The Hip Hop Generation 1st and 2nd Chunk

The hip hop generation has faced a plethora of problems, economical and social, in the wake of the new emerging rap culture. Although rap has given these generators a lifestyle and culture of thier own that differs greatly from that of the baby boomers before them, it has also given them many a crisis as stated above. According to Kitwana, the hip hop generation has had harder times getting jobs and have faced problems such as class warefare and animosity within thier own race.

The race war, policing, incarceration and the containment of black youth. The hip hop generators, a group of African Americans that was born within the years of 1964 and 1984 all face an ever growing series of crisis in their culture. One that is common even in today’s youth is the prison crisis. According to Kitwana, the prison crisis affects black Americans the most with an outstanding 62 percent of black men is state prisons. This factor along with the “mandatory minimums”, corruption within the justice system, and the decline of black power sets a rather grim outlook for black Americans. But, this is not the only crisis Kitwana touches upon. Within the hip hop generation, there seems to be a divide of the sexes; conflict that can be clearly seen in rap music that depicts women as “bitches, gold diggers, hos, hoodrats, chickenheads, pigeons, and so on.”(pg85)

Clarification: What does Kitwana mean by saying that "Tupac and Tyson are irredeemable misogynist"?

Application: Do you think that most, if not all, of the problems stated so far by Kitwana are still affecting black youth in this day and age?

“Just Walk on By: Black Men and Public Space”

In Brett Staples’ “Just Walk on By: Black Men and Public Space”, the fear connected to harmless black men by women, and sometimes even men, is brought to light. According to Staples’, even as an African American male s “just walk on by” they are immediately associated with criminals or worse. In an essay like structure, Staple’s conveys his subject in a chronological order, once referring back to his child hood in Pennsylvania, telling of how he was oblivious to this connection because of the backdrop of violence in his “angry industrial town”. It seems that the author has a small rage towards the constant association, and the ability he has to alter public space.
Vocabulary:
Affluent: Rich, Wealthy, Prosperous.
Unwieldy: Awkward, Heavy, Bulky, and Cumbersome.
Rhetorical Terms
Anecdote:
Pg 205 “My first victim was a woman…”
Pg 207 “Another time I was on assignment…”
Imagery:
Pg 205 “...a broad six feet two inches with a beard and billowing hair…”
Onomonopiea: “
Pg 206 “Thunk, thunk, thunk…”
Aporia:
Pg 206 “It is not altogether clear to me how…”
Questions:
Clarification:
What does Staple mean by “perilous flavor”?
Application:
How would you personally feel if you had the ability to alter public space in the same manner as Staples?
Style: If less pedantic language was used in Staple’s article, would it change the meaning of it at all?
Quotation:
“Virtually everybody seems to sense that a mugger wouldn’t be warbling bright sunny selections from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.”