Holy Wow. I Did It.

Wow. This was quite the nerve wracking presentation but I was pleasantly surprised with myself. My preparation processes was average but sufficient for me. Before jumping to practicing the actual speech part, I made sure to solidify the writing portion and content.

I knew I predominantly wanted to talk about the causes and effects for the shift so I first organized the main points of my essay through a concept map in order to overview everything. I then went into more depth for each cause, hitting on the main points behind each. I did the same kind of preparation for the results as well. Then finally finished off with an engaging introduction and conclusion. I tried to incorporate clear cut information so the talk didn't go off on a tangent about random details and statistics. This all involved my preparation for the writing portion of the speech so I would be fully prepared to speak fluidly.

Once I was confident in my content, I put it all together with transitions so the speech would flow. I separated all my ideas onto notecards and started practicing the speech in a way that allowed me to memorize it. Once I was confident in my memory, I wrote just the causes and effects in order on one card as a crutch if needed. So after days of going through my speech and practicing to each of my roommates, I was confident. Listing the key points on a card helped me visualize my speech in my mind as I spoke because I knew specifically what was coming next and could transition to it smoothly. Overall, constant, everyday practice was definitely what worked best for me in order to deliver in a conversational way. But there are definitely places where I'd like to improve.

The first aspect I could use a lot of improvement on is enthusiasm. I think I did a fine job delivering my content but I could have entertained the audience more in order to keep them engaged. I was very focused on saying the right thing so with more practice maybe I'd be able to be more comfortable allowing me to differ my tones and make it more of a conversation rather then talking at people. I could also work on my eye contact being evenly dispersed throughout the room. I looked back and forth a few times but it could have been more relaxed and natural rather than jerky. And finally, my conclusion should have been stronger seeing as it is the last thing everyone heard me say. After listening, I realized I sort of left everyone hanging rather then rounding up all my ideas and being engaging in the end just as I was at the beginning. So for my next speech I know I need to focus a lot on my delivery being enthusiastic and smooth as well as finishing strong.

So without further ado, here it is. My Tedtalk.

Shift of Smooth to Vulgar, is it the Culture?

I am focusing on the shift in rap music from the late 80's-90's to what it is currently. There has been a noticeable shift if music regarding all genres but my focus will be on just the hip/hop rap genre. Rap first emerged with the group NWA in the late 80's. They are credited with "creating" this-hop/rap. So I will discuss the reason behind why it first started then continue to explain how it evolved. The music gained popularity after criticism and more rappers emerged like Tupac and Snoop Dogg. Their music can almost be depicted as smooth rap. As the popularity grew more and more sub genres started to show. People like Ludacris, 50 cent and Lil Wayne are the bridge between the smooth rap and what hear now. Currently the most popular rap artists have a lot more electronic rap music which is also a lot more vulgar. I will be incorporating not only the change of emotion in the music but the topics rapped about, the rhythm and the language differences. The African American culture and equality can also be attributed to the shift that we see within the genre. 

In my thesis statement I hope to incorporate these differences which can be partially attributed to the technological advances, as well the people who are connected to them. 

There is a noticeable shift of smooth rap music, starting with Tupac that slowly changes to a more upbeat, vulgar feel like Lil Wayne which are due to technological advances and cultural changes. The noticeable changes that we can hear include the emotion in the music, the topics discussed, the rhythms and the language used. 

Works Cited

Adamu, Mosheh. "A HipHop Paradigm Shift." Scribd. Scribd, n.d. Web. 

Baraka, Rhonda. "Gettin' Back To Basics." Penn State WebAccess Secure Login:. Billboard, 6 Apr. 2001. Web. 

Clayton, Mahogany. "A Shift in Hip Hop: What Kendrick's Verse Didn't Do." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 11 Aug. 2014. Web. 

Hess, Mickey. Is Hip Hop Dead?: The Past, Present, and Future of America's Most Wanted Music. N.p.: Praeger, 2007. Print. 

Johnson, Maurice L. A Historical Analysis: The Evolution of Commercial Rap Music. Florida State University Libraries. Jonathon Adams, 2011. Web. 

King, Brandon. "The Beef Between 90s Hip Hop & Millennium Hip Hop." Hip Hop Golden Age. N.p., 05 Oct. 2016. Web. 

