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yeli-renrong · 4 years

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I remember the phrase "sound it out" from school, and I vaguely remember learning something about long & short vowels or such and to (on Between the Lions) but I don't think I ever understood that or paid it any thought since there were so many exceptions. of course, that doesn't mean it didn't do me any good, just that I didn't consciously recognize that it did (perhaps explaining what non-phonic approaches to teaching reading could be contemplated to begin with?)

One non-phonic approach to reading instruction is based on the belief that reading is a process of integration of syntactic, semantic, and graphic (i.e. whole word shape) cues -- in other words, a series of context-based guesses. This model has no allowance at all for the fact that spelling isn’t completely irregular -- as far as it’s concerned, the English alphabet may as well be a logography!

The paper that originally laid out this model (doi:10.1080/19388076709556976) can speak for itself:

Simply stated, the common sense notion I seek here to refute is this: “Reading is a precise process. It involves exact, detailed, sequential perception and identification of letters, words, spelling patterns and larger language units.”

In phonic centered approaches to reading, the preoccupation is with precise letter identification. In word centered approaches, the focus is on word identification. Known words are sight words, precisely named in any setting.

This is not to say that those who have worked diligently in the field of reading are not aware that reading is more than precise, sequential identification. But, the common sense notion, though not adequate, continues to permeate thinking about reading.

Spache presents a word version of this common sense view: “Thus, in its simplest form, reading may be considered a series of word perceptions.”

The teacher's manual of the Lippincott Basic Reading incorporates a letter by letter variant in the justification of its reading approach: “In short, following this program the child learns from the beginning to see words exactly as the most skillful readers see them . . . as whole images of complete words with all their letters.” In place of this misconception, I offer this: “Reading is a selective process. It involves partial use of available minimal language cues selected from perceptual input on the basis of the reader's expectation. As this partial information is processed, tentative decisions are made to be confirmed, rejected or refined as reading progresses.” More simply stated, reading is a psycholinguistic guessing game. It involves an interaction between thought and language. Efficient reading does not result from precise perception and identification of all elements, but from skill in selecting the fewest, most productive cues necessary to produce guesses which are right the first time.

The argument in favor of this position is... a handful of case studies of reading errors made by young children! (And some Chomskyist stuff that I don’t care to work through.) And Ken Goodman, the author of the paper quoted above and one of the major proponents of ‘whole-language theory’, had some studies to back this up:

In a study conducted by Goodman (1965), students in grades 1-3 first read lists of words. Then the children were presented the same words to read in meaningful text. The students made many more errors when they read the words out of context (i.e., when the words were in lists) than they did when the words were read in context. This, of course, is consistent with the hypothesis that reading will be facilitated when semantic-contextual and syntactic-contextual cues are present (i.e., when words are read as part of a text) compared to when words are read devoid of context cues (i.e., when words are read on lists). This finding has been used repeatedly to defend the meaning-emphasis practice of teaching students to recognize words by analyzing syntactic, graphemic-phonemic, and especially semantic cues.

Nicholson (1991) detected several very serious shortcomings in the Goodman (1965) study, however. First, no attention was paid in the Goodman (1965) investigation of the patterns of performance by good and poor readers. In addition, the participants always read the lists followed by reading of the words in context, and thus there was the possibility that the improved performance in moving from list reading to reading in context might reflect some type of practice effect (i.e., the words in context had been seen before, on the lists).

In Nicholson (1991), students once again were asked to process words in lists and in context. In this study, however, the list-context order was manipulated such that some participants read the lists first and others read the words in context first. Moreover, the study included systematic analysis of reading as a function of the grade of participants and their reading abilities relative to other students (i.e., good, average, weak). The outcomes in this study were anything but consistent with Goodman's (1965) results:

- Some readers did benefit from reading the words in the sentence context -- namely, poor readers at each age level and average 6- and 7-year-olds. - In context, a positive effect on reading was obtained in sentence context for good 6-year-old readers and average 8-year-olds only when reading words in sentence contexts followed reading words in lists, consistent with the practice effect explanation of the original Goodman (1965) finding. - There was no positive effect derived from reading words in context for good 7- and 8-year-old readers. Indeed, when the 8-year-old good readers did sentence-context reading first, they did better on reading of the words in list format.

