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Letter to the Free, Music Video, Postcolonialism

Letter to the free (csp)

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Music Video – Letter to the Free is a product which possesses cultural and social significance. It will invite comparison with other music videos allowing for an analysis of the contexts in which they are produced and consumed.

Released in 2016. The genre is hip-hop/rap

Letter to the free’ is in black and white as the marches were a non-violent protest to demonstrate the desire of black Americans to exercise their constitutional right to vote.

Common

Common is an American hip-hop artist, actor, and activist who became a mainstream success in the early 21st century.

He is known for intelligent and positive lyrics that were performed in a spoken-word style.

A Grammy winner, Common has also turned to acting, as seen with roles in projects. For the latter film, he and vocalist/musician John Legend have won a Golden Globe and an Oscar for the song “Glory.” 

Common made his album debut with Can I Borrow a Dollar? An artist known for often thoughtful, verbose lyricism and exploring varied sounds

Lyrics from letter to the free:

‘Freedom (Freedom)
Freedom come (Freedom come)
Hold on (Hold on)
Won’t be long (Won’t be long)’

:Shows that black people will come together to fight for equal rights and work hard to get it as soon as they can.

‘Instead of ‘n****’ they use the word ‘criminal’ ‘

:He’s saying that a lot of white Americans believe that people of colour are instantly criminals due top their skin colour.

‘The same hate they say will make America great again’

:White people think that to ‘make America great again’ white people should be superior to black people

‘Investing in injustice, fear and long suffering’

:American’s are paying to make ‘America great again’ at the cost of Black people suffering.

Jodie’s presentation

Postcolonialism

postcolonial criticism challenges the assumption of a universal claim towards what constitutes ‘good reading’ and ‘good literature’; questioning the notion of a recognised and overarching canon of important cultural texts – book, poems, plays, films etc – much of which is institutionalised into academic syllabi.

ORIENTALISM:

The Link between culture, imperial power & colonialism

the power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism

Edward Said Culture and Imperialism, 1993: xiii

As a cultural critic, Said is known for the book Orientalism (1978), a critique of the cultural representations that are the bases of Orientalism.

The conclusion of Edward Said’s theory was that Western writings depicted Orient as an irrational, weak, feminized ‘Other’.

Jacques Lacan:

Letter to the Free

Common – LETTER TO THE FREE (CSP)

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  • The  name ‘Common’ stands for ‘Common sense’
  • He was born in Chicago in 1972
  • Launched his own record label
  • first rapper to win an academy award
  • starting an acting career
  • net worth of £45 million

13th Amendment:

Section 1

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

  • Passed by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified on December 6, 1865, the 13th Amendment abolished slavery in the United States.
  • The 13th Amendment was passed at the end of the Civil War before the Southern states had been restored to the Union, and should have easily passed in Congress.
  • On February 1, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln approved the Joint Resolution of Congress submitting the proposed amendment to the state legislatures. 
  • With the adoption of the 13th Amendment, the United States found a final constitutional solution to the issue of slavery. The 13th Amendment, along with the  14th and 15th, is one of the trio of Civil War amendments that greatly expanded the civil rights of Americans.

Key Concepts:
● Cultural resistance
● Cultural hegemony
● Subcultural theory

Key idea: the political, personal and cultural are always intertwined. The Idea of Resistance and Political Protest. Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.

Antonio Gramsci: Italian philosopher writing in the 1930s

Cultural hegemony: power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means.
● Ideology: worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values.

What is a subculture?
● Working-class youth culture
● Unified by shared tastes in style, music and ideology
● A solution to collectively experienced problems
● A form of resistance to cultural hegemony –  (re: Jodie’s presentation)

Common Lyrics:

  • “Slavery’s still alive, check Amendment 13” – talking about how slavery hasn’t been abolished just because rules have changed. They are constantly living in fear of doing the wrong thing or even being falsely accused.
  • “Prison is a business, America’s the company” – talking about how the justice system is prejudice to POC.
  • “We staring in the face of hate again The same hate they say will make America great again” – how America is great for cultural hegemony like white people . Referencing to Trump who uses this line in his campaign – terminology used in the 60s.
  • For America to rise it’s a matter of Black Lives– talking about how America benefits by exploiting POC.

