(1) use their understandings of hip-hop culture to question portrayals of male and female identity as told through the works Tupac Shakur. (2) write 3-paragraph expository essays.

Guiding Questions: (1) What double-standard does Tupac set for women? (2) What positive and negative images of the Black man does Tupac represent? (3) Who do you believe represents Black women positively within hip-hop?

Introduce New Material. Ms. Brown was not afraid of taking curricular and pedagogical risks. In our initial interview I asked her what, if anything, was off limits in terms of explicit language or content. She replied, “I’m open-minded... I am not going to eliminate something from discussion or reading just because it has curse words on it.”

Still, I was impressed by Ms. Brown’s framing of the unit around such a provocative theme.

In the song off his best-selling album, All Eyez On Me (1996), Tupac tells his

“sistas” a cautionary tale to “keep ya head up, legs closed, eyes open.” The first verse reads:

Look here Miss Thang, hate to salt your game but you’s a money hungry woman and you need to change. In tha locker room all the homies do is laugh. High five's cuz anotha nigga played your ass.

It was said you were sleeezy, even easy sleepin around for what you need See it's your thang and you can shake it how you wanna. Give it up free, or make your money on the corner.

But don't be bad and play the game get mad and change. Then you wonda why these muthafuckas call you names. Still lookin' for a way out and that's OK I can see you wanna stray there's a way out.

Keep your mind on your money, enroll in school. And as the years pass by you can show them fools. But you ain't tryin' to hear me cuz your stuck, you're headin' for the bathroom 'bout to get tossed up.

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