“To Pimp a Butterfly” initially received very mixed reviews. Some called it overwhelming and harsh. Others labeled it as on of the most innovative and refreshing rap albums in years. Neil McCormick of The Daily Telegraph called the album a "bravura masterpiece," describing it as "dense, intricate … a poetic narrative built around a long dark night of the soul." The general populous greatly enjoyed the album, as it sold over one million copies. It also reached #1 on the Billboard Top 100 albums. In addition to being successfully marketed, “To Pimp a Butterfly” won numerous awards and accolades, including the Grammy for Rap Album of the Year. He also received his second nomination for Album of the Year, but lost to Taylor Swift’s “1989.” But some critiques did not believe that “To Pimp a Butterfly” deserved such high praise. Clover Hope of The Muse claimed that the album was overwhelmingly black. Although she greatly enjoyed the album, she was left with a deeper impression she has yet to figure out. “This is a special album, and that won 't change. But I already need a break from it. I gotta get away from it. Its blackness is way too vast,” she said in her review. Others have felt similarly, claiming that his political message is overbearing at times. It’s easy to see how these critiques could make these arguments. From start to finish, “To Pimp a Butterfly” deals with struggles faced by many African Americans. In almost every song of the album, Kendrick raps about police
Lorna Dee Cervantes' poem, “Poema para los Californios Muertos” (“Poem for the Dead Californios”), is a commentary on what happened to the original inhabitants of California when California was still Mexico, and an address to the speaker's dead ancestors. Utilizing a unique dynamic, consistently alternating between Spanish and English, Cervantes accurately represents the fear, hatred, and humility experienced by the “Californios” through rhythm, arrangement, tone, and most importantly, through use of language.
The poem “To This Day” written by Shane Koyczan, the symbolism is the black things grabbing the kid. This is showing that words do hurt and it stays with you this is shown through the whole story of the pain and suffering of the kid. This is said " who used to say that rhyme sticks and stones as if broken bones hurt more than the names we got called" this is showing word do hurt and the black things grabbing him is showing that like a broken bone it still hurts over time just like words do. With this evidence it shows that if you don't want to be called that don't say it at all.
I believe this is a poem about the speaker’s interaction with a past lover. In the first 15 lines in this poem she is using the word “Bitch”, to represent her internal feelings towards her past lover. The imagery is very vivid in this poem. She uses very descriptive phrases like; “Bark hysterically,” and “Slobbers and grovels,” in order to convey about her inner bitch. In lines 19-27 she gives a vivid picture of this rocky relationship she had with this man. She then uses the bitch, devoted and loyal, as a metaphor for the feelings she had for the man. It is inferred that she behaved as a loyal loved puppy and this man neglected her. For instance, lines 20-21, “How she would lay at his feet and looked up adoringly/though he was absorbed in
Clint Smith is a writer, teacher, and doctoral candidate in Education at Harvard University with a concentration in Culture, Institutions, and Society. Smith Clint wrote a poem called “Something You should Know.” The poem is about an early job he had in a Petsmart. The poet allows the readers into his personal life, but before he had trouble opening up to people and his work. Moreover, Clint wrote an insight in the poem about relying in anything to feel safe and he says it is the most terrifying thing any person can do.
The Poem “Introduction to Poetry” is by Billy Collins, an English poet, and it is about how teachers often force students to over-analyze poetry and to try decipher every possible meaning portrayed throughout the poem rather than allowing the students to form their own interpretation of the poem based on their own experiences.
Kendrick Lamar’s third studio album, “To Pimp a Butterfly,” sheds light on the struggle of achieving rich and fame and the trials that come with. Rolling Stone and Billboard praised the album awarding it the best album of 2015. The album depicts the difficulties of fame by putting the trials and tribulations on display; the inability for those to adjust to their new lifestyle and the potential temptations that creep in. “To Pimp a Butterfly” has been both a divisive and uniting factor in its emergence in popular culture.