13TH:

“America is home to 5% worlds population but 25% of the worlds prisoners” – the 13th

“300,000 prisoners in 1972 but now its 2.3 million”

“POC were arrested for minor crimes such as loitering or vagrancy.“

“if you are white you are living the life based on what you’re ancestors chose. If you’re Black then you are living your life based on what your ancestors didn’t get to choose. “

“myths based on needing black bodies working”

“kkk was romanticised…another wave of terrorism…. shifted to something more legal; segregation”

“for the first time justice became at least a possibility”

Post Colonialism:

Overall, this is a topic that concerns IDENTITY and REPRESENTATION. In other words, where does our identity come from? How is our identity formed? How do we understand our own identity and how is our identity represented in the local, national and global media? But here it is specifically looking at identity and representation through the lens of Empire and Colonialism. Critically looking at culture. A key figure is Edward Said who wrote a couple of books about the link between culture, imperial power and colonialism.

ORIENTALISM:

The Link between culture, imperial power & colonialism

the power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism

Similarly, ‘the East becomes the repository or projection of those aspects of themselves which Westerners do not choose to acknowledge (cruelty, sensuality, decadence, laziness and so on). At the same time, and paradoxically, the East is seen as a fascinating realm of the exotic, the mystical and the seductive.’ (Barry, 2017:195)

The one thing the orient couldn’t do was represent itself.

Jacques Lacan “The Other”

French Philosopher who says that we will never truly understand who we are or who others are. That we are in a state of constant comparison and subtly searching for identity. He says when a baby first sees itself in the mirror is the first time it becomes self-conscious as it understands that that is themselves in the mirror whilst animals wouldn’t. We only get a sense of who we might be or could be. We can never truly see who we are and will never know.

Letter to the Free, Moving Image, Music Video, Postcolonialism

Letter to the Free – CSP

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Key Concepts:
● Cultural resistance
● Cultural hegemony
● Subcultural theory

– Key idea: The political, personal and cultural are always intertwined.

– The idea of resistance and political protest.

– Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change. The media can change how people see the world.

– Antonio Gramsci: Italian philosopher writing in the 1930s.


Key Terms:
● Hegemonic: Dominant, ruling-class, power-holders.
● Hegemonic culture: The dominant culture.
● Cultural hegemony: Power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means.
● Ideology: Worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values.

Jodie’s Presentation

Letter to the Free – Common

  • Lonnie Rashid Lynn, known by his stage name Common  (formerly Common Sense), is an American rapper and actor.
  • Common’s first major-label album Like Water for Chocolate (2000), received commercial success. In 2003, he won the Grammy Award for Best R&B Song for the Erykah Badu single “Love of My Life”.
  • Commons genre of music he records is Hip Hop, Neo Soul and Progressive Rap.
  • He achieved mainstream success through his work with the Soulquarians.
  • Common signed a major label record deal with MCA Records and relocated from Chicago to New York City in 1999. He began recording almost exclusively with a loose collective of musicians and artists (dubbed the “Soulquarians” by central figure Questlove).
  • Commons net worth is $45 million.

Letter to the Free Lyrics:

‘Black bodies being lost in the American dream’ – This explains that the dream for America is to be equal and racist free however black people are being taken out of the community and sent to be prison making America a white supremacy.

‘Slavery’s still alive, check Amendment 13’ – This expresses that slavery is still alive and is not used as a punishment but used because ‘they’ are black. Amendment 13 is “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” meaning, slavery should only be used if someone has committed a criminal act. As well, people with power, e.g white racist police officers are arresting black people for no reason, due to them being a different race.

