Looking for KRS-One Audio Via East Bay Express Article?
If you're looking for information and audio related to the KRS-One/Adisa Banjoko drama, please check ProHipHop's Controversy category. Everything I've written on the topic is in there, including audio links.
If you haven't seen Eric K. Arnold's article in the East Bay Express, it's worth a look to consider one take on how KRS-One has damaged his reputation.
Update: Adisa corrects a detail in Arnold's article that may be of importance to folks familiar with the Muslim communities in Los Angeles in a post whose title caught me by surprise with its humor:
We ain't no saints and we ain't no monks...But make no mistake Muhammad didn't make no punks...
Yeah, I heard where Kris went postal..lol
Posted by: HumanityCritic | March 24, 2006 at 12:52 AM
He definitely expressed himself to the fullest!
If you check out the Controversy section, the short audio clips highly some of KRS-One's statements. The longer tape puts it in the context of the event, which was not just a small panel with KRS-One but a large roundtable with many more expected to participate than were able once Kris got started.
Posted by: Clyde Smith | March 24, 2006 at 02:12 AM
Eyewitness or no, Arnold is thoroughly confused.
The guy's article says:
He also insisted that "You can't go to college and say you're hip-hop," perhaps forgetting how much money he's made on the college lecture tour circuit, or his 1989 song "You Must Learn."
Is he really that confused that he doesn't understand that the point is that you can't go learn about a living breathing culture from an institution, and then claim to LIVE it based on that?
He attended the conference and doesn't understand that simple point?
That lack of basic understanding just invalidated any point he(Arnold) had to make with his article.
Posted by: iron | March 25, 2006 at 12:48 AM
Yeah, Arnold's way of arguing that point does not hold up. There's a big difference between making college appearances to cash in on one's past and going to college to study. It's been made quite clear that KRS-One isn't about studying if it doesn't involve studying what he has to say.
I think most people in attendance, including those with PhDs, would agree with your statement that you can't really be part of a cultural movement by studying it in a classroom and I've never heard that claim made by such scholars.
But KRS-One said that you can't go to college and be hip hop as if the two were mutually exclusive. He did not make his point well and has been widely ridiculed for that particular statement so perhaps he should clarify what he's saying rather than leaving it to anonymous defenders of the one true hip hop faith.
Arnold is absolutely correct that KRS-One has fucked his brand. It will be interesting to see how KRS-One's rash statements affect his revenue stream from future college appearances.
Posted by: Clyde Smith | March 25, 2006 at 05:39 AM
It was pretty clear to me, even before he said it.
As an analogy, there are a lot of people who call themselves producers when all they basically do is use tracks in cooledit or fruityloops or acid.
A lot of people call themselves emcees when all they do is type out lyrics.
If krs is confusing people with that statement, they should really forget about studying philosophers and scholars like Hegel, Marx or Adorno - it would just be a train wreck. If that simple point escapes people, seriously, older philosophy is going to kick their asses.
Posted by: Iron | March 25, 2006 at 10:14 AM
There's a lot of truth in what you say and certainly my own academic experiences were often frustrating due to the fact that there was all this great theory and a really undeveloped interest in connecting it to practice.
Posted by: Clyde Smith | March 25, 2006 at 01:13 PM