McNulty-Finn, Clara. "The Evolution of Rap." Harvard Political Review. Harvard Political Review, 10 Apr. 2014. Web. 

Soerensen, Maria. "Hip-hop and Rap Music in the 21st Century." Storify. N.p., n.d. Web.

There's Always Something Changing!

It is interesting how paradigm shifts happen in our society. All of a sudden one fad turns to another. One example of a paradigm shift is the marriage rate significantly decreasing for young people. Marriage was an essential part of life for women in the 20th century. For men, it was more of a "I'm completing life tasks" type of thing. Many couples would meet and soon after be married before they even turned 21. But in our current society it would almost be unusual if a couple were to meet then quickly marry before they even graduated college yet. Settling down, marriage, and having kids are all being pushed until after adults have their life in a solid place with a good job. This most likely has to do with the fact that women have a more respect and more privileges. They are expected to attend college and get a well paying job which allows them to support themselves instead of relying on a man. In my opinion, it is for the better. Allowing people to focus on themselves before they have to rely or take care of another in the midst of their busy lives.

Another example of paradigm shift is the evolution of music from the 20th century into the 21st century. Our parent's generation (20th century) loved their rock and roll, the bands and all the fashion that came with it. Our generation in the 21st century tends to love their R&B and hip-hop. There has been an explosion of the rap and hip-hop genre. So as an example, our parent's Grateful Dead is our Kanye West. With the help of all the new technology, electronic beats and dance music is incorporated in a lot of rap/hip-hiop songs which widens the interest of more listeners. Even though there are still plenty of bands still popular (mostly from the 90's), rappers have taken over the industry. It still makes me laugh that our parents are constantly surprised by the vulgarity of this new profound style of music we all tend to be playing in our homes and cars.

Make it one They'll Remember

A speech is just a spoken essay, which seems pretty simple and easy. But speeches require a lot more components than just any normal typed essay. You need to have a specifically clear outline, distinct transitions, both of which need the help of the tones and volumes in your voice. Enthusiasm seems to be the distinguishing point between a good speech and a great speech. Two different people could read the same outline for a speech but have two entirely different outcomes depending on their voices and how they change and project them.

There were a number of great speeches that I have heard in the past week from all my classmates. A lot of which had superb content, facts and a solid thesis. But the people that stuck out were the people who were genuinely enthusiastic about their topic; whether it was true enthusiasm or not, it made the difference. The differing tones in their voices made it that much easier to follow along with their speech because it held my attention. They also strategically changed their voices when transitioning into their next points which allowed me to almost make a mental diagram of their outline.



This speech was interesting all throughout. The speaker constantly engages in the audience by relating real life situations and allowing students and even parents to relate to what he's speaking about. He adds music and humor to his speech which makes a significant difference in keeping his audience listening. One specific thing he talked about was proposing to a girl. He was building up the tension within his voice by speaking quickly in addition to the fast guitar tempo. This whole scenario of a girlfriend was actually a metaphor to applying, being accepted and choosing a college. The metaphor kept me particularly interested because I questioned why this girl was so important to him in high school. Great speeches involve emotion and enthusiasm, differing tone and a solid layout so that your audience can follow along; all of which this high school valedictorian did a great job of showing.

Timing is Everything

I never realized until this class that there is the perfect word for the perfect timing which is Kairos. It is an Ancient Greek term that they believed in so strongly they attributed a creature to it. Kairos relates immensely to the relevance of a subject that you are trying to discuss for or against. We've discussed kairos in a few different contexts, mostly relating in English terms in addition to a few real life scenarios.

When I think about social media, I think about how strong kairos is. Twitter is a great example for this in some aspects because millions of people are able to voice their opinion on a topic immediately when the scenario is happening. But twitter can also expose bad kairos which a lot of people are either completely ignored for because of their timing or they are just laughed at. For example, the situation between Kanye West and Taylor Swift due to Kanye's lyrics in one his songs. Many people immediately responded to it via twitter and celebrities were using their fan's tweets to back themselves up. But a few days later the topic was out of everyone's minds yet people were still posting their opinions. And even the celebrities themselves voiced that the issue was over and that people needed to let it go; while their level headed fans sat back and laughed at how concerned other fans were with these celebrities's social lives when many more pressing issues were occurring.