‘Prison is a business, America’s the company’ –

‘Instead of ‘n***a’ they use the word ‘criminal’ –

13th Netflix movie (2016)

  • 13th explores the history of racial inequality in the United States, focusing on the fact that the nation’s prisons are disproportionately filled with African-Americans.
  • The movie was directed by Ava DuVernay and was distributed by Netflix.
  • 13th was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 89th Academy Awards, and won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Special at the 69th Primetime Emmy Awards.
  • The 13th documentary made $566 USD in box office.

Postcolonialism

Postcolonialism specifically looks at identity and representation through the lens of Empire and Colonialism.

Postcolonial criticism challenges the assumption of a universal claim towards what constitutes ‘good reading’ and ‘good literature’; questioning the notion of a recognised and overarching canon of important cultural texts.

The Shadow of Slavery:

Key figure: Edward Said who wrote a book about culture, imperial power and colonialism. His book is called Orientalism.

Quote (Edward) – ‘the power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism‘.

Jacques Lacan was a intellectual French philosopher and psychoanalyst. He expresses that we can never discover ourselves as we cannot see ourselves from the outside, from a 3rd person perspective. Lacan proposed that in infancy this first recognition occurs when we see ourselves in a mirror. (You see yourself differently the way someone else sees you, in both looks and perspective.)

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letter to the free

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Common:

Lonnie Rashid Lynn, known by his stage name Common, is an American rapper and actor. He debuted in 1992 with the album Can I Borrow a Dollar?, and gained critical acclaim with his 1994 album Resurrection. He maintained an underground following into the late 1990s.

Lynn began rapping in the late 1980s, while a student at Luther High School South in Chicago, when he, along with two of his friends, formed C.D.R., a rap trio that opened for acts such as N.W.A and Big Daddy Kane.

In 1996, Common Sense appeared on the Red Hot Organization’s compilation CD, America Is Dying Slowly (A.I.D.S.), alongside Biz Markie, Wu-Tang Clan, and Fat Joe, among many other prominent hip hop artists. The CD, meant to raise awareness of the AIDS epidemic among African American men, was heralded as “a masterpiece” by The Source magazine. He would later also contribute to the Red Hot Organization’s Fela Kuti tribute album, Red Hot and Riot in 2002. He collaborated with Djelimady Tounkara on a remake of Kuti’s track, “Years of Tears and Sorrow”.

13th amendment

Filmmaker Ava DuVernay explores the history of racial inequality in the United States, focusing on the fact that the nation’s prisons are disproportionately filled with African-Americans.

The film explores the “intersection of race, justice, and mass incarceration in the United States;” it is titled after the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, adopted in 1865, which abolished slavery throughout the United States and ended involuntary servitude except as a punishment for conviction.

“The loophole in our constitution’s ban on slavery not only allowed slavery to continue, but launched an era of discrimination and mass incarceration that continues to this day. To live up to our nation’s promise of justice for all, we must eliminate the Slavery Clause from our constitution.”

The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime.

Letter to the Free, Music Video, Notes

CSP – LETTER TO THE FREE

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Common’s ‘Letter to the Free’

Lonnie Rashid Lynn, known by his stage name Common, is an American rapper and actor. He wrote ‘Letter to the Free’ in 2016.

  • His debut album was ‘Can I Borrow a Dollar?’ (1992).
  • Common won his first Grammy award in 2003 for ‘Best RnB Song’ for the single ‘Love of my Life’.
  • He co-wrote the song ‘Glory’ for the 2014 film ‘Selma’. He starred in the movie and won the Academy award for best original song.

Lyrics

Lyrics from ‘Letter to the Free’

“We ain’t seen as human beings with feelings”

  • The idea that black people living in America are often considered ‘lesser’ to those in political power and even civilians who support the right wing, hegemonic views.

“Black bodies being lost in the American dream”

“Slavery’s still alive, check Amendment 13“

The 13th Amendment  

Politically, the 13th Amendment states that …

“Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

  • The 2016 Netflix original documentary film ’13th’, directed by Ava DuVernay explores how slavery and racism is still present in the prisons of America even though it was seemingly abolished in 1865.