Oops!

In very simple terms: how do you prompt a student who’s struggling with a word -- “Sound it out!” or “Context clues!” (The teachers I had always said clues instead of cues; I don’t know if that was because children would be more likely to know the former word or if someone misread it somewhere in the chain of transmission.) And there are a few problems with that:

- No attention is paid to the process of encoding. Even if treating words as logograms whose readings are to be inferred from context works to teach children to read (it doesn’t), how are they supposed to learn to write? (At the height of whole-language theory’s influence, some states banned public schools from buying spelling books.)

- What happens if you hit a proper noun? Take the following sentence: “Notably, Ross' classification does not support the ☃☃☃☃ of the Tsouic languages, instead considering the Southern Tsouic languages of Kanakanavu and Saaroa to be a separate branch.” Context cues let you extract meaning from this sentence without knowing the reading of ☃☃☃☃, but if you have to read it aloud and you can’t sound things out, you’ll hit “Kanakanavu” and produce garble. (You might still be wrong even if you can sound it out, because stress is unwritten and English words aren’t marked for which rule-set to use -- consider the words alveolar and maraschino -- but there’s a difference between being wrong and producing garble. Garble will probably accurately represent the cues, including the vague, impressionistic shape of the word, but a stress or rule-set error will at least convey the spelling. Buegehti for Buttigieg is a good example of garble -- you have the word-shape cues (starts with Bu, most of the letters are there) and the semantic cues (weird surname from the periphery of Europe; I assume Buegehti is pseudo-Finnish), but it’s not even close, and probably unrecoverable without context. (So contextual information isn’t totally useless.)

- Even if the relevant actors were willing to accept lack of attention to spelling and inability to decode phonetic information that context won’t help you with in order to get gains in reading ability... there are no gains.

But, as things do, whole-language theory got a lot wackier from there. Its proponents started referencing Chomsky’s language instinct to posit a reading instinct, which, the theory went, would lead children to automatically acquire reading with no instruction necessary (except highly technical facilitation was still considered necessary, because if schoolteachers aren’t essential, what’s the point?); claiming that phonics actually impeded literacy; attacking opponents of their theory as part of a far-right conspiracy to suppress teachers’ freedom and destroy public education; calling whole-language education a ‘revolution’ that would lead to true liberation and model the egalitarian society of the future; and so on.

For example, Shafer 1998:

Over the years, various writers, politicians, and media sources have taken aim at whole language, vilifying its motives and misrepresenting its goals. While many of the attacks have come from a lamentable ignorance on the part of T.V. reporters and talk show hosts, evidence exists that a portion of it has been carefully orchestrated by conservatives who clearly seem threatened by the implications of a whole language curriculum. Indeed, the list of writers who have opposed whole language initiatives reads like a who's who of conservative pundits. William Bennett, Phyllis Schlafly, Cal Thomas, and Chester Finn have all written articles deriding whole language, despite its overwhelming acceptance among academic organizations and respected scholars.

Many theories have been offered as to why whole language has become so partisan and acrimonious - and why conservatives in particular seem threatened by its humanistic objectives. What seems glaringly clear, in the end, is that whole language - with its caveat for student liberation and control - scares people who want to maintain a hierarchical, top-down approach to learning. The threat of whole language, at least from my perspective, lies in its bold challenge to traditional icons and time-honored practices. Some teachers feel intimidated by the notion that their way is not the only way - that their favorite authors shouldn't be their students' favorite authors.

