The UC Irvine Student Outreach and Retention (SOAR) Center hosted the first Hip-Hop Culture Conference at the ANTrepreneur Center on May 2. The event featured live performances, creative panels, dance workshops and community discussions as students collectively embraced the hip-hop community and heard from industry professionals.
The event was two years in the making and emerged from the SOAR Center’s Umoja pilot program, which supports Black and African students at UCI. The term “umoja” is derived from the Kiswahili word for “unity,” and reflects the program’s mission to honor the cultural experiences of communities impacted by displacement through the transatlantic slave trade. In recognizing the shared history of diaspora, or being dispersed from ancestral land, the program helps students to utilize campus resources and encourages them to engage and reconnect with their cultural roots.
Fourth-year music performance student and Umoja Peer Pathfinder Educator Antonio Lee opened the event with libations — a ritual in traditional African cultures — and a land acknowledgment to the Kizh Nation.
“We pour out for our personal ancestors, our dearly departed loved ones, grandparents, parents and mentors. For me, that includes my father, who introduced me to hip-hop, and my grandfather, who instilled that spirit of being a hustler into me,” Lee said to the audience. “Finally, we acknowledge those not yet born in hip-hop culture and those who will carry this torch for it.”
As a movement deeply rooted in self-expression, hip-hop has long offered youth a way to navigate identity, community and hardship. Hip-hop originated in the early 1970s as a response from Bronx residents who were neglected by the government when fires devastated their neighborhoods. In the wake of extreme poverty following the disaster, the community came together through dance bashes and DJ battles, where artists would try to out-spin each other. The movement quickly grew to include MCing, breakdancing and graffiti, which has shaped the genre into the strong cultural force it is today.
First-year cognitive science student Gabrielle Olaso recognized how the medium can communicate complex ideas in an accessible way.
“A lot of hip-hop music is a palatable way for people to receive a message and like internalize it,” Olaso told New University.
Second-year public health policy student Maliyah Miller elaborated on music’s ability to resonate with diverse audiences and influence perspective.
“Through saying a message in a vibe driven with beats, it’s like as long as you have that, it could really reach an audience,” Miller told New University. “Sometimes when you feel like the beat of the music or you listen to a song, it kind of changes your perspective on things.”
Miller reflected on her own connection to the genre. As a dancer and fan of hip-hop, she sees it as intertwined with her identity.
“I’m a fan of hip-hop because I feel like it’s in my culture of being an African American woman. I feel like the messages in hip-hop have lots of significance to real-life issues,” Miller said. “And it’s just fun listening to artists that, you know, love the hip-hop style of music. It’s just a more upbeat, fun rhythm of music.”
According to Lee, the event also served as an uplifting space for connection, affirmation and community.
“Hip-hop still remains a self-expression that remains all about community, creation, culture and resilience. It teaches us to do it ourselves, to do it together and to make our mark, especially in spaces where we’re told that we don’t belong,” Lee said. “Hip-hop is not exclusive. It’s just specific. It’s rooted in struggle and transformation, and it’s a vehicle for those who have been pushed out of the American dream to reimagine what’s possible.”
Programs like SOAR continue to build those spaces, as Black students make up just 2% of UCI’s population. In addition to organizing community events, the center offers student resources like free scantrons, snacks and green books. Lee attributed the center’s initiatives to being modeled after social justice groups like the Black Panther Party, a group that prioritized community empowerment through education, health care and collective action.
“A lot of these programs were modeled after leaders like the Black Panther Party, and the programs that they created with the free breakfast, with the free meals, and really rallying the community together to make change happen and so students at UCI [can] recognize that continued need and made that change,” Lee said.
For those interested in getting involved with SOAR, students can volunteer or apply through the center’s website.
Melissa Mixon is a Features Staff Writer. She can be reached at mixonm@uci.edu.
Edited by Kaelyn Kwon