Cheo Hodari Coker Quotes

People forget that art is not just a piece of entertainment. It is the place where we collectively declare our values and then act on them. That's one of the most powerful things we have as a community: our culture and our art. And it's the intersection between life and how people deal with life. It's the most important thing we do.

Music and fashion are a sign of the times and a reflection of what people want and need at this very day and age.

Hip Hop is an extension of our very being, and so the study of Hip Hop is the study of self-expression leading to the study of one's true self.

Hip Hop is an idea. It is the pursuit of one's authentic being through the arts. It is not a physical thing; it is an attitude - even an aptitude.

This is more in regards to celebrities. What we've got to understand is that we are the influencers of the hip-hop culture, the black culture. We are the way out, you feel what I'm sayin'? As far as who we look to and where we get stuff from - hip-hop culture is influencing the world, really, but especially the black communities.

Art is the signature of a generation; artists have a way of defining the times.

The arts and humanities define who we are as a people. That is their power -- to remind us of what we each have to offer, and what we all have in common. To help us understand our history and imagine our future. To give us hope in the moments of struggle and to bring us together when nothing else will.

Language is like songs, like food, like dance-it is the expression of what we think.

But what I'm very interested in, whether it's writing, whether it's hosting a show, whether it's cooking food, I'm just into the discussions of identity, culture and the politics of culture.

The role of culture is that it's the form through which we as a society reflect on who we are, where we've been, where we hope to be.

What does culture want? To make infinity comprehensible.

Hip hop music is important precisely because it sheds light on contemporary politics, history, and race. At its best, hip hop gives voice to marginal black youth we are not used to hearing from on such topics.

The art of a people is a true mirror to their minds.

If you want to understand a nation, look at its dancers and listen to its folk songs—don't pay any attention to its politicians.

Hip-hop is substance. It's social. It's science - that's what it started off as. We have fun, and we still having fun; ain't nothing wrong with fun, but we need that social, we need that substance, we need that science, and we need that spiritual.

You cannot act a color. Do not tell me I'm acting black, because I'm not. I'm acting whatever you want to call it - urban. I don't even have a name for it. I just call it 'me.'

One of the reasons I paint black people is because I am a black person.

Hip-hop isn't dead by any means, but it's not something I define my black identity with.

I really just prefer to be exactly who I am, and black is really the closest race and cultural category that represents the essence of who I am.

I think hip hop allows us to talk about everything, and Africa is what I choose to talk about now. If people are not talking about Africa, that's them, that's cool, there's nothing wrong with that. But this is who I am, this is what I have to say, this is what I have to offer.

A self is a frightening thing to waste, it's the lens through which one's whole life is viewed, and few people are willing to part with it, in death, or even imaginatively, in art.

I think a lot of people can learn from listening to hip hop. It ain't always about beats and rhymes.

Nothing reveals more about the inner life of a people than their arts.

The impact of black music and black art forms on American culture is really difficult to appreciate.

My theory is that nine times out of ten, if there's a depression, more a social depression than anything, it brings out the best art in black people. The best example is, Reagan and Bush gave us the best years of hiphop.