When students cease to be receptacles of information and begin generating their own ideas, they occasionally formulate theories that are disconcerting to those who want to maintain "authority" in the classroom. Thus, the recent controversy over teaching a literary canon and classes in western civilization helps illustrate the result of whole language - where students question rather than absorb - and where learning comes to be a very personal, reflective activity. "To study," argues Paulo Freire, "is not to consume ideas, but to create and recreate them" (4).

(On the same page: “It seems clear that people learn best when they are progressing from whole to part so that they understand the importance of correctness and the viability of certain non-standard dialects in certain settings.” First, what the fuck is this supposed to mean? And second, I can’t see something like “progressing from whole to part” without having flashbacks to the polemics against Hegel from one of my philosophy professors -- the direction of progression and the concomitant assignment of more basic status to that which one progresses from, he said, was what distinguished Hegelian from analytic philosophy, and the Hegelian progression from whole to part underlay all the most prominent horrors of the 20th century. It was hard enough to quibble with that then, but it gets harder every time I see someone try to shore up nonsense with that ‘Hegelian’ formula.)

Edelsky 1993 (doi:10.2307/3587486):

Whole language (WL) is, first of all, a perspective-in-practice, anchored in a vision of an equitable, democratic, diverse society. A WL perspective highlights theoretical and philosophical notions about language and language learning, knowledge, and reality. In a WL perspective, language is an exquisite human tool for making (not finding) meaning. The WL view is that what people learn when they learn a language is not separate parts (words, sounds, sentences) but a supersystem of social practices whose conventions and systematicity both constrain and liberate. And the way people acquire that system or are acquired by it (Gee, 1990) is not through doing exercises so that they can really use it later but rather by actually using it as best they can with others who are using it with them, showing them how it works and what it is for (Smith, 1981). ...

Appropriating the label, the jargon, or the typical materials and activities of WL without taking on the liberatory (and therefore status-quo-disrupting) political vision, and without adopting a WL theoretical perspective, is a sure way to prevent genuine change.

And from the sewer of journalism, Metcalf 2002:

Why the infatuation with testing? For its most conservative enthusiasts, testing makes sense as a lone solution to school failure because, they insist, adequate resources are already in place, and only the threat of exposure and censure is necessary for schools to succeed. Moreover, among those who style themselves "compassionate conservatives," education has become a sentimental and, all things considered, cheap way to talk about equalizing opportunity without committing to substantial income redistribution. Liberal faddishness, not chronic underfunding of poorer schools or child poverty itself, is blamed for underachievement: "Child-centered" education, "progressive" education or "whole language"--each has been singled out as a social menace that can be vanquished only by applying a more rational, results-oriented and business-minded approach to public education. ...

Why is the same conservative constituency that loves testing even more moonstruck by phonics? For starters, phonics is traditional and rote--the pupil begins by sounding out letters, then works through vocabulary drills, then short passages using the learned vocabulary. Furthermore, to teach phonics you need a textbook and usually a series of items--worksheets, tests, teacher's editions--that constitute an elaborate purchase for a school district and a profitable product line for a publisher. In addition, heavily scripted phonics programs are routinely marketed as compensation for bad teachers. (What's not mentioned is that they often repel, and even drive out, good teachers.) Finally, as Gerald Coles, author of Reading Lessons: The Debate Over Literacy, points out, "Phonics is a way of thinking about illiteracy that doesn't involve thinking about larger social injustices. To cure illiteracy, presumably all children need is a new set of textbooks."

Whole-language theory isn’t as popular now as it used to be. But the underlying Lysenkoist tendency has taken strong root in L2 education, which is why most of the people in my second-year German class couldn’t properly decline the definite article.

Sometimes you just have to drill.

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tcm · 5 years

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Interview with Mark A. Vieira, author of Forbidden Hollywood: The Pre-Code Era (1930-1934)

Mark A. Vieira is an acclaimed film historian, writer and photographer. His most recent book, Forbidden Hollywood: The Pre-Code Era (1930-1934): When Sin Ruled the Movies is now available from TCM and Running Press.