The Idea of Resistance and Political Protest

Key idea = The political, personal and cultural are always intertwined.

Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.

Antonio Gramsci talked about Hegemony and Hegemonic culture, the way in which the dominant ideologies are in power.

Sub cultural theories – Subcultures offered young working class people a solution to the problems they were collectively experiencing in society.

Postcolonialism

Looking at identity and representation through the lens of Empire and Colonialism under the shadow of Slavery. It is a way of critically looking at culture.

Edward Said

He said that ‘the privileged role of culture in the modern imperial experience’. The way in which literature, music, art etc. frames the Western countries as the dominant culture and Eastern countries inferior. He has the idea that culture was created by white Europeans to give themselves a privileged position. He wrote a book called ‘Orientalism’ in 1978.

Orientalism = The stereotyping of the east. The assertion of western power over the east.  a general patronizing Western attitude towards Middle Eastern, Asian, and North African society.

Jacques Lacan “the other”

  • Lacan was a French Philosopher. He came up with the ideology that we never really know who we truly are, our identity is impossible to fully see ourselves.
  • His ideas stem from the way in which children first see themselves in a mirror and make a connection that it is themselves in reflection.
  • We are exploring ‘The Other’ as a way of exploring ourselves.
  • Linking to postcolonialism, this would be to suggest that the West uses the ‘Other’ (East), to identify and construct itself.
Letter to the Free, Music Video, Notes, Revision, Theory, Uncategorized

Letter to the Free

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Common

An American rapper and actor. He has won many awards such as grammys for best R&B song, best rap album at the grammys, and many more. He launched ‘Think Common Entertainment, a record label in 2011. He has acted / voice acted in films/tv shows: Date night, suicide squad, small foot, now you see me, never have I ever and many more.

13th amendment

Abolished Slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. There is a loophole in the 13th amendment- which allowed slavery to continue and provided more discrimination that still happens in today’s society.

Documentary:

Released in 2016. Film director and maker, Ava DuVernay, speaks about the history of racial inequality in the USA. Showing us that America’s prisons are filled with many more African-Americans than white Caucasians. It points out how much harm can be caused by slavery.

https://hautlieucreative.co.uk/media23al/wp-content/uploads/sites/58/2022/01/Music-as-Political-Protest.pdf

Cultural Hegemony

Key Concepts:
● Cultural resistance
● Cultural hegemony
● Subcultural theory

The Idea of Resistance and Political Protest

Key idea: the political, personal and cultural are always intertwined

Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.

Antonio Gramsci

Hegemonic: dominant, ruling-class, power-holders
Hegemonic culture: the dominant culture
Cultural hegemony: power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means.
Ideology: worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values

Functions by framing the ideologies of the dominant social group as the only legitimate
ideology.

(slide 3) The dominant social groups are shown through its economic, political, moral and social institutions.

Subculture

Working-class youth culture
Unified by shared tastes in style, music and ideology
A solution to collectively experienced problems
A form of resistance to cultural hegemony

Song lyrics

“We ain’t seen as human beings with feelings” I chose this lyric because it points out how people of colour are constantly being dehumanised.

“They stop, search and arrest our souls” I chose this lyric because people of colour don’t get the freedom deserve.

Post Colonialism

Looking at identity and representation through the lens of Empire and Colonialism.

Shadow of Slavery

Edward Said

Orientalism- the link between culture, imperial power and colonialism.

The arguments around postcolonial critical thought ‘constituted a fundamentally important political act’ (MacLeod, 200: 16)

The power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism– Edward Said Culture and Imperialism, 1993: xiii

‘In this view, the outlying regions of the world have no life, history or culture to speak of, no independence or integrity worth representing without the West.‘ (Said, 1993: xxi).

Jacque Lacan “The other”

Search for identity by looking at the mirror or other things. You are only self conscious and aware when you see yourself in the mirror.

