Miriam: Can you tell me more about the positive and negative aspects – tell me more about how you teach understanding media. You clearly love hip-hop, but there’s also parts you’re critical of, so can you talk a little bit about how you get that criticism across without brow-beating, or without appearing to be like, “it’s bad! Sexism is bad! Those thong underwears are very bad!”

Neil:

I don’t think that it’s necessarily about – there is a lot misogynistic undertones in a lot of hip-hop historically. Even from the roots of it, it’s always been very much of a boy’s club, and so there’s that element that we try to deconstruct. As well, there’s the violence aspect – that’s another one that you see all the time in the media. Even the riots in Montreal – it wasn’t just, “oh a bunch of crazy hockey fans”. It was “Hip-hop concert nearby that also finished at this time.” And apparently these two forces come together. There’s always rhetoric in the media about hip-hop inspiring violence. I’m not saying that it’s not completely true, or that it’s false what we’re hearing, but there’s definitely something missing. It’s not just that.

There are those elements as well. Those are the two main ones, I think that we try to deconstruct.

Miriam: But how do you engage with the students to keep them from being like, “You’re trying to get me to hate hip-hop”?

Neil:

No, this is it. Basically we identify that these are problems, right? They are problems because – well, misogyny is bad and so is violence. It’s kind of obvious, we don’t have to go on and on for that. I think instead of being like, “Don’t listen to 50 Cent!” or, “Don’t watch The Game’s music videos,” with his video chicks in it. They are going to see it, they are going to watch it anyway. It’s just about making them aware that first of all, this isn’t as it seems. It’s a very limited view of what these artists, and of what this demographic, is capable of doing.

I think one of the big things that we do try and communicate is that it’s all about keeping it real, do you know what I mean? We had a huge unit in both of our runs, and they’ve been amongst one of the best classes, always. What we try and do is give these kids the opportunity to think about where they come from, and actually write down lyrics, rhymes and reflections about their family; about their neighborhood; about what they do on a regular day. Like, it’s easy for these kids to look at the videos, and hear these songs, and have their delusions of grandeur about cash, money, hoes, bling bling. That’s not the reality for everyone. You have to be true to your own reality.

Also, on top of that, during that class we showed the video of the roots and what they do. This is like a case and point of just how artificial the whole image that they are seeing it. A lot of these rappers that they do see; they have lots of money, but nowhere near what you see. They don’t have chests full of money and throwing it on strippers, and making them dance. They don’t have these luxury cars and SUVs. These things are all kind of brought in by the record, and we have to introduce that element too. It’s not just artists, you have a whole corporation – a whole commercial mandate that is behind this one artist. Just shedding some light on that component in itself, and just being like, “Hey, that’s not their real car; that house is probably rented!” You know what I mean?

Miriam: Do you ever get resistance from people? Do you ever have students that are like, “I don’t want to hear you tell me that this isn’t real”?

Neil:

I think it’s interesting that when we’re doing the activities and we’re talking about it, they don’t resist very much. I think we get through to a lot of them, but then it’s very easy to see them still acting and behaving in the same way even after that discussion. For example, this past run at James Lyng, Chris – little guy who was always like, “I’m the boss” – he would walk around like, “I’m the boss, I’m the boss!” – when I did the evaluations, we were talking about the portrayal of women in hip-hop, and he was like, “I’m not going to call those girls bitches and hoes – that could be my moma!” It was just like, these kids are so incredibly intelligent when they’re engaged in that discussion. They’re still going to act a fool, and act like their regular selves and be like, “I’m the boss!” even after that.

I would like to think that we did get through to Chris, and I think all these kids on that level. It’s just it’s up to them to take what they want from it in the end.