Michael Eric Dyson, the Avalon Foundation Professor in Humanities at the University of Pennsylvania, an ordained Baptist minister and the author of several books gave a lecture, "George Bush, Clarence Thomas and 50 Cent," at Hamilton College on April 14. Dyson, author of Making Malcolm: The Myth and Meaning of Malcolm X and Holler If You Hear Me: Searching for Tupac Shakur, was the second speaker in The C. Christine Johnson Voices of Color Lecture Series. It was sponsored by the Office of the President, The Dean of Students, The Dean of Faculty and The Brothers Organization. Dyson's talk addressed the Iraqi conflict, affirmative action, and Hip Hop as an outlet for social commentary.
Dyson spoke with a minister's fervor and an academic's understanding combining a seemingly limitless memory for Hip Hop lyrics and philosophy. He voiced his concern at the disproportionate number of black and Hispanic soldiers in the U.S. armed forces, using the military to gain economic and educational opportunity that would otherwise be closed to them. He sited the use of high-placed black officials as the mouth piece of the Bush administration in order to create a "shrewd vision for the American media" of a happy and supportive minority force. Dyson discussed embedded reporting, criticizing, "we expect of our news people whether they are reporting on page or on stage that they would be skeptical."
Dyson then moved onto the highly criticized Affirmative Action program. He began, "the people who are fighting against the admission of the extraordinary, are often themselves remarkably mediocre." Dyson went on to talk about the more competitive admission standards for minority scholars and how "merit is a socially contingent good, always consumed with things that go beyond the page, beyond the test," such as geographical distribution, area of interest or athletic ability. And that to assume minority candidates are taking the spots of more qualified white candidates is "a presumption predicated by bias and sealed by bigotry."
Dyson closed with a discussion on Hip Hop as a tool of social commentary, used to voice all of the criticisms we least want voiced. Of Hip Hop, Dyson commented, "it is a brutal but insightful form of conscience that pushes beyond capitalistic spews," differentiating between the message-free rhyme of the capitalist machine and the carefully composed commentary on often ignored social problems such as welfare, racism and poverty. He sited Tupac Shakur as a self- taught, well-read, intelligent voice calling attention to the social climate of the inner city.
