I Think Very Deeply

Most Hip Hop artists have expansive vocabularies and acute observation, questioning and comparison skills. They use complex imagery and metaphor to create the "raw-est" lyrics (to use the most overused root word at the middle school where I work). Rich description, narrative, analysis, evaluation- "on wax" if you will(that's old school ;)). The challenge is to usher students into metacognition with regard to these higher order thinking skills. They too are capable of such verbal linguistic prowess but when they do it they are unaware. Reading and analyzing song lyrics while drawing parallels to their own conversations/verbal interactions (positive and negative) will help them to be more deliberate about using and understanding more varied, sophisticated figurative language.

Here's a track, "The Grudge" by The EMCs that deals with childhood situations, emotional expression and has a narrative flow in a first person P.O.V. This song could also open up a character dicussion- Is it good to hold a grudge? What about revenge? What is the artists' perspective on it? Do you agree? Why?

***insert explicit lyrics warning here- dub out the curse words or use only select, "clean" excerpts for study.

http://www.ballerstatus.com/music/551/