In my AP Lang class, we have been reading the American Romantics and Transcendentalists and I keep referring to songs that have the same themes and motifs. These poor babies just look at me like I am too far gone.
When I told Jack that they knew nothing good (not to belittle their music, but goodness, they need to branch out), we decided to undertake their music education starting now. Last week I opened by having Pink Floyd's "Time" playing and the lyrics up on the projector when they walked in. (I am sure their will be lots of revisits to Carpe Diem in the coming weeks.). Pink Floyd? Five out of twenty had heard of them. Only two had heard them, actually listened to a song.
Today, we will be reading Emerson's "Self Reliance" and they get to listen to Oingo Boingo's "We Close Our Eyes." Next week when we sample some Walden, it is Talking Heads and "Flowers." And then we will talk about irony. The darkness of anti-transcendentalism will be next and then the gritty realism of the Civil War and new frontiers. Not sure what music will happen then or when I get on my Kate Chopin feminism kick. Jack thinks spoken word poetry should be done with Cake.
If there is some vital song that I need bring to their world, by all means, share!
It is unclear if I will be deemed cool or just weird, but I do remember Ann playing some They Might Be Giants in our Joe Campbell class. Ann was such an amazing teacher - she let me have opinions. Then she taught me to defend them.
Ooh, Giants need to go in the list.
The Cure would be good for the darkness of anti-transcendetalism. Early David Bowie (Iggy Pop) also needs to be in there somewhere.
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