Below I’ll give you my selections for the best Hip Hop books by a few categories. I will cover these and other great books more in depth later.
- The Rap Year Book: The Most Important Rap Song From Every Year Since 1979, Discussed, Debated, and Deconstructed (2015)
- Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation (2005)
- The Hip Hop Wars: What We Talk About When We Talk About Hip Hop–and Why It Matters (2008)
- Hip-hop Poetry And The Classics (2004)
- HIP HOP COLORING BOOK (2016)
- The History of Gangster Rap: From Schoolly D to Kendrick Lamar (2018)
- Hip-Hop Revolution: The Culture and Politics of Rap (Culture America (Paperback)) (2007)
- Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop (2017)
- Rap and Hip Hop Culture (2014)
- The Hip-Hop Generation (2003)
- Prophets of the Hood: Politics and Poetics in Hip Hop (2004)
- The History of Hip Hop (2017)
- When the Beat Was Born: DJ Kool Herc and the Creation of Hip Hop (2018)
The Rap Year Book: The Most Important Rap Song From Every Year Since 1979, Discussed, Debated, and Deconstructed (2015)
Here's what The Rap Year Book does: It takes readers from 1979, widely regarded as the moment rap became recognized as part of the cultural and musical landscape, and comes right up to the present, with Shea Serrano hilariously discussing, debating, and deconstructing the most important rap song year by year.
Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation (2005)
Forged in the fires of the Bronx and Kingston, Jamaica, hip-hop became the Esperanto of youth rebellion and a generation-defining movement. In a post-civil rights era defined by deindustrialization and globalization, hip-hop crystallized a multiracial, polycultural generation’s worldview, and transformed American politics and culture.
The Hip Hop Wars: What We Talk About When We Talk About Hip Hop–and Why It Matters (2008)
How hip hop shapes our conversations about race–and how race influences our consideration of hip hop Hip hop is a distinctive form of black art in America-from Tupac to the Pulitzer Prize-winning Kendrick Lamar, hip hop has long given voice to the African American experience.
Hip-hop Poetry And The Classics (2004)
Fans of Hip-Hop can gain a deeper understanding of the bridges that link the great poets of the past to contemporary poets of today through a comparison of the writings of classic authors such as Robert Frost, Shakespeare, Rudyard Kipling, Edgar Allen Poe and Langston Hughes with those of Hip-Hop artists such as Tupac Shakur, Public E…
HIP HOP COLORING BOOK (2016)
The Hip Hop Coloring Book is a fun activity book for kids and adults, and the latest in Dokument Press’s popular Coloring Book series. The book features a selection of Mark 563’s own illustrative takes on some of Hip Hop’s most important figures, ready to be colored in. The 64 pages are packed with legendary rappers from the East to the West coast, spanning the Golden Era through to today’s rap superstars.
The History of Gangster Rap: From Schoolly D to Kendrick Lamar (2018)
The History of Gangster Rap is a deep dive into one of the most fascinating subgenres of any music category to date. Sixteen detailed chapters, organized chronologically, examine the evolution of gangster rap, its main players, and the culture that created this revolutionary music.
Hip-Hop Revolution: The Culture and Politics of Rap (Culture America (Paperback)) (2007)
In the world of hip-hop, “keeping it real” has always been a primary goal—and realness takes on special meaning as rappers mold their images for street cred and increasingly measure authenticity by ghetto-centric notions of “Who’s badder?”In this groundbreaking book, Jeffrey O. G.
Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop (2017)
Rap may be the most revolutionary development in poetry over the past forty years, yet its originality is hidden in plain sight. Often overshadowed by the beat, bluster, and hype surrounding the music, lyrics are the heart of hip hop. Book of Rhymes explores America’s least-understood poets by unpacking their complex craft and according them the respect they deserve as lyricists.
Rap and Hip Hop Culture (2014)
Rap and Hip Hop Culture traces the ideological, social, historical, and cultural influences on a musical genre that first came to prominence in the mid-1970s in one of New York’s toughest neighborhoods, the South Bronx. Orejuela describes how the arts of DJing, MCing, breakin’ [b-boying], and graffiti developed as a way for this community’s struggle to find its own voice.
The Hip-Hop Generation (2003)
The Hip Hop Generation is an eloquent testament for black youth culture at the turn of the century. The only in-depth study of the first generation to grow up in post-segregation America, it combines culture and politics into a pivotal work in American studies.
Prophets of the Hood: Politics and Poetics in Hip Hop (2004)
At once the most lucrative, popular, and culturally oppositional musical force in the United States, hip hop demands the kind of interpretation Imani Perry provides here: criticism engaged with this vibrant musical form on its own terms. A scholar and a fan, Perry considers the art, politics, and culture of hip hop through an analysis of song lyrics, the words of the prophets of the hood.
The History of Hip Hop (2017)
This cultural brilliance of sound presented a voice and unique mind through the rough streets of America’s largest conurbations going as far back as the 1920s.
When the Beat Was Born: DJ Kool Herc and the Creation of Hip Hop (2018)
Paperback Publisher: Scholastic, Inc. (2018) ISBN-10: 133819318X ISBN-13: 978-1338193183 Package Dimensions: 9 x 9 x 0.3 inches Shipping Weight: 3.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies) Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars 47 customer reviews Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #311,325 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) Would you like to tell us about a lower price?
Best Hip Hop Books: The Ultimate List
We highly recommend you to buy all paper or e-books in a legal way, for example, on Amazon. But sometimes it might be a need to dig deeper beyond the shiny book cover. Before making a purchase, you can visit resources like Library Genesis and download some hip hop books mentioned below at your own risk. Once again, we do not host any illegal or copyrighted files, but simply give our visitors a choice and hope they will make a wise decision.
Never Far from Home: My Journey from Brooklyn to Hip Hop, Microsoft, and the Law
Author(s): Bruce Jackson
ID: 3673274, Publisher: Atria Books, Year: 2023, Size: 3 Mb, Format: epub
Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm
Author(s): Dan Charnas
ID: 3207969, Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Year: 2022, Size: 12 Mb, Format: mobi
Hip hop genius 2.0 : remixing high school education
Author(s): Michael Lipset; Tony Simmons; Samuel Steinberg Seidel
ID: 3231807, Publisher: , Year: 2022, Size: 1 Mb, Format: pdf
Please note that this booklist is not final. Some books are truly hot items according to Washington Post, others are drafted by unknown writers. On top of that, you can always find additional tutorials and courses on Coursera, Udemy or edX, for example. Are there any other relevant books you could recommend? Drop a comment if you have any feedback on the list.