The International Committee To Support Imam Jamil Al-Amin (formerly H. Rap Brown), ICSIJAA and the Prisoners of Conscience Committee (POCC) have embarked on a joint project to develop a way to address the historical disconnect evident in both the popular music and in the struggle for justice and self-determination.

The movement asserts the fact that the word RAP in New Afrikan culture has traditionally meant not only to speak well, but to articulate. It is for this precise reason that Imam Jamil Al-Amin was called "Rap" during the mass rebellion stage of our struggle for community self-defense and self-determination.

In a recent interview (August '04 on The Block Report) Imam Jamil speaks of the historical disconnect encouraged by referring to the music as "Hip-Hop"; a term with no historical connection to our people's culture. He points out, concerning this phenomena, "I was Rap before the music."

The term Rap was personified by his actions and attitude, referring to clear articulation of a clear position. The music developed out of the efforts of combining music with political lyrics and poignant poetry; which can be traced through the works of Amiri Baraka, Oscar Brown Jr., Gil Scott-Heron and the Midnight Band, the Last Poets, Curtis Blow on down to Grand Master Jay and the Furious Five. He points out "Hip-Hop" was not even a word ... just a sound in the lyric of the poetry "hippity hippity hop and you don't stop."

Some of the rappers have remained true to their craft and true to the struggle, so their music is referred to as "Conscious Rap''. But there are others who betray RAP and thereby betray the struggle, either out of ignorance because they have been historically disconnected themselves or they do it out of greed. The recording industry never intended for the success of RAP, or for the struggle to be institutionalized and sanctioned by the industry. In fact Oscar Brown Jr. and Gil Scott-Heron were only given the type of exposure they were given back in the day to be used as gate keepers, to keep out the flood of creative black genius coming forth. The labels could/would say, "Sounds great, but we've already got an artist like that. Uh...good luck though'". It was only when Rap lost its political purpose, that it became mainstream and accepted by the white corporate world. It went from Amiri Baraka's classic “Beautiful Black Woman” to the Last Poets' lustful “Black Thighs”, to the Watts Prophets vulgar “Bla

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