She graduated from Yale University where she received a BA in Sociology and then received her Ph.D. from Brown University in the field of American Studies. She has taught at NYU, University of California at Santa Cruz and is now a Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University.
Professor Rose is most well-known for her ground-breaking book on the emergence of hip hop culture. Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America, published in 1994 by Wesleyan Press, has since become a classic. It is considered a foundational text for the study of hip hop, one that has defined what has eventually become a serious field of study. Black Noise won an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation in 1995 and was also considered one of the top 25 books of 1995 by the Village Voice. In 1999, Black Issues in Higher Education listed Black Noise one of its “Top Books of the Twentieth Century.”
