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Dirk Vander Ploeg II Professor of English Writing and Rhetoric
Anna Skinner
Dirk: When I learned that Anna’s new “favorite thing in the world” was rap, I took instant interest because I am an amateur hip-hop DJ myself. At the time, Anna’s main source for hip-hop music was local radio. I am partial to the belief that hip-hop is much larger than the newest rap track getting radio play, so I loaned her a hip-hop DJ mix CD from my library. She loved it! Soon, I was loading her down with Jamaican dance hall and ’80s mash-up mixes. Each time I returned, she would enthusiastically give her personal review of the last CD, spurring discussions about society, language and the intricacies of slang.
Anna: I’d never listened to hip-hop in my life until October 2003, when two of the stations on my rental car radio were hip-hop. I’d heard of it and knew my students liked it, so I figured I’d try it. I discovered that, rhetorically, the audience, purpose and situational contexts of hip-hop are fabulous! There’s no question it’s about sex and materialism, but musicians since the 1960s — the Beatles, the Shirelles, Elvis — have been writing scandalous songs about this stuff. Hip-hop is this generation’s way of taking it one step further, of pushing the limits. But it’s also a bridge between generations. It’s a way for my students to connect with me, and I think they can tell that I am genuinely curious about it. With hip-hop, they are the instructors, and I am the novice, instead of the other way around.
Dirk: I thought I was teaching Anna about urban music, but I think it was she who was schooling me about the relevance and depth of rhetoric in today’s world. We were not discussing yellowing British manuscripts; we were discussing rap — real-world discourse set to music. Anna’s interest in my kind of music pushed me to explore the boundaries of that communication art form. I discussed rap and culture in more detail with my English teacher than I had with anyone else before, despite frequent interaction with other DJs, producers and MCs. Anna showed me that all realms of knowledge are interdependent; hip-hop is just as coupled with rhetoric as it is with music theory, sociology and politics.
Anna: Every time Dirk sees something new, he wants to analyze it and understand it. He grasps what I want him to grasp, and he moves further. He’s a front-row sitter, always involved, willing to listen. Even though our class is finished, he will send me an article or a new song, and we’ll talk about what’s going on there rhetorically, socially and culturally. He keeps learning; he keeps coming back to bounce ideas off me. He is the perfect example of what I want to happen for all my students. Excerpted in part from an essay by Dirk Vander Ploeg II
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