.

Okay, we don't want to give away to many details about the award show... so make sure you come back next week and see whats going on with the other Hip Hop Events..

So lets start a new discussion:

What do you about the mix up of HIP HOP (Common, Nas, Jeezy) and Dance Tracks (Soldja Boy, DJ Unk)...

The Birth of HIP HOP

In the beginning God created heaven and earth, and then He created HIP HOP. We are Team HIP HOP, consisting of Dorian P., Megan C., and Natasha G., and we are all apart of the summer 2009 PR Methods course at Florida A&M University (FAMU). We were given the assignment to plan a fictitious event for the FAMU Institute of Music Industry Studies; Dorian-Book & Listening Party, Megan-Awards Show, and Natasha-Music & Film Festival. Each week we will post topics of discussion and we welcome your opinions, to help with the success of our events.

The PR Methods course is a writing class and lab. In this class we will learn how to compare communication tools PR professionals use for getting messages through the media to target publics and audiences. The course is designed around the events that we will plan (as stated above). We are required to individually create media kits (packets of information regarding event and/or company that are sent to various media), websites and blogs, that will help to promote our events.

The books we are using to help guide us in this course are:
-Public Relations Writing: Form and Style, 8th Edition
Doug Newsom and Jim Haynes
-The New Rules of Marketing and PR
Dave Meerman Scott
-Strategic Writing: Multimedia Writing for PR, Advertising, Sales and Marketing, and Business
Charles Marsh, David W. Guth, Bonnie Poovey Short
-Writing PR: A Multimedia Approach
Meta G. Carstarphen and Richard A. Wells
-The Associated Press Stylebook
N. Goldstein

Hello fellow HIP HOP bloggers,

I am Dorian P., the fashionista from Cincinnati, Ohio. I am a graduating Public Relations senior. I have the privilege of planning a book signing and listening party to promote Russell Simmons' newest book. This event will help promote not only the book, but the FAMU Institute as well.

I am Megan C., the north star from Ft. Lauderdale, Fla by way of New Jersey. I am a graduating Public Relations senior with a minor in Spanish. I am honored to have the opportunity to plan the FAMU Institute's first awards show entitled "FAMU Hip Hop Honors." The purpose of this event is to award individuals in the Florida HIP HOP Industry.

I am Natasha G., the southern belle from the beautiful country city of Macon, Ga. I am a graduating Public Relations senior with minors in both Business Administration and French. I have the pleasure of planning a weekend music and film festival that will showcase the best in film and music of today and yesterday that celebrate hip hop. This event is to help generate interest in the new HIP HOP Institute.

So now we're posing this question to you...

"When did u fall 'n luv with
HIP HOP?"