Why white kids love hip-hop : wankstas, wiggers, wannabes, and the new reality of race in America / Bakari Kitwana.

Includes index.

Part 1. Questions. Do white boys want to be black? ; Why white kids love hip-hop ; Identity crisis? : more than acting black ; Erasing blackness : are white suburban kids really hip-hop's primary audience? -- Part 2. Answers. From W.E.B. Du Bois to Chuck D ; Wankstas, wiggers, and wannabes : hip-hop, film and white boyz in the hood ; Fear of a culture bandit : Eminem, the source and America's racial politics (old and new) ; Coalition building across race : organizing the hip-hop voting bloc.

Our national conversation about race is out-of-date. Hip-hop is the key to understanding how things are changing. In a book that will appeal to hip-hoppers both black and white and their parents, Kitwana teases apart the culture of hip-hop to illuminate how race is being lived by young Americans. He poses and answers a plethora of questions, among them: Does hip-hop belong to black kids? What in hip-hop appeals to white youth? Is hip-hop different from what R&B, jazz, and even rock 'n' roll meant to previous generations? What does class have to do with it? How do young Americans think about race, and how has hip-hop influenced their perspective? Kitwana addresses uncomfortable truths about America's level of comfort with black people, challenging preconceived notions of race. With this brave tour de force, Bakari Kitwana takes his place alongside the greatest African American intellectuals of the past decades.--From publisher description.