A progressive voice for her generation, Clemente has dedicated her academic work to researching national liberation struggles inside the US, with a specific focus on the Young Lords Party and the Black Liberation Army. While a student at SUNY Albany, she was President of the Albany State University Black Alliance and Director of Multicultural Affairs for the Student Association. At Cornell University, she was a founding member of La Voz Boriken, a social/political organization dedicated to supporting Puerto Rican political prisoners and the independence of Puerto Rico.

Clemente has recently been named the Deputy Director of the Hip-Hop Caucus, and will join other Hip Hop activists this year on two tours, the Rap Sessions Tour and the Hip-Hop for President Tour that includes Hip-Hop artist(s) Dead Prez, Rebel Diaz, Blitz the Ambassador; author of the book That White Girl, Jennifer “J Love” Calderon; DJ Kuttin Kandi, Dr. Jared Ball, Green Party Candidate of the Green Party and Def Poetry poet Kahlil Almustafa.

Clemente has written for Clamor Magazine, The Ave. magazine, The Black World Today, The Final Call, and numerous websites. She has been the subject of articles in the Village Voice, The New York Times, Urban Latino, and The Source magazines and has appeared on CNN, C-Span, Democracy Now and Street Soldiers. In 2001 she was a youth representative at the United Nations World Conference against Xenophobia, Racism and Related Intolerance in South Africa and in 2002 was named by Red Eye Magazine as “one of the top 50 Hip-Hop Activists to look out for.”

In 1995 she developed Know Thy Self Media Messengers, presenting workshops and lectures at colleges, universities, high schools, and prisons. She has presented at over 200 colleges, conferences and community centers on topics such as: “African-American and Latino Intercultural Relations,” “Hip-Clemente has produced three major Hip-Hop activism tours: Dare to Struggle, Dare to Win with M1 of dead prez and Fred Hampton Jr.; The ACLU College Freedom Tour with dead prez, DJ Kuttin Kandi, Mystic, and comedian Dave Chapelle; and the Speak Truth to Power Tour, a collaborative tour of award winning youth activists.

In 2003 Clemente helped form and coordinate the National Hip-Hop Political Convention that drew over 3,000 activists brought together to create a national political agenda for the Hip-Hop generation. She is currently focused on the impact of the 2008-09 elections, addressing issues of excessive use of physical force, intimidation and infiltration tactics by law enforcement officials and increasing the number of young women of color in leadership roles. She is co-founder of the R.E.A.C.Hip-Hop, a media justice coalition and co-host of a weekly talk show, “Where We Live” in NYC and is working on a book with Cousin Jeff of BET about African-American and Latino relations.

Ten days after hurricane Katrina ravaged parts of the south, Clemente traveled to the areas as an independent journalist. Davey D., prominent journalist and founder of the largest Hip-Hop website has said about her, “Hip-Hop Activist Rosa Clemente is one of the few ‘non-mainstream’ journalists allowed into New Orleans where the levee breach and flood water destruction has occurred. She brings to us a heart-wrenching eye opening account of what’s really going on… She talks about how things are much worse then we could ever imagine.”