Cornel West, an esteemed professor at Harvard and award-winning author, is being heavily criticized for his recent album. This past year West released a hip hop album called “Sketches Of My Culture,” the album was done in a spoken word rhyme style and was laced with jazzy and soulful beats. Subject matter ranged from respect for elders, history, being a productive member of society and the importance of self-respect and pride.
He also did a track called “3Ms” which was about Martin Luther King Jr, Medgar Evers and Malcolm X. Despite the obvious educational and intelligent content of this album, Lawrence Summers, the university’s President, has declared this album to be unacceptable of a Havard Professor purely because it falls under the genre of hip hop. West is prepared to leave his job in support of what he believes in.
There are truly too many things that are wrong with this situation to mention. It is really sad that the stereotypes of hip hop of blinded people that badly. Lawrence Summers must have his Ph.D.