Letter to the Free, Moving Image, Music Video

CSP: LETTER TO THE FREE

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A LETTER TO THE FREE:

Common:

  • Stage name Common (formerly Common Sense)
  • American actor and rapper
  • Mainstream attention was from work with the Soulquarians
  • Won a grammy for best R&B Single, with the song “Love of My Life”
  • When acting he played in films like; John Wick Chapter 2, Street kings and American Gangster along with many others.
  • Birthday: March 13, 1972 (age 49)

A letter to the free quotes:

“Slavery’s still alive, check Amendment 13” – references proof for the song, makes people realise that they haven’t actually seen that slavery is gone, they’ve only heard and thought they knew. However in Amendment 13 its said that you can still be a slave if you’re a criminal.

“Prison is a business, America’s the company” – shows that America is profiting off of arresting people, specifically black people.

“Instead of ‘n***a’ they use the word ‘criminal” – this is an example of how slavery hasn’t disappeared, its just changed to be something else that people turn a blind eye to because its behind a prison wall. As well as this, the racial slur used displays that its those same, white, racist people that still have the power and instead of openly acting in slavery, they “arrest” black people for little or no reason at all, then getting them into slavery in prison.

13th Amendment:

  • The film explores the “intersection of race, justice, and mass incarceration in the United States”
  • the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, adopted in 1865, which abolished slavery throughout the United States and ended involuntary servitude except as a punishment for conviction of a crime.
  • She examines the prison-industrial complex and the emerging detention-industrial complex, discussing how much money is being made by corporations from such incarcerations.
  • Made $566 USD in box office

Youth Culture: Jodie’s presentation 

Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.

○ Attempts to change to laws or legislation
○ Organised political movements
○ Public protests
○ Petitions, marches

Antonio Gramsci: 1891 – 1937

● Antonio Gramsci: Italian philosopher writing in the 1930s
Key Terms:
● Hegemonic: dominant, ruling-class, power-holders
● Hegemonic culture: the dominant culture
● Cultural hegemony: power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means.
● Ideology: worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values

POSTCOLONIALISM:

The Shadow of Slavery:

Most locations wealth comes from the 400 years of slave trading. Places like the UK thrived off of slave trading between America and Africa. African kings traded other tribes prisoners for guns, plants and guns, then America traded plants, guns and substances for slaves.

Edward Said:

“the power to narrate, or to block other narratives from forming or emerging, is very important to culture and imperialism” – Edward Said Culture and Imperialism, 1993: xiii

Edward Said – “In this view, the outlying regions of the world have no life, history or culture to speak of, no independence or integrity worth representing without the West.“

ORIENTALISM:

Europe’s view at the oriented of the world, implying the the west side of the word is better than the east, promoting stereotypes. For example stereotypes like Muslims are terrorists and black people are criminals, orientalism is what those races define the wests views on them.

Jacques Lacan:

“We cannot actually see ourselves as whole, we use a reflection to understand who we are / who we are not“

We can never discover who we are, because we cannot look at ourselves from the outside. We can only apprehend a reflection of ourselves. Finding ourselves is useless, we will never find out who/what we are, however we can find out who we are not.

Letter to the Free, Moving Image, Music Video, Notes

CSP 7: Letter to the Free, Common

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Lonnie Rashid Lynn, Jr. (Common)

  • born March 13, 1972, Chicago, Illinois, US
  • American hip-hop artist, actor, and activist who became a mainstream success in the early 21st century, known for intelligent and positive lyrics that were performed in a spoken-word style.
  • He was the first rapper to win a Grammy Award, an Academy Award and an Emmy Award
  • Net Worth: $45 Million
  •  launched ‘Think Common Entertainment, a record label in 2011

13th (2016)

  • American documentary film by Ava DuVernay
  • explores the “intersection of race, justice, and mass incarcentration in the United States;”

Key Concepts:

‘Slavery’s still alive, check Amendment 13
Not whips and chains, all subliminal
Instead of ‘nigga’ they use the word ‘criminal’

Highlights the fact that racial injustice is still very prominent within society, even though it isn’t entirely obvious – it has been masked by

‘For America to rise it’s a matter of Black Lives’

Post Colonialism Under the Shadow of Slavery

 The historical period or state of affairs representing the aftermath of Western colonialism and  the critical academic study of the cultural, political and economic legacy of colonialism and imperialism, focusing on the impact of human control and exploitation of colonized people and their lands. 