Once I took a moment to reflect on my decision making process and the way I do things, I realized how much I unintentionally use kairos. From simply just asking my parent's permission to do things to participating in conversations with someone else that had a differing opinion than me. My parents always used to tell me, "there is a right time and place for everything" which is exactly what kairos defines. But on the downside of 'good' timing, I've often been told I need to move on in conversations because my mind is still so caught up with the original topic. So my statements have no relevance anymore because as kairos demonstrates, relevance is everything.

My hometown has a program named Kairos, which is a church retreat designed for many juniors and seniors in high school. I never really understood the name until I learned the true definition. Their slogan for their retreat lies on the "the right timing for God", which all makes sense now!

From Saint Anne's Church

Pepsi Unites us all?

The immensely famous, Kendall Jenner, participated in a Pepsi commercial back in April of this year. The advertisement promoted American culture and touched on the current socials issues and how they are being fought against with the help of protests. This commercial did receive an enormous amount of backlash due to the 'glamour' Pepsi associated with protests. Despite Pepsi's attempt to convey American's unity, their main goal was to show anyone from any walk of life can drink Pepsi, and Pepsi can contribute to unity. 

The commercial depicted many different people from many different backgrounds coming together during a protest and being united because of Pepsi. It's obvious Pepsi tried to include many ethnicities present in the United States emphasizing the minorities including a hijab-wearing women, an Asian man, African American individuals and many others that are more difficult to identify. The commercial also includes their careers ranging from musicians to photographers, dancers and models. 

Even though this commercial is extremely questionable and offensive to many Americans due to Pepsi's defiance for recognizing the lives lost, and the non-glamour lifestyle of protests; my focus will be primarily on the civic related components in addition to the mistakes Pepsi and why Pepsi overstepped. The goal of this commercial was to unite the diversified people and civil activists of America during a protest. This advertisement is the epitome (of an attempt) of using the American culture in relation to their product to try to promote Americans to buy it, even though the opposite occurred.

I would attempt to discuss this advertisement as though it was a semi-successful due to the civically related components, in addition to adding the downfalls and mistakes Pepsi made. I would discuss Pepsi's attempt to use civic components while connected to a few superficial components which directly lead to its downfall. My hook would include something related to, "A drink that brings all Americans together?" One major point that would be included in my speech would be identifying the diversity shown in the advertisement because America is know as the 'melting pot.' Another point I would discuss would be that protests are very common currently in America whether they are LGBTQ motivated or relating to the black lives matter movement.

***I'm uneasy to use this as my artifact so I would really like people to add their opinions on whether or not I should discuss this commercial due to the fact of how controversial it it. I'm not sure if it would help or hurt while writing a speech. I recognize and agree fully with the fact that Pepsi didn't go about this commercial the right way while glamorizing protests when currently, they are no where near graceful nor glamorous. 

My Passions in a Blog

The places people will go for Music

One demanding passion of mine is music, in particular, music festivals whether it be following the festivals through social media or attending them myself. Being from Chicago, Lollapalooza is a give. I have attended Lollapalooza for the past three summers. Then in the beginning of this past May, I thankfully had the opportunity to fly to Miami, Florida to attend Rolling Loud. I have a very long list just waiting to be fulfilled but not everything can happen with a snap of my fingers.

Throughout this blog, I would like to discuss and review the many different festivals happening around the United States. The biggest festivals mostly happened around summer time due to the good weather but there are plenty dispersed throughout the year. Within these reviews I would include things like: the headliners, the 'underground' artists, the people in attendance, the fashion, the environment including the city it takes pale in, and the afterparties offered. There is a plethora of things that play into musics festivals in order to make them the magical places people say they are. 

A big thing that plays into music festivals are the groups of people that are known to attend. Festivals have reputations just like restaurants or cities. The stereotypes for each festival is one of the most interesting aspects because the people go for the music so the music carries a reputation as well. Some cities that host these festivals don't have the most optimistic responses to them. It's interesting to read in on the political side of things as well as everything else. The people in charge are, most of ht time, the people who run the city which is sometimes forgotten.

I will try to coordinate each blog with the most recent festival. As of right now that won't be hard because of festival season recently happening. But for the rest of the blogs it won't be hard to review ones that have already past. 


By Veld Music Festival