UCSC Feminist Studies and the UCSC Music Department proudly present Lifting As We Rhyme: 50 Years of Black Feminist Sonic World Making—a roundtable discussion featuring Tricia Rose, internationally respected speaker, award-winning writer, and leading scholar of African American culture, racial inequality, and gender. Rose will be joined by Humanities professor Gina Dent and Music professor and hip hop artist akua naru. Join these dynamic artists/scholars for a spirited discussion on how black feminist artists have had a transformative impact on black cultural movements in hip hop.

On April 30th, UCSC Feminist Studies and the UCSC Music Department will also host a book talk with Tricia Rose, who will discuss her most recent book, Metaracism: How Systemic Racism Devastates Black Lives – And How We Break Free. More information available here.

Tricia Rose is the Director of the Systemic Racism Project at the John Nicholas Brown Center for Advanced Study, and Chancellor’s Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University. Rose is the author of Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America (1994), Longing to Tell: Black Women Talk About Sexuality and Intimacy (2003) and The Hip Hop Wars: What We Talk About When We Talk About Hip Hop and Why It Matters (2008). Her most recent book, Metaracism: How Systemic Racism Devastates Black Lives-And How We Break Free (2024), is part of a larger public engagement and learning project featuring the How Systemic Racism Works interactive website (release in 2025).

Gina Dent is Professor of Humanities and Faculty Research Director at the Institute of the Arts & Sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Currently, she serves as Principal Investigator and Co-Director for Visualizing Abolition.

akua naru is a hip hop artist, poet, producer, performer, and Assistant Professor of Hip Hop, at University of California, Santa Cruz.