Read what people think about Losing My Cool by Thomas Chatterton Williams, and write your own review.
Losing My Cool How a Father's Love and 15,000 Books Beat Hip-hop Culture
by Thomas Chatterton Williams
Hardcover: Apr 2010,
240 pages.
Paperback: Apr 2011,
240 pages.
Rated of 5
by Froma F. (Boulder, CO) Powerful indictment of hip hop culture
This is an important book. Williams chronicles his life in hip hop culture and his eventual break from that culture as he moves away from negative values (empty materialism, denigration of women) into a life of self examination. Along the way he becomes a philosophy major and Williams is particularly gifted at explaining difficult concepts in language that makes them seem quite simple. Although this is not an introduction to Heidegger or Hegel, you will walk away understanding the ideas they propound. The book is filled with extraordinary insight about the values hip hop culture promotes, what it is like to grow up middle class and black in America and how pernicious the hip hop values are for most young, black people. Williams is very insightful and is most compelling when he reflects on his life. One caveat: WIlliams seems somewhat uncomfortable and overly self-conscious when writing about himself and the people he knows and in the early part of the book, the writing is stilted. Persist! This is a book that is well worth reading.
Rated of 5
by Beverly D. (Palm Harbor, FL) a young man's look at hip hop
Williams examines the seductiveness and potential dangers of the hip hop lifestyle as it applied to him as a young man growing up in Plainfield,N.J. Ultimately finding his "place" through the study of Hegel, Heidegger and his father's unending belief in study & learning, Williams is able to love the music but ignore the philosophy and find his way as a young African -American philosopher and first time author.
Rated of 5
by Joe S. (Port Orange, FL) Good but not great.
This was an interesting book concerning the effect of hip hop on young African Americans. I was drawn to it by the 15,000 books in the subtitle. The author's father collected these books throughout his life in order to continue to educate himself and his children. The story of the author's being caught up in the hip hop culture and his eventual realization of what it had done to him were interesting but not that much different than other books I have read on the same subject. The main difference is the love and respect that he and his parents have for each other. It's worth reading once.
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Its board approved the...
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of 5
by Froma F. (Boulder, CO) 
of 5
by Beverly D. (Palm Harbor, FL) 
of 5
by Joe S. (Port Orange, FL) 
