Nikky Ermineskin sits down in a sound-editing cubby at the Knowledgeable Aboriginal Youth Association centre in East Vancouver. Excitedly, she plays a track recorded by a group of 11-year-olds she is hoping to steer away from graffiti tagging and toward more constructive art forms. Ermineskin, 21, is the recording-studio co-ordinator for KAYA, an organization that advocates and runs programs for urban aboriginal youth. A repeated riff of “No one at home/ No one to hold” hooks into the tune, improvised around the theme of being left behind.

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WITH A TITLE like “Hip-Hop: Art or Poison?” CNN’s Paula Zahn managed to make 2007 feel a lot like 1997 or 1987 again. The provocative — if not inflammatory — title of Zahn’s “special report” from late February felt like yet another reiteration of mainstream media sensationalism around hip-hop culture (read: public expressions of blackness).

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In the beginning of January UAN had the distinct honor and pleasure of meeting with London-born Hip Hop pioneer Monie Love at The Marlin Hotel in South Beach for a fun filled True School Party, featuring super dope DJ and producer 9th Wonder on the 1s and 2s, where we reminisced while jamming to 80s and 90s Hip Hop and R’N'B hits all night long. Without question, Monie has come a long way since back in the late 80s and early 90s when she hooked up first with the Native Tongues Crew and later with legendary producer Marley Marl, producing vibrantly spunky jams that were guaranteed to “hype up the party.”

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We sat down with Kenyan rap stars Attitude, Bamboo and Missy Maira collectively known as Project 254 to find out what’s cracking in Kenya’s burgeoning Hip Hop scene.

We were quickly put on notice that Kenya and much of Africa is not ‘primitive’ and out of step the way it get depicted on TV. We also found out that Hip Hop in Africa is huge. The artists we interviewed while relatively unknown here in the states are mega superstars on the continent. They have billboards all over. They have their own public bus routes. They are heard on the radio everyday. They were recently featured in the award winning documentary ‘Hip Hop Colony’ which shows the ins and outs of Kenya’s Hip Hop scene.

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In celebration of International Woman’s History Month we went digging in the crates and pulled up some old yet timeless tapes of Sista Souljah. Many of y’all may know her as an author. She’s given us two incredible books called ‘No Disrespect‘ and the ‘Coldest Winter Ever‘.

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As American youth are learning their ABCs to succeed in school, rapper-actor Ludacris tells teens speaking any language on World AIDS Day that if they do not learn the ABCs of AIDS prevention, they might not live much beyond their school years.

Chris Bridges, or Ludacris as he is known as a hip-hop artist, is an ambassador for Youth AIDS initiative, which took its international HIV/AIDS awareness campaign to Washington December 1.

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On the hip-hop scene, ‘’beatboxing‘’ — the term for the art of creating rhythms and sound effects with the human voice — has taken a back seat to rapping, DJing, emceeing, break dancing and graffiti art since it surfaced in the ’80s.

Until now.

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