Best. Class. Ever.: Doing and Being Hip-Hop in School

• In Event: Youth Identity Making and Transgressing Spaces

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explore teaching and learning in a yearlong, collaboratively taught high school class on Hip-Hop to illustrate the meaning youth made about their identities as cultural producers. Using data from a participatory ethnography, this paper examines how youth are intrinsically motivated and engaged in consequential learning that offers a reference point in which their identity and unapologetic, non-conforming expression, nature, and ingenuity are explicit foci of learning. Research questions focused on what the class meant to youth and what was most important to them about what they learned. The paper signals the importance of constructing opportunities for urban youth to thrive.

Authors

• Joanne C. Larson, University of Rochester

• Grant Atkins, East High School