Raquel Stecher: Twenty years ago you wrote Sin in Soft Focus: Pre-Code Hollywood for Harry N. Abrams. Why did you decide to revisit the pre-Code era with your new TCM-Running Press book Forbidden Hollywood?

Mark A. Vieira: That’s a good question, Raquel. There were three reasons. First, Sin in Soft Focus had gone out of print, and copies were fetching high prices on eBay and AbeBooks. Second, the book was being used in classes at the USC School of Cinematic Arts. Third, Jeff Mantor of Larry Edmunds Cinema Book Shop told me that his customers were asking if I could do a follow-up to the 1999 book, which had gotten a good New York Times review and gone into a second printing. So I wrote a book proposal, citing all the discoveries I’d made since the first book. This is what happens when you write a book; information keeps coming for years after you publish it, and you want to share that new information. Sin in Soft Focus: Pre-Code Hollywood told the story of the Code from an industry standpoint. Forbidden Hollywood has that, but it also has the audience’s point of view. After all, a grassroots movement forced Hollywood to reconstitute the Code.

Raquel Stecher: Forbidden Hollywood includes reproduced images from the pre-Code era and early film history. How did you curate these images and what were your criteria for including a particular photograph?

Mark A. Vieira: The text suggests what image should be placed on a page or on succeeding pages. Readers wonder what Jason Joy looked like or what was so scandalous about CALL HER SAVAGE (’32), so I have to show them. But I can’t put just any picture on the page, especially to illustrate a well-known film. My readers own film books and look at Hollywood photos on the Internet. I have to find a photo that they haven’t seen. It has to be in mint condition because Running Press’s reproduction quality is so good. The image has to be arresting, a photo that is worthy in its own right, powerfully composed and beautifully lit—not just a “representative” photo from a pre-Code film. It also has to work with the other photos on that page or on the next page, in terms of composition, tone and theme. That’s what people liked about Sin in Soft Focus. It had sections that were like rooms in a museum or gallery, where each grouping worked on several levels. In Forbidden Hollywood, I’m going for a different effect. The photo choices and groupings give a feeling of movement, a dynamic affect. In this one, the pictures jump off the page.

Raquel Stecher: Why did you decide on a coffee table art book style format?

Mark A. Vieira: Movies are made of images. Sexy images dominated pre-Code. To tell the story properly, you have to show those images. Movie stills in the pre-Code era were shot with 8x10 view cameras. The quality of those big negatives is ideal for a fine-art volume. And film fans know the artistry of the Hollywood photographers of that era: Fred Archer, Milton Brown, William Walling, Bert Longworth, Clarence Bull, Ernest Bachrach and George Hurrell. They’re all represented—and credited—in Forbidden Hollywood.

Raquel Stecher: What was the research process like for Forbidden Hollywood?

Mark A. Vieira: I started at the University of Southern California, where I studied film 40 years ago. I sat down with Ned Comstock, the Senior Library Assistant, and mapped out a plan. USC has scripts from MGM, Universal and the Fox Film Corporation. The Academy Library has files from the Production Code Administration. I viewed DVDs and 16mm prints from my collection. I reviewed books on the Code by Thomas Doherty and other scholars. I jumped into the trade magazines of the period using the Media History Digital Library online. I created a file folder for each film of the era. It’s like detective work. It’s tedious—until it gets exciting.

Raquel Stecher: How does pre-Code differ from other film genres?

Mark A. Vieira: Well, pre-Code is not a genre like Westerns or musicals. It’s a rediscovered element of film history. It was named in retrospect, like film noir, but unlike film noir, pre-Code has lines of demarcation—March 1930 through June 1934—the four-year period before the Production Code was strengthened and enforced. When Mae West made I’M NO ANGEL (’33), she had no idea she was making a pre-Code movie. The pre-Code tag came later, when scholars realized that these films shared a time, a place and an attitude. There was a Code from 1930 on, but the studios negotiated with it, bypassed it or just plain ignored it, making movies that were irreverent and sexy. Modern viewers say, “I’ve never seen that in an old Hollywood movie!” This spree came to an end in 1934, when a Catholic-led boycott forced Hollywood to reconstitute the Code. It was administered for 20 years by Joseph Breen, so pre-Code is really pre-Breen.

