Early Life
Nas was born Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York. His father, Olu Dara, is a jazz and blues musician from Mississippi. His mother, Fannie Ann Jones, was a Postal Service worker from North Carolina. He has one sibling, a brother named Jabari Fret who assumes the alias Jungle. As a young child, Nas and his family relocated to the Queensbridge Houses in Long Island City, Queens. His neighbor, Willy "Ill Will" Graham, influenced Nas's interest in hip hop by playing him records. Nas's parents divorced in 1985, and he dropped out of school in the ninth grade. He educated himself about African culture through the Five Percent Nation, the Nuwaubians, the Bible and the Qur'an.
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