Mos Def: A Poet, Lyricist, and Actor

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Our group chose the man known by many in the hip-hop world as Mos Def. He is known for being a superb lyricist, poet, and actor. We are doing two of his works named “Hip-Hop” from off his album Black on Both Sides and a poem he wrote regards to the Barclays Center named “On center.stadium.status”. Before I talk about these two works of art, let me give a brief background on Mos Def.
Mos Def parents named him Dante Terrell Smith on the 11th of December in 1973. He was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Mos def is one of 12 siblings which included step-siblings. Mos Def and several of his siblings lived with his mother in Brooklyn. The rest went on to live with their father in New Jersey. He grew up in New York City when crack became the big drug market in the 80s, during which he became beleaguered by the violence, addiction and crime but he never succumbed to its influences. At nine years old he began to love theater and hip-hop. According to “Mos Def Biography” on Bio.com, his first play was in the fifth grade, a school production, “Free to Be….You and Me” and during his freshman year in high school he got his first professional acting role in the TV movie God Bless the Child. His senior year he won a recurring role on the TV series You Take the Kids. A year later he landed a role on The Cosby Mysteries. According to IMDb Mos Def is a vegetarian and in September 2011, he announced that he has adopted the name Yasiin Bey and will discontinue using the name Mos Def by the end of the year. He is also been known as Pretty Flaco, Flaco Bey, The Mighty Mos Def, and Bezé.
According to Gale’s Biography in Context of Mos Def, in his early 20s, he changed his name to Mos Def, which is short for his favorite affirmation--"most definite...

... middle of paper ...

...s; "My work is a reflection of the human condition," Mos Def says. "I don't want to hurt anybody. I don't want to mislead people. I want to tell the truth. All my songs are not happy. Some of them are even aggressive—some may say mean, but we all experience these feelings in life. I'm just being honest about what I feel and what sounds and ideas were motivating me at the time.". Which in conclusion, I feel this quote summed up everything about Mos Def because all he wanted to do is get the truth out there to us and let it be known, whether it is good or bad is up to us to decide.

Works Cited
"About Mos Def." MTV Artists. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013.
"Biography." IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013.
"Mos Def." Newsmakers. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Biography in Context. Web. 7 Dec. 2013.
"Mos Def Biography." Bio.com. A&E Networks Television, n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013.

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