Raquel Stecher: What are a few pre-Code films that you believe defined the era?

Mark A. Vieira: That question has popped up repeatedly since I wrote Sin in Soft Focus, so I decided which films had led to the reconstituted Code, and I gave them their own chapters. To qualify for that status, a film had to meet these standards: (1) They were adapted from proscribed books or plays; (2) They were widely seen; (3) They were attacked in the press; (4) They were heavily cut by the state or local boards; (5) They were banned in states, territories or entire countries; and (6) They were condemned in the Catholic Press and by the Legion of Decency. To name the most controversial: THE COCK-EYED WORLD (’29) (off-color dialogue); THE DIVORCEE (’30) (the first film to challenge the Code); FRANKENSTEIN (’31) (horror); SCARFACE (’32) (gang violence); RED-HEADED WOMAN (’32) (an unrepentant homewrecker); and CALL HER SAVAGE (’32) (the pre-Code film that manages to violate every prohibition of the Code). My big discovery was THE SIGN OF THE CROSS (’32). This Cecil B. DeMille epic showed the excesses of ancient Rome in such lurid detail that it offended Catholic filmgoers, thus setting off the so-called “Catholic Crusade.”

Raquel Stecher: It’s fascinating to read correspondence, interviews and reviews that react to the perceived immorality of these movies. How does including these conversations give your readers context about the pre-Code era?

Mark A. Vieira: Like some film noir scholars, I could tell you how I feel about the film, what it means, the significance of its themes. So what? Those are opinions. My readers deserve facts. Those can only come from documents of the period: letters, memos, contracts, news articles. These are the voices of the era, the voices of history. A 100-year-old person might misremember what happened. A document doesn’t misremember. It tells the tale. My task is to present a balanced selection of these documents so as not to stack the deck in favor of one side or the other.

Raquel Stecher: In your book you discuss the attempts made to censor movies from state and federal government regulation to the creation of the MPPDA to the involvement of key figures like Joseph Breen and Will H. Hays. What is the biggest misconception about the Production Code?

Mark A. Vieira: There are a number of misconceptions. I label them and counter them: (1) “Silent films are not “pre-Code films.” (2) Not every pre-Code film was a low-budget shocker but made with integrity and artistry; most were big-budget star vehicles. (3) The pre-Code censorship agency was the SRC (Studio Relations Committee), part of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors Association (MPPDA)—not the MPPA, which did not exist until the 1960s! (4) The Code did not mandate separate beds for married couples. (5) Joseph Breen was not a lifelong anti-Semite, second only to Hitler. He ended his long career with the respect and affection of his Jewish colleagues.

Raquel Stecher: How did the silent movie era and the Great Depression have an impact on the pre-Code era?

Mark A. Vieira: The silent era allowed the studios the freedom to show nudity and to write sexy intertitles, but the local censors cut those elements from release prints, costing the studios a lot of money, which in part led to the 1930 Code. The Great Depression emptied the theaters (or closed them), so producers used sexy films to lure filmgoers back to the theaters.

Raquel Stecher: TCM viewers love pre-Codes. What do you think it is about movies from several decades ago that still speak to contemporary audiences?

Mark A. Vieira: You’re right. Because we can see these films so readily, we forget that eight decades have passed since they premiered. We don’t listen to music of such a distant time, so how can we enjoy the art of a period in which community standards were so different from what they are now? After all, this was the tail end of the Victorian era, and the term “sex” was not used in polite society. How did it get into films like MIDNIGHT MARY (’33) and SEARCH FOR BEAUTY (’34)? There were protests against such films, and there were also millions of people enjoying them. What they enjoyed is what TCM viewers enjoy—frankness, honesty, risqué humor, beautiful bodies and adult-themed stories.

