Tupac Changes: The Reality of Racism

Tupac Changes: The Reality of Racism

Introduction

This essay will conduct a rhetorical analysis of the song “Changes” by Tupac Amaru Shakur. Tupac Amaru Shakur was born on June 16, 1971 in United States. He grew up in the East Harlem area. The involvement of his parents and other family members in a socialist movement aimed at protecting the black people from police brutality had a significant influence on him (McQuillar & Johnson, 2010). His songs focus on the treatment of black people by the society, and the white people. Apart from the political stance taken in his songs, he was a very talented musician, hip hop artist, actor and was named as the greatest artist by many renowned publications like Rolling Stone Magazine who named him as the 86th Great Artist in the all of the times. This essay discusses about inspiration created by Tupac using the words, music and the reality of racism mentioned in the song. Tupac not only discusses the hardships of the black people but also highlights the weaknesses of the black people which is hindering in their progress.

Discussion

The lyrics of the song talks about racism and details the accounts of the bad treatment he received from the society and the lack of adaptability of the black people (Demashk, 2011). He urged the black people to take a stand with him and asked them to change their life styles and achieve success. Tupac effectively used the lexis to grab the attention of his listeners and raise the awareness about the racial discrimination faced by the black people by using the words like “races, racist, negro, black… etc”. Additionally the rapper, in order to reduce the distance between his audience and himself, frequently used the pronouns “we” and “I”. Tupac also used the pronoun “you” to involve the listeners in the song rather than just listening. The pronouns were also used in conjunction of words such as “strangers, cops, Negro, black etc.” to explain the injustice faced by the black people and the rapper at the hands of police and society. The rapper used these combinations of words to highlight the facts that he and the black people were accused of the crimes whether they did it or not just because of being black. The adjectives used by the rapper paints a sad and negative picture of the black people's living atmosphere as he uses the words “hungry, poor” and identifies that the cause of these conditions is because of their skin color “black, white”. The most influential word used by Tupac is the adjective “change” which is also the title of the song. With the use of this word the rapper stresses on the need of all the people both black and white to change the behavior towards each other and start treating each other as brothers and sisters.

Tupac chose the language and grammar according the subject and nature of the people discussed in the ...