Old School, New Courses

From left to right: Static, Gonzalez and Isela Estrada in front of their NYC mural.

Hekter Gonzale looks a bit like a modern-day Che Guevara, with a big mane of shaggy hair, and a thick mustache and goatee framing his wide smile. But Gonzalez isn't involved in third-world revolutionary wars -- he runs the University of Hip-Hop in southwest Chicago so break dancers can practice their moves for upcoming b-boy battles. A breaker himself, his casted right arm is his current combat wound, but there are no uniforms or uniformity here; Gonzalez wears a plastic fork in his hair for most of the day.

Gonzalez's title at the school is Ambassador of Educational Joy, and though he might not think so, the 20-year-old would be an able spokesperson for a hip-hop nation. He preaches hip-hop as a lifestyle and a life story. Says Gonzalez, "Hip-hop isn't what you wear; it's not what music you like; Healthy Independent People Helping Other People, that's what it is to us."

Six years ago, Lavie Raven laid the groundwork for the university by giving break dancing lessons after school at Hubbard High School. With space provided by the Southwest Youth Collaborative in 1996, Raven obtained a permanent address to provide lessons, a practice space and a supportive atmosphere in the one-story building at 6400 Kedzie Avenue. Raven, 30, still runs the university and doubles as a teacher at Kenwood Academy in Hyde Park.

The university's Sunday afternoon sessions are where some of the area's most buffed and ruthless body benders tear off their moves. The school is also open Monday, Wednesday and Friday after school for kids (once their homework is done) to come practice, or just relax and talk to some of the elders.

The university also runs summer programs in which Gonzalez gives lessons on radical political movements, such as the Young Lords and the Brown Berets; the intricacies of Chicago politics; and issues surrounding political prisoners. Gonzalez says the outcast status of political prisoners is similar to that of hip-hoppers -- even in modern-day Chicago.

"Tourists come here and buy something that says, 'Chicago, the Windy City'; but it's not windy here," Gonzalez says. "It's called the Windy City because the Daly machine is so corrupt."

The university has a sister organization named Higher Gliffs in Oakland, California, and is building up the resume necessary for classification as a hip-hop movement. A recent trip to New York by Gonzalez, Raven and others culminated in protests against the Rockefeller Laws, which sought to initiate stiffer sentencing laws for minors, with the painting of banners and a wall of fame. Other projects include "Graffiti Gardens," in which students plant flowers in front of Chicago murals to practice "beautification, not gentrification."

Gonzalez, like so many of the b-boys at the University this afternoon, uses the phrase "grew up in hip-hop", to describe his beginnings. Living in Uptown, he got into breaking from his cousins, and the enthusiasm spread throughout the family. His mom used to pay his cousin a dollar to pop lock. Gonzalez started graphing at 10 and breaking at 13, and credits his early frustrations in trying to practice his art for his emergence as a political activist.

Shadows, from the Unknown Spirits crew, does a hollow in Chicago's Marquette Park. Photo by Hekter Gonzalez

Under the city's Gang Ordinance Laws, police officers wouldn't allow him and his friends to put down their linoleums and practice on street corners by their house. Says Gonzalez: "We'd take our linoleums down to Oak Street beach and it would be O.K., because it's a richly populated area. But if we put our strips down two blocks from my house, they're trying to confiscate my radio. Because it's a multicultural neighborhood we can't do it? We weren't harming anyone. It's like telling the suits they can't hang around downtown."