Founder of Generation Hip Hop L.E.A.D.S.
Panelist

Marinieves Alba is founder of Generation Hip Hop L.E.A.D.S., a program that promotes self-esteem, social awareness, and youth leadership among high school-age youth of color. Using a multidisciplinary leadership development model, which incorporates arts with leadership and skills-development activities, L.E.A.D.S (Leading Efforts to Address Disabling Social Challenges) promotes leadership and participation among youth of color and frames youth activism and leadership within the context of contemporary urban, hip-hop culture.

Panelist

James Bernard is executive coordinator of the Project Forum on Race and Democracy, a project of the Rockefeller Foundation, and is the senior communications fellow at PolicyLink. He launched The Source and XXL, two hip-hop magazines, and has written about popular culture for the New York Times, the Village Voice and Entertainment Weekly. He is co-author of The Book of Rock and Rap Lists.

Bernard sits on the board of the Fortune Society, which provides social services for young people who have been through the criminal justice system. He has represented health care workers as a field representative for SEIU Local 250 in northern California and has been a consultant for the Rockefeller Foundation.

In 2000, Bernard sat on the Independent Judiciary Screening Panel, which selected nominees for the New York State Supreme Court on behalf of the Democratic Party. He was a commissioner for the National Criminal Justice Commission, whose report, The Real War on Crime, was a national bestseller. He also sits on the nominating committee for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. A native of Nashville, Tennessee, Bernard graduated from Brown University and Harvard Law School.

Professor of Hip-Hop at the State University of New York at Binghamton
Panelist

Toni Blackman, a professor of hip-hop at the State University of New York at Binghamton, is a pioneer in hip-hop education. She is the founder of Freestyle Union, a Motown-like training ground for rappers, and has been called the U.S. Hip-Hop Ambassador, having recently traveled to Senegal and Ghana with the U.S. Department of State. An arts advocate and performance artist, her work has extended to South Africa, England, France, and Angola.

Blackman, moderator of Kevin Powell's "Hip-Hop Speaks," was a Lilith Fair Talent Search winner, was featured in the Hip-Hop Theater Festival, and has opened for the Roots, Wu Tang and Ricki Jones. She is the subject of a documentary for NHK-Japan National Television. Her first book will be released by Villard/Random in 2003.

Moderator

Jeff Chang writes extensively on music, culture, and race. His book Can't Stop, Won't Stop, a cultural and political history of the making of the hip-hop generation, will be published by St. Martin's Press in 2003. He is the former senior editor/director of politics, news and ideas at Russell Simmons's 360hiphop.com, a founding editor of ColorLines magazine, and a co-founder of SoleSides Records.

Chang has lectured and spoken at the University of California at Berkeley, Dartmouth College, Wesleyan University, Trinity College, New York University and UCLA, where he received a master's degree in Asian American Studies in 1995. He has worked as a community organizer, public interest lobbyist, and a record executive and producer. He currently lives in Berkeley, California, with his wife, Lourdes, and two sons, Jonathan and Solomon.

Panelist

Kate Rhee works at the Prison Moratorium Project, a multiracial group of young activists dedicated to building a society beyond prisons.

Panelist

Kofi Taha is co-founder and co-director of the Active Element Foundation, the only foundation in the United States that exclusively funds youth organizing efforts at the national level. A human rights organizer, he has engaged in campaign work around political prisoners and education overhaul. Taha has written for several hip-hop magazines, and he co-produced the Black August hip-hop benefit concerts in New York and Cuba for three years. He holds a BA in political economy from Columbia University.