"Hip Hop as a Necessary Tool in the Classroom"

Professor Rajul Punjabi

Following on the heels of the first ever "Hip Hop and the American Constitution" course offered at a U.S. law school, Professor Rajul Punjabi now writes that using hip hop in the college classroom has become a "necessary tool."  According to Punjabi:

"I can do my best to break a literary concept down to my class, but it doesn't resonate until I contextualize it in an accessible way. And in 2012, I'm confident to say that hip hop as a genre and culture is an integral tool to make almost any text accessible.  Now of course, it's easy to defend my claim in an English-based curriculum. I employ Jay-Z for his abundant usage of metaphor, allusion, and hyperbole to teach figures of speech. Tupac works when we're looking at socioeconomic backgrounds in literature. Lauryn Hill? Indispensable during a lesson on imagery and narration. And don't get me started on our close-reading of the word "swagger" nee "swag" (Shakespeare vs. Soulja Boy). It was a long, loud, two hours but no English instructor worth her salt likes a quiet classroom anyway."

CFP: Radical Teacher No. 97 - Hip-Hop and Critical Pedagogy

Hip-Hop and Critical Pedagogy

ON-LINE Special Issue of Radical Teacher, No. 97

Call for Submissions

All submissions due no later than February 15, 2013

With this special issue we propose to construct a frame for understanding the place of Hip Hop in classrooms—from K-12 public schools and other youth-based community spaces to college and university courses. With the increasing popularity of what some are calling Hip Hop Studies, it becomes essential to think critically about a range of methodological approaches, innovative instructional strategies and the overall challenges (practical,

political and ethical) of teaching Hip Hop.  Central to our concerns is a focus on critical literacy, defined by Ira Shor as “learning to read and write as part of the process of becoming conscious of one's experience as

historically constructed within specific power relations."  With this special issue of Radical Teacher we plan to consider the function of Hip Hop as a nexus of pedagogical innovation and critical literacy.

We seek contributions from a range of practitioners who are exploring the use of Hip Hop music and related elements of Hip Hop culture in the classroom.  Our definitions (of “Hip Hop,” of “classroom,” and so on) are, necessarily, flexible: our interest is in publishing a diverse range of writings that will help us all think about happens when Hip Hop becomes academic.  In this light we welcome submissions from educators, activists,

and scholars whose experiences have provided interesting data on this subject.  Possible formats include conventional research papers and essays, interviews, annotated lesson plans, syllabi and bibliographies, anthologies of student work, and visual art.  

Among other topics, we can imagine submissions treating:

Hip Hop and social justice teaching

Hip Hop K-12 instruction

Hip Hop at the University and Liberal Arts College

Hip Hop research strategies and agendas

Hip Hop and critical literacy practices

Hip Hop as global consciousness

Hip Hop and the politics of race

Hip Hop, Gender, and Sexuality

Hip Hop Studies and Traditional Fields of Study

Hip Hop Studies Methodologies

Hip Hop and Youth Organizing

Hip Hop and Africanist Aesthetics

Hip Hop and political organizing

Hip Hop, Police Brutality, and the Carceral State

Hip Hop and the Occupy Movement

Hip Hop and alternative media practices

Please send submissions and inquiries to: radicalteachhiphop@gmail.com

Guest Editors: Christopher M. Tinson, Ph.D., Hampshire College and Carlos Rec McBride, M.Ed., University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Radical Teacher is a socialist, feminist, and anti-racist journal grounded in radical left politics. We publish articles that focus on education written by educational workers at all levels, in traditional and nontraditional institutions.