Hip Hop Archive Collection

Queens Public Library has embarked on a mission to recognize and promote the growth of the hip hop community. We provide Queens Public Library customers with programming that enhances their knowledge of this worldwide music movement and cultural phenomenon. This reflects the important role Queens communities played in hip hop's ascension from a local art form to an internationally recognized movement.

While providing programs that promote the overall mission, Queens Public Library also collects and displays artifacts such as pictures, periodicals, audio tapes, video tapes, writings, news articles, flyers, and oral histories from people involved with the music from the origins of the genre, up until present day.

Our goals are to bring awareness to the fundamental elements of Hip Hop culture and to build a community. We are committed to preserving and continuing Queens’s legacy and historical contributions to Hip Hop.

Pioneering TV host and Hip Hop historian Ralph McDaniels is the Hip Hop Coordinator for Queens Public Library.

Watch Ralph McDaniels’s livestream programs on QPL’s Instagram page, and catch up on the replays in QPL’s Instagram Reels collection.

More information, and to see a list of upcoming Hip Hop Programs here.