Written by: Sofia Tas-Castro
Way back when I was 11 years old, I started listening to rap music. At the time I didn’t have the money to buy the full songs on iTunes so I would either listen to the samples the app gave me or I would look up the full version on YouTube.
Now, everyone knows the common stereotypes associated with Rap as a genre: it’s vulgar, profane, and violent. My parents weren’t the biggest fans of the genre but that didn’t stop me from listening to the samples.
Image from Britannica
Eminem in particular caught my attention because of his “I don’t care” attitude. He wasn’t afraid of being different both lyrically and in appearance and he was always, always, confident in his music.
Granted, most of his music falls into the genre of rap. However, the more I listened to it, the more I caught on to his lyricism.
Take these lyrics from his song Brainless:
“Take some inventory: in this gourd, there’s a Ford engine, door
Hinge, syringe, an orange, an extension cord, and a ninja sword
Not to mention four linchpins, an astringent stored”
At a glance these lyrics seem pointless, but when he raps them in his song, Eminem somehow makes it so that syringe and orange RHYME. Orange, a word that is impossible to rhyme with, was somehow near-rhymed by a person everyone claimed was a “fake” or “wannabe” rapper. In fact, Eminem explains how kids and teachers in highschool used to bully him because of their perception of him being dumb and useless.
Paying attention to the chorus of the song, Eminem raps:
“If you had a brain, you’d be dangerous
A brain, you’d be dangerous” (I’ma prove you wrong)
Momma, I’ma grow one day to be famous
And I’ma be a pain in the anus (I’ma be the bomb)
I’ma use my head as a weapon
Find a way to escape this insaneness (Momma always said)
“Son, if you had a brain, you’d be dangerous”
Guess it pays to be brainless”
This rapper, known for reading the dictionary for fun in order to learn more words to add to his arsenal of language, acknowledges the power of language in a world that diminishes its value. Not to mention, he’s outright mocking those who believe he’s an idiot. An idiot does not read the dictionary, nor are they able to create double and triple entendres.
While Rap’s vulgarity serves to get certain messages across, the genre shouldn’t be reduced to just that aspect. However, it’s a genre of music that can tell a story and employs rhythm, connotative and lexical definitions to tell these stories and express heavy emotions. Modern society is beginning to realize this, with rapper Kendrick Lamar having received the Pulitzer prize in 2019 for his album DAMN.
As someone who grew up in a high school that was STEM focused, to have someone as famous as Eminem acknowledge the power of words made me feel that reading and writing wasn’t useless or weak regardless of the opinions my peers were spouting. Analyzing these lyrical movements introduced me to words and rhythms I had never heard of before while simultaneously expanding my capacity for memorization.
Although a source not many people would acclaim merit too, without Rap I would not have thought of language as cool as it is and would not have been inspired to learn how to manipulate it.
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