Cultural phenomenon, rapper Kendrick Lamar has embraced a growing minority centered culture in America through his album “To Pimp A butterfly” this album conveys themes of hardship for minorities and cultural uprising. One of the singles on this album “Alright” simply tells black audiences that with faith everything will be alright. He uses the Lyrics “Alls my life I has to fight, nigga .Alls my life I...Hard times like God. Bad trips like: ‘God!’ Nazareth, I 'm fucked up..Homie you fucked up..But if God got us then we gon ' be alright” These lyrics simply tell suppressed minorities that despite hardship there is hope within our communities. . Months prior to the release of Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” several attacks from white police officers happened in the black community. A common case in this uproar was the “Mike Brown case”. In this case a black man was shot dead after allegedly robbing a local gas station. Kendrick simply responded to these seemingly racial attacks with his album to “Pimp a Butterfly”. To pimp a butterfly simply means to use your influence to the best of its ability to make a meaningful impact. With tracks like “Alright” Kendrick Lamar does just that. The Primary themes and issues conveyed in this song are white supremacy, racism and black uprising
“The Man to Send Rain Clouds” by Leslie Marmon Silko: This story tells of the death of a tribal elder (Teofilo). Upon his death, his grandsons, Leon and Ken, secure his body and proceed to apply their cultural rituals for a burial. “Before they wrapped the Oldman, Leon took a piece of string out of his pocket and tied a small gray feather in the old man’s long white hair. Ken gave him the paint. Across the brown wrinkled forehead, he drew a streak of white and along the high cheekbones he drew a strip of blue paint.” (Silko, 439) Not knowing much about Native American beliefs I do know that feathers and face painting is a large part of their culture. This is the first clue given that the characters in this work are Native American. After gathering his body they proceed to bring him back to they have an interaction with the local Catholic priest, Father Paul. During this interaction, the family members don’t tell Father Paul that their grandfather has passed when he asks did they locate him. At once I could tell that there is a rift of some nature because the ritual they just performed on the body would be in stark contrast/opposition to a Catholic burial. The author of this novel is describing the encroachment of religion on Native American culture. This is again shown when Ken and Leon stop by the church to ask Father Paul to use holy water to the graveyard. The reasoning for the sprinkling of the holy water is so that Teofilo could send big thunderclouds from the
In Robert Frost’s poem “Blue-Butterfly Day” the speaker compares the blue butterflies to “sky-flakes” that fall to the ground in flurries just like snow. What does this comparison say about how the speaker of the poem feels about the butterflies? The speaker could have said the butterflies “dropped to the ground in mangled clumps.” How would that comparison have changed the feel of the poem? In this lesson we will examine how comparisons affect the feel of the poem.
For my poem I decided to look at Angel Butcher by Philip Levine. Levine was born and grew up in Detroit during the early-mid 20th century, and this upbringing helped to shape his writing style and subject matter. He spent his early adult years working in car factories, which is a common setting for many of his writings. He described these jobs as “stupid”, and it is easy to see in his works that he did not think highly of this industrial life. Levine was also the son of Jewish immigrants and this upbringing added another level of inspiration, but he also faced anti-Semitism throughout his childhood which greatly affected him. For a poet that later became known for his poems that supposedly authentically depict working class factory life in
One challenge Kendrick Lamar faced was when his family was directly touched by the violence of the streets, He handled it by remaining thoughtful and safe, also he was a strong observer, even as a child. In 2015, Kendrick released his next album, To Pimp a Butterfly, including and featuring artists like Bilal, Snoop Dogg and Pharrell Williams, and others.
Ted Kooser, the thirteenth Poet Laureate of the United States and Pulitzer Prize winner, is known for his honest and accessible writing. Kooser’s poem “A Spiral Notebook” was published in 2004, in the book Good Poems for Hard Times, depicting a spiral notebook as something that represents more than its appearance. Through the use of imagery, diction, and structure, Ted Kooser reveals the reality of a spiral notebook to be a canvas of possibilities and goes deeper to portray the increasing complexities in life as we age.
The Caterpillar is a poem which focuses on the previously overlooked actions some of us may partake in, that may not be thought much of, but have short and long lasting effects on a scale we might not be very familiar with. Do we feel remorse for living organisms on a small macroscopic level, or is it just an insignificant part of our complex lives? Is the appreciation of life developed through experiences? Do we feel more pity for a single being that has been through trauma than we do for thousands that have not? In this poem, the conflict between caterpillars and humans is discussed in a such a way that brings up questions about how valuable we perceive other life to be, and how different
Poetry is a reduced dialect that communicates complex emotions. To comprehend the numerous implications of a ballad, perusers must analyze its words and expressing from the points of view of beat, sound, pictures, clear importance, and suggested meaning. Perusers then need to sort out reactions to the verse into a consistent, point-by-point clarification. Poetry utilizes structures and traditions to propose differential translation to words, or to summon emotive reactions. Gadgets, for example, sound similarity, similar sounding word usage, likeness in sound and cadence are at times used to accomplish musical or incantatory impacts.
Some of the poems and essays I have read during this class were relatable to me. Being away from college, I have struggled with not being at home. I have become a different person when I am at school, but when I am home, I feel like I am my normal self again. Some of these authors of the poems and essays that I have read throughout this class has struggled with being somewhere where they don’t belong and that they are someone else when they are not home. Unlike the other poems and essays we have read throughout the course. I enjoyed reading the ones about “home” because I actually understood what they are going through and that I can relate. Some of these poems and essays include “Going Home” by Maurice Kenny, Postcard from Kashmir”, by Agha Shahid Ali, “Returning” by Elias Miguel Munoz and “Hometown” by Luis Cabalquinto. All of these poems deal with duality.