Edward Said – Orentalism

  • the stereotyping of the East – exaggerates religious and cultural differences causing their humanity to be overlooked and the culture misunderstood
  • justifies the assertion of Western power over the East
  • when the West views the East in this way – it creates policies which marginalises them
  • ‘In this view, the outlying regions of the world have no life, history or culture to speak of, no independence or integrity worth representing without the West.‘ – Said, 1993

Jacques Lacan – ‘The Other’

  •  the recognition of the ‘Other’ – the mirror stage of child development, whereby, as we cannot actually see ourselves as whole, we use a reflection to understand who we are / who we are not
  • To link this to postcolonialism would be to suggest that the West uses the East / the Orient / the ‘Other’, to identify and construct itself. How it sees itself as the ‘West’ as opposed to . . . in other words, it acts as The Other, a mirror by which a reflection of the self can be measured out and examined

Music Video

common

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Lonnie Rashid Lynn, known by his stage name Common, is an American rapper and actor. He debuted in 1992 with the album Can I Borrow a Dollar?, and gained critical acclaim with his 1994 album Resurrection. He maintained an underground following into the late 1990s.

In the 2000s Common began to land bit parts in television shows and movies. His early films included the crime drama American Gangster (2007), the sci-fi adventure Terminator Salvation (2009), and the comedy Date Night (2010). 

Common earned numerous awards during his career, including Grammys for his collaborations with Erykah Badu and Kanye West on “Love of My Life (An Ode to Hip-Hop)” (2002) and “Southside” (2007), respectively. For “Glory,” a song he performed with John Legend for the movie Selma, the two artists earned a Grammy and an Oscar. In 2017 Common won an Emmy for “Letter to the Free,” which was featured in DuVernay’s documentary 13th (2016).

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letter to the free

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  • Common is an American hip-hop rapper
  • He has a wife called Tiffany Haddish
  • Commons real name is Lonnie Corant Jaman Shuka Rashid Lynn
  • He was born on 13th March 1972 in Chicago
  • He debuted in 1992 with the album ‘Can I Borrow a Dollar?’
  • Has a net worth of £45 million

13TH:

Documentary “13th” to screen Oct. 17 at MSU
  • Directed by Ava DuVernay
  • Production company: Kandoo Films
  • Distributed by Netflix
  • Release Date: October 7th 2016
  • The film had a budget of $1,000,000

The film explores the “intersection of race, justice, and mass incarceration in the United States;” it is titled after the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, adopted in 1865, which abolished slavery throughout the United States and ended involuntary servitude except as a punishment for conviction.

Filmmaker Ava DuVernay explores the history of racial inequality in the United States, focusing on the fact that the nation’s prisons are disproportionately filled with African-Americans.

Jodies Presentation

Key Concepts:
● Cultural resistance
● Cultural hegemony
● Subcultural theory

Key idea: the political, personal and cultural are always intertwined

Culture is what influences people’s hearts, minds and opinions. This is the site of popular change.

Key Terms:
● Hegemonic: dominant, ruling-class, power-holders
● Hegemonic culture: the dominant culture
● Cultural hegemony: power, rule, or domination maintained by ideological and cultural means.
● Ideology: worldview – beliefs, assumptions and values

What is a subculture?
● Working-class youth culture
● Unified by shared tastes in style, music and ideology
● A solution to collectively experienced problems
● A form of resistance to cultural hegemony

Common’s lyrics:

  • Instead of ‘n***a’ they use the word ‘criminal’
  • Prison is a business, America’s the company
  • Black bodies being lost in the American dream

5% of the worlds population is in US and 25% of worlds prisoners are American

In 1972 there were 300,000 prisoners and now there are above 2.3 million