Foreword : On Jay-Z and hip hop studies / Cornel West
In search of meaning : sign, symbol, and Shawn / Julius Bailey
Jigga speaks : the tradition of black oratorical genius / Toni Blackman
The most authentic cultural agent / G. Jahwara Giddings
The meeting with a president and a "king" / Davey D
A urban singer of tales: the freestyle remixing of an Afro-Homeric oral tradition / Nicole Hodges Persley
The prodigal God and the legacy of socially responsible hip hop / T. Hasan Johnson
Zen and the art of transcending the status quo : the Reach from the hood to the suburbs / Bakari Kitwana
Black marketing whiteness : from Hustler to HNIC / Stephany Rose
A forty million dollar slave's moment of clarity / Daylan Dufelmeier
Hip hop's prospects for womanist masculinity / Melina Abdullah
Complicating Shawn Carter: race, the code, and the politics of school / David Stovall
Oedipus-not-so-complex : a blueprint for literary education / A.D. Carson
The culture industry : mainstream success and black cultural representation / Gil Cook
The self-reliant philosopher king : Shawn Carter exonerated / Sha'Dawn Battle.