Action Research

I believe that life offers us multiple teachable moments and the true student sees life as one big classroom; this said, we will be doing a little field study Tuesday at Joyce Gordon Gallery. What this means is that my plans for class 9/2 will shift to accomodate this. I think we were going write the assessment essay Thursday, Sept. 4, plus make presentations on What is Hip Hop? We'll see what we can fit in. We'll continue our conversation on Dyson, on-line. Be sure to respond to one student post after you post your comments. I'll have another chapter for you Tuesday, Sept. 2.

We will survey hip hop culture: the music, the writing, art, theatre, poetry, the fashion, literature in the context of it's history and social ramifications. We will note how it has changed over its 50 year history and how various cultures have personalized it to fit in with its cultural mores.

Group projects: Start thinking about hip hop as a global movement and what region that interests you. Each group will collectively research the hip hop movement in a region such as the Middle East, Africa, Europe, South America, Caribbean, Australia, Far East, South Asia. This project will include an analysis and discussion of three elements, one of the three has to be literary: poetry, rap music, visual arts, dance, theatre, literature, music.

Research project: The research project is a profile of an artist who is also an entrepreneur who uses hip hop tools to develop social conscious.

These are big projects. Smaller projects are our writing attached to events, such as the gallery visit, theatre parties, and dance and other concerts. Students will also have collected writings on each book we read. So far these books are Dyson's and the two by Chang, plus The Message: 100 Life Lessons (recommended), From Totems to Hip Hop (recommended), and The Spoken Word Revolution (slam, hip hop @ the poetry of a new generation) (required).