Hip-Hop culture is a unique phenomenon because it does incorporate and affect so many different cultures, ages and classes. In the early 1970′s the unnamed culture known today as “hip-hop” was forming in New York City’s ghettos. Each element in this culture had its own history and terminology contributing to the development of a cultural movement. The culture was identified in the early 1980′s when DJ Afrika Bambaataa named the dynamic urban movement, “hip-hop.” Since that time “hip-hop” has served as a powerful voice and form of expression for young black audiences and has evolved into a culture with its own language, style of dress and mindset. The hip hop culture envelops not only music but also fashion and dance.

What makes hip hop’s evolution is the range of flavor the culture has to offer and what “hip-hop heads” thrive on is individuality and creativity, which is never more apparent than in hip-hop fashion. In fact, hip hop fashion is one of the top clothing industries in the world today. It is claimed to have begun in the African American community but has spread quickly into being a truly universal style for people of all ethnicities and sexes and a lynch pin of hip hop culture. Hip hop fashion is preferred by various celebrities such as 50 cent, Puff Daddy, Ja Rule and Sean Combs. It is often satirized by comedians such as Ali G. Hip hop fashion is a visible element of hip hop culture.

Hip hop dancing is evolving in many different directions today, heavily influenced by the evolution of hip hop music and its popularity in media, surrounded by heated debates on history and authenticity. Modern hip hop music gave birth to new styles of hip hop dancing partly inspired by the old school styles. Most of those styles focused on upright dancing as opposed to breakdance which is better known for its floor-oriented movements. To express one’s creative talent, hip-hop dancing is perhaps the best way in which impressions and expressions come from the soul.

Music has always played a key role in shaping minds and attitudes. Hip hop music sheds light on contemporary politics, history and race. The social influence hip hop music has on the hip hop cultural movement includes activities of dancing, associated slang, fashion and other elements. Hip hop music encompasses the written word, visual art, dance and rhythmic style with intricate beats. Music has no boundaries and no limits; anything worthy should be available through music, especially spirituality and religion. A big influence on the hip hop identity is its redeeming music.

Culture is the product of a current reality. The identity of a culture is created by the work and thought of human beings. It is the expression of a class or element of a particular class and is reflective of a certain period. The allure of Hip Hop culture as an organizing mechanism has arisen primarily because there is no existing political apparatus that adequately addresses the needs of young people and/or poor and working class communities; in a political vacuum. Culture, as a general matter, cuts to the core of how people articulate their beliefs, values and customs. Hip Hop culture is the most visible and vocal representative entity of its own identity.

Hip-hop music or rap music is an admired and famous style or genre of music in the USA. This well-known music genre is made up of two components, rapping and record scratching. Rapping is also known as MCing and DJing, which comprises of audio mixing. These two main components combined with graffiti and break dancing form the four core elements of hip-hop.

The origin of hip-hop can be traced back as far as the ancient tribes in Africa. Rap has been compared with the chants, drumbeats and foot-stomping African tribes performed before wars, the births of babies, and the deaths of kings and elders. Historians have reached further back than the accepted origins of hip-hop. It was born as we know it today in the Bronx, cradled and nurtured by the youth in the low-income areas of New York City.

Fast-forward from the tribes of Africa to the ghettos of Kingston, Jamaica in the late sixties. The impoverished of Kingston gathered together in groups to form DJ conglomerates. They spun roots and culture records and communicated with the audience over the music. At the time, the DJ’s comments weren’t as important as the quality of the sound system and its ability to get the crowd moving. Kool Herc grew up in this community before he moved to the Bronx.

During the late sixties, reggae wasn’t popular with New Yorkers. As a DJ, Kool Herc spun rhythm and blues records to please his party crowd. But, he had to add his personal touch. During the breaks, Herc began to speak to his audience as he had learned to do in Jamaica. He called out, the audience responded, and then he pumped the volume back up on the record. This call and response technique was nothing new to this community who’d been reared in Baptist and Methodist churches where call and response was a technique used by the speakers to get the congregation involved. Historians compare it to the call and response performed by Jazz musicians and was very much a part of the culture of Jazz music during the renaissance in Harlem.

Others copied Herc’s style. Soon a friendly battle ensued between New York DJs. They all learned the technique of using break beats. Herc stepped up the game by giving shout-outs to people who were in attendance at the parties and coming up with his signature call and response. Other DJs responded by rhyming with their words when they spoke to the audience. More and more DJs used two and four line rhymes and anecdotes to get their audiences involved and hyped at these parties.

One day, Herc passed the microphone over to two of his friends. He took care of the turn table and allowed his buddies to keep the crowd hyped with chants, rhymes and anecdotes while he extended the breaks of different songs indefinitely. This was the birth of rap as we know it. Hip-hop has evolved from the days of the basement showdowns to big business in the music industry. In the seventies and eighties, the pioneers and innovators of the rap record was the DJ. He was the guy who used his turntable to create fresh sounds with old records. Then, he became the guy who mixed these familiar breaks with synthesizers to produce completely new beats. Not much has changed in that aspect of hip-hop.