Wyclef Jean Rationale Analysis

Rationale (Part 1):

English Language written task part 1

Interview with Wyclef Jean with the language magazine:

LM: Today we are honored to introduce successful rapper, actor and lyricist Wyclef Jean who is also popularly known as a member of the Brooklyn based hip-hop crew the Fugees. His self-produced album The Carnival (1997) catapulted his fame as an individual rapper outside of the Fugees. He is popularly known for his musical gamut of reggae, creole, salsa, jazz, rap and R&B. Jean moved to Brooklyn at the age of 9 from Haiti with the rest of his family. As a kid he had to overcome many cultural differences growing up in the projects of Marlboro and Coney Island. So tell us Wyclef what was your initial view of America and what cultural

Well, when I initially moved to New York I always thought it would be raining dollars from the sky because from where I come from America is known as the land of diamonds moreover a place where anybody can get rich. As our plane was landing I saw the lights from the sky and I told my brother ‘Hey look. We gonna get rich, we have arrived’. Growing up in Manhattan was tough. First off we had the language barrier between us and the rest of the neighborhood. People kept constantly telling me to go back to Jamaica I told them that I was from Haiti and then they said go back to Haiti. There was a lot of hip-hop, graffiti and music around where I grew up. I thought I needed to be accepted by these people and the only way to do that was to gain their respect. I realized I needed to do their music better than them so as a kid I started challenging myself. I started listening to Bob Marley, Bigga Haitian and lots of reggae and hip-hop music; slowly I started to pick up parts and bits of

Our songs are for all the misfits in society. We deliver our music to all the souls that are searching for refuge. We wanted to give hope to all of those in struggle. ‘Killing me softly’ is about hearing the song that tell you exactly how hard it is to hear what you are going through. We use a lot of euphemism and metaphor in our songs to inadvertently provide a sense of security to everyone. I couldn’t be happier to hear that our songs are helping and sending the people a message. I wanted to spread our culture while doing this. I wanted people to identify themselves with our music and create this intercultural connection with each of us in order to help us break down all our language