Raquel Stecher: What do you hope readers take away from your book?

Mark A. Vieira: One thing struck me as I wove the letters of just plain citizens into the tapestry of this story. Americans of the 1930s wrote articulate, heartfelt letters. One can only assume that these people were well educated and that they did a lot of reading—and letter writing. I want my readers to read the entire text of Forbidden Hollywood. I worked to make it accurate, suspenseful and funny. There are episodes in it that are hilarious. These people were witty! So I hope you’ll enjoy the pictures, but more so that you’ll dive into the story and let it carry you along. Here’s a quote about SO THIS IS AFRICA (‘33) from a theater owner: “I played it to adults only (over 15 years old). Kids who have been 12 for the last 10 years aged rapidly on their way to our box office.”

#pre-Code #TCM #Forbidden Hollywood #pre-code films #interview #jean harlow #mae west #ginger rogers #Depression era #1930s #Raquel Stecher

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thesinglesjukebox · 7 years

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K'NAAN FT. SNOW THA PRODUCT, RIZ MC & RESIDENTE - IMMIGRANTS (WE GET THE JOB DONE) [4.57] From 2016 (a bit has changed), but just got a video...

Joshua Minsoo Kim: That one of the most widely popular and critically acclaimed works of art in recent times involves minorities and rapping should be a cause for excitement. And for many, it genuinely is. Personally, I can't shake the depressing irony of how exorbitant ticket prices essentially bar the working class from seeing Hamilton. Such is the nature of Broadway, but equally inherent is the wholly unremarkable rapping that would have to be present in an art form whose audience is primarily older, affluent white people who don't enjoy much rap. Virtually every track sounds like something a high school student would make for their history class if they chose the "create a rap song" option in lieu of a typical presentation (never more clear for me than when I saw this). The Hamilton Mixtape isn't nearly as egregious, and its existence allows for the masses to hear music that touches on undoubtedly important topics. Unfortunately, "Immigrants" suffers in a similar way to the musical: the prioritization of clarity, both in the message and its delivery, leads to a song that's only conceptually interesting. And for how many words these four rappers want you to hear, I'd be hesitant to call "Immigrants" lyrical; there's no impressive wordplay or thought-provoking images, just corny lines that act as the song's entire wellspring of impassioned rallying cries. The artists merely "get the job done." [1]

Alex Clifton: By far the best track from The Hamilton Mixtapes, based on one of my favourite lines from the musical, "Immigrants (We Get the Job Done)" is more prescient and timely than ever. It's an eclectic bunch but nobody feels awkwardly shoehorned in; the verses are stunning, representing perspectives from all over (Somalia, Mexico, Pakistan, and Puerto Rico). As we battle a xenophobic, racist president and nationalist movements around the world, we need more media reminding us all that freedom isn't free. "It's America's ghost writers, the credit's only borrowed" is a phenomenal line: let those ghosts be heard, their voices amplified. [9]

Alfred Soto: I'm embarrassed for the four artists credited. Good intentions in this dark time produced this grotesque, horribly rapped manifesto. I know more than a few conservatives who like Jay-Z and Future. [1]

