For over a decade, educators have looked to capitalize on the appeal of hip-hop culture, sampling its language, techniques, and styles as a way of reaching out to students. But beyond a fashionable hipness, what does hip-hop have to offer our schools? In this revelatory new book, Marc Lamont Hill shows how a serious engagement with hip-hop culture can affect classroom life in extraordinary ways. Based on his experience teaching a hip-hop–centered English literature course in a Philadelphia high school, and drawing from a range of theories on youth culture, identity, and educational processes, Hill offers a compelling case for the power of hip-hop in the classroom. In addition to driving up attendance and test performance, Hill shows how hip-hop–based educational settings enable students and teachers to renegotiate their classroom identities in complex, contradictory, and often unpredictable ways.

Product details

Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: Teachers College Press (April 23, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 9780807749609
ISBN-13: 978-0807749609
ASIN: 0807749605
Product Dimensions: 6.2 x 0.5 x 9 inches

BEATS, RHYMES, AND CLASSROOM LIFE: HIP-HOP PEDAGOGY AND THE POLITICS OF IDENTITY