Arabic hip hop

Arabic hip hop is hip hop music and culture originating in the Arabic-speaking world. It is performed in Arabic, and local Arabic dialects, English, French, Berber languages (Tamazight). Like most artists of the genre, the artists from the Arab world are highly influenced by American culture.

Also considered part of Arabic hip hop are emcees of Arab origin in the Arab diaspora including Europe, North America, and Australia.

Before Arabic hip-hop emerged as a separate genre, Arab-Americans were regularly involved in hip-hop in the United States, notably producer Fredwreck, based in L.A. and Miami-based DJ Khaled. American hip-hop music began to see popularity in the Arab World in the early-to-mid 1990s. Northern African Arabs, mostly residing in France, the epi-center of European hip-hop, were the first to begin making the music that constitutes the Arabic hip-hop genre. For example, the Super Saian Crew and IAM had Arabic members. This music, a product of the French banlieue’s beur and noir communities, was a blend of traditional American hip-hop, the French styles popular at the time, and Raï, a popular music style from Northern Africa. French hip-hop rose to popularity partly because of Francophone radio broadcasting requirements, begun in 1994, that established quotas for all stations of 40% of daily broadcasts to be in French.

Groups began to emerge in Palestine in the mid-90s, including popular group DAM. DJ Lethal Skillz was promoting new local groups "such as Aks El Seir" at around the same time. In Egypt, hip-hop was less popular, but a small buzz led to an emergent b-boy population. In 2004, the first hip-hop show took place there when the RZA, member of the Wu-Tang Clan, performed in the Siag Hotel in Cairo alongside Kinetic 9 of Killarmy, a Wu-Tang Clan affiliate, Cilvaringz (a Moroccan-Dutch, and the first Arab to get signed by an American rap group) and Saleh Edin, an Arab Moroccan rapper.

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