Today's topic was "Protest Songs", inspired by the Dr. Martin Luther King holiday in the US on 18 January.
The discussion turned out to be great! -- there was so much thought put into the explanations for the songs chosen!
I was also aspecial occasion to see another former student join us! He is now back in Mexico City. But it meant that today we had participants from Seattle, Tokyo and Mexico City. While I miss the in-person conversations, I am happy that we can gather from the four corners of the world online :-)
Before we started talking about protest songs, I reminisced about watching the infamous Seahawks Super Bowl loss with the Mexican student back in February 2015. It was at my favorite "dive bar" in Seattle: Targy's on Queen Anne (website).
I had to explain what a "dive bar" is (definition), then the Japanese student told about us "izakaya" bars in Japan which are their equivalents of dive bars. Info on izakaya bars.
The Taiwanese student said they use the term "izakaya", but in Taiwan is it a regular Japanese restaurant with ramen and sushi; it is a place where business people go.
The students from different countries started asking each other about the types of alcohol in their home countries, especially what sake is like. We weren't talking about music, but that's ok -- the point of the group is to practice speaking conversational English!
To end this part of the discussion, I mentioned that since people in the US tend to drink a lot of alcohol during December, a lot of people don't drink any alcohol during the month of January. It's called "Dry January" (information).
Now on to protest songs!
The first song was "你敢有聽著咱唱歌 (Do You Hear The People Sing)" (video with lyrics). The student explained that in 2004 a soldier in Taiwan as mistreated and he died from his injuries, which resulted in the civil population speaking out for more transparency from the army. They said that if there was not transparency from the army and the government, the people would be like slaves.
Because the voices in the song are not shouting loudly, I asked the student if one can hear in their voices that the people are angry. He said, yes, you can hear that they are very angry; he said that in Taiwan slogans are more persuasive than shouting.
The next song was "American Jesus" (video, lyrics, song info) by Bad Religion (info). The student who chose this song likes punk rock music, which means he had many choices of songs for today's theme. He was introduced to Bad Religion by his English teacher when he was young, but he didn't understand what this song was about until he learned English better.
In short, it is a criticism of President Bush who said something to the effect that "We will win the Gulf War because God is on our side."
Often the members of punk bands are considered uneducated people just complaining, but the singer for Bad Religion, Greg Gaffin (info) has a PhD and is a professor! Bad Religion is intellectual punk rock!
The next song was "EZLN" (video, Wikipedia on EZLN).This song is about the uprising in Chiapas in 1994 after the NAFTA treaty (info) was signed. The people in Chiapas were asking for more rice and education for the indigenous people. The army supported the uprising
against the government. The army movement became a political movement;
people agreed the demands were fair and this movement led to the Left government Mexico now has.
The song uses a Manu Chao (info) song as the background, with the manifesto of the army on top of it. It was not a mainstream song, but it was popular among the people who supported the army.
There are a few Manu Chao songs that I really like, but they are ones about being happy and having a light heart. But he is very respected in Latin America as an activist, not only in his solo music, but also in his previous band, Mano Negra (info), which was a very political band.
The next song was "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" (video with lyrics, song info) by Gil Scott-Heron (info). This is a really great choice related to US history!The student who chose it says she likes it because it is a call to action, rather than sitting at home.
This song is credited as the birth of rap music; it was birthed of outrage and taking poetry and applying it to songs. Lyrically the song refers to a lot of people of the time it was written (1970), but many of the statements are still 100% valid today.
We talked for a while about how to change a political system (or even a company). Should revolution come from working inside the system, within its constraints, or should it come from outside the system. It was very interesting to hear what the students had to say on the topic.
The student from Mexico City said that the phrase "The revolution will not be televised" is often said and written in Latin America. He knew the phrase, but didn't know the song. We wondered what came first: the phrase in Latin America, or the Gil Scott-Heron song.My choice for protest song was "Fight The Power" (video, lyrics, song info) by Public Enemy (info) from the movie "Do The Right Thing" (video trailer). The film is a classic social commentary on race relations in America. I realize it would be hard for international students to understand the accents and dialogue in the movie, to say nothing of the visual social commentary which goes to the heart of race relations in America, but this movie really is one of the best, most powerful, commentaries about American society.
And this song is a perfect audio addition to that commentary.
With that our time for the day was over. It was a really great conversation, I left the meeting very happy. :-)
Next week's topic: The first song or album you bought (or played repeatedly).