Lauren Gilbert: This is unsubtle in the same way as Hamilton is -- another immigrant coming up from the bottom. It's not intended to be subtle, but a shot across the bow, a Statement of Purpose and of #resistance. And yeah, it's easy enough to be cynical about that; are we really going with "all you have to do / is see the world with new eyes"? Is that all it takes? But as I listen to K'naan here, I keep coming back to one passage in Ben Rawlence's City of Thorns. City of Thorns is a biography not of a person, but of a place: Dadaab, the second-largest refugee camp in the world. And K'naan holds a place of honor in the residents' eyes; K'naan is a hope, that one can be Somali and something more than a footnote, forgotten by the rich countries who occasionally remember to send some of their largess to Dadaab. In the words of Tawane, one of the residents, "we are not vulnerable people, we are super humans. Refugee is a state of mind. Look at the examples of Madeleine Albright, of K'naan." Tawane arrived at Dadaab in 1992 when he was seven years old. He is 32 now, still striving to become "implementing partner" in his own life. And no matter how hard he tries -- or how often he says "I will be in the White House" -- it is likely he will stay in Dadaab for the rest of his life, hoping for a relocation or a chance at a life where he is a citizen, not just a temporary resident. And he will watch this video, and his friends will watch this video, the same way some of his friends in the camp watch Manchester United and dream of a life playing soccer. I think of him, and the Somali refugees now banned from the country that was still "the lodestar in the refugee firmament, the model, for better or worse," and I can't hold the heavy-handedness of "who these fugees / what they do for me / but contribute new dreams" against the track. It feels like this song isn't for me -- white, native-born, celebrating fireworks earlier this month in a country that has nurtured me even as it has excluded so many others. This track is for the kids who will never have that life, and for bleeding-heart donors who might kick a few dollars to organizations that support them. There are worse things than wide-eyed optimism, than trying to bend the arc of history towards justice, one $10 donation and one (pretty fire) verse from Snow Tha Product at a time. [8]

Thomas Inskeep: I like the intent of this. And K'naan, Residente, and especially Riz MC are all awesome rappers. (I'm not as big a fan of Snow Tha Product, just because something in her voice rubs me wrong; that said, she has some of the best lyrics here.) The problem is Residente's main man behind the boards, Trooko. "Immigrants" has a slow, sludgy, militaristic feel, and it's not any fun to listen to. So while I applaud this, I don't actively enjoy it. [5]

Jonathan Bradley: In Hamilton, this title is a quick-witted applause line in an energetic account of the American Revolution. As a hook for this derivation, it becomes a mantra, not a victory dance, which drains it of much of its verve: the sober voice of millions of people demanding dignity and rights, not the exultant Hamilton and Marquis de Lafayette dunking on the English. The translation from celebration to seriousness and Broadway to mixtape treads a rough path and not always a felicitous one. Hamilton is a hip-hop-inspired musical, which is something different to a hip-hop record (the churlish types upset by its dissimilarity to their fav rap album haven't really considered that, likewise, Illmatic is a crappy piece of musical theater) and it's fun to hear its songs given over to their creative roots. To my ears, the Spanish verses from Snow Tha Product and Residente come closest to the thrill of "Yorktown" in the pop-song form. From the mixtape, though, what you really want is Ashanti doing "Helpless" and Kelly Clarkson's crushing "It's Quiet Uptown." [6]

Maxwell Cavaseno: The ascendance of Lin-Manuel Miranda and Hamilton as cultural icons are thanks in part to an audience who likes the idea of rap in theory but want it without the perceived "sullying" of rap culture, drastically removed from any tropes that inspire discomfort in dealing with cultural or ideological dissonance. If Barack Obama had posed next to Shawn Carter or Kanye West while they freestyled about America in a YouTube video, 2016 or not, we'd still see all kinds of complaints about who the president forced upon us. With the Hamilton Mixtape we now also have this bizarre world where rappers are allowed to express themselves and be considered stars -- so long as they occupy the sanitized conventions of this bright and shiny Artistic Work, which their own discographies might not be anywhere close to. And while I'm not "a fan" of the works of most of the cast of this song, I know that individually they deal with greater political and identity-based questions in a way that honestly tends to appeal more to that crowd. Yet they still will find possibly some of the biggest success in their careers propping up this musical's legacy, rather than their own. [2]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

#K'Naan #Snow Tha Product #Riz MC #Residente #Immigrants (We Get The Job Done)

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