Looking to fulfill your arts requirement in your general education while learning about the kind music you listen to on a daily basis?

This is the class for you.

With Rap music and Hip Hop Culture being so prominent in today’s society, especially with the millineal generation, its only right that there is a class that actually teaches you the influences and origins behind it.

Dr. Kellori Dower, choir director and full time professor on campus had the same thought process.

She started this class Fall 2017. She happened to write the whole curriculum for the course.

“We wanted to make sure that in the music conversations that we have on this campus that all cultures are being represented,” she states.

The class delves into the history of Hip Hop culture and movement and how Rap music developed towards the end of it. It also discusses how it is infiltrated into marketing and other aspects of society, and its commercialization.

Dr. Dower also wanted the class to clear the air of negative connotations and common misconceptions widely held about Rap music.

“Rap in general has been thought of as something negative. But everybody’s got a story. Bach had a story. Beethoven’s got a story. Tupac has a story too. And his story needs to be told. And we need to be studying it at the collegiate level.”

Dower also believes that music has always been the soundtrack to social movements and change. Rap music has definitely been one of the most powerful examples of this.

The atmosphere in the class is very welcoming and fun. Class discussions and activities promote participation. The class is pretty much a family with the same love for rap music and hip hop culture holding them together.

Enrollment is closed for this semester but definitely look into joining this class in the semesters to come.

“We just hope it catches on so more people know (about the class).” Professor Dower says.