Inside Hip-Hop’s 50-Year Influence on Black Men’s Health

Images: Getty. Animation: Chloe Krammel.

“You know what’s gonna happen with hip-hop? Whatever’s happening with us.” —Yasiin Bey, formerly known as Mos Def, on “Fear Not Of Man” (1999)

FIFTY YEARS AGO, inside a nondescript rec room at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the South Bronx, Clive Campbell, famously known as DJ Kool Herc, deejayed his sister’s back-to-school party to unite young people in the neighborhood for one last summer memory. Little did he know, that party would later be credited as the birth of hip-hop—a culture that has consistently shaped and reflected the Black people who created it and the Black men who embraced it.

Hip-hop has been a record of Black men’s health journeys over the last 50 years. When DJ Scott La Rock of Boogie Down Productions was shot dead in 1987, hip-hop united to help curb gun violence—a public health crisis that continues to disproportionately harm young Black men. In 1995, when N.W.A. co-founder Eazy-E died from AIDS-related pneumonia, members of the hip-hop industry rallied together to host a concert that would teach the Black community about the deadly epidemic as HIV became the leading cause of death for African-American men ages 25 to 44. In 2003, when Black men were engaging in less physical activity than their white counterparts, P. Diddy ran the New York City Marathon and chronicled his journey on MTV to inspire change.

In honor of hip-hop’s 50th anniversary, Men’s Health is examining how the evolution of Black men’s health can be traced through the genre. In our package, “Hip-Hop & Health: 1973 to Today,” hip-hop figures and experts give a rare look into how inextricable hip-hop is from Black history and the Black men who are living embodiments of hip-hop’s past, present, and future. Explore a pivotal moment from each decade, below.