This Monday I will be starting a Hip Hop Workshop with 10^th graders at Ben Carson high school in Detroit. We will be focusing our first session on the song, “Diamonds From Sierra Leone Remix” by Kanye West and Jay-Z. This is an adapted version of the original, “Diamonds From Sierra Leone” on Kanye’s sophomore album Late Registration. As a bonus track, the remix features Kanye’s career mentor, partner and closest friend Jay-Z, and serves as a testament to the continued success of their joint label, Roc-a-fella records. The song’s instrumental appears a third time on a mixtape by fellow Chicago rapper Lupe Fiasco, who adds his own perspective to the theme of Diamonds. All three versions are equally impressive (the joint Kanye/Jay-Z one may reign supreme), but are drastically different in tone and message.

Kanye’s original version revolves solely around his feud with Vibe, a magazine that rated his first album worse than Kanye felt was deserved. He uses the theme of Diamonds to relate to the famous hand sign of Roc-a-fella records, and uses this track practically as an autobiography. This song epitomizes why Kanye West is always the subject of much debate; his unrestrained ego is evident in every single line, but the diction is so well crafted, the flow so well delivered and the word play so intricate that it is impossible not to be a fan of this song. Yes, he’s a self-centered ass, but maybe it’s warranted.

On the remix, however, Kanye takes a much more laudable approach to the premise of the sample. He uses the first verse to explain his inner conflict between perpetuating a loved and enjoyable passion for buying expensive jewelry, and his knowledge that these jewels may conflict diamonds. These conflict, or blood diamonds, are being mined in many West African countries (including Sierra Leone) by men, women and children in war zones. Kanye’s insecurity about this issue candidly shines through his lyrics; it is an extremely critical and horrendous problem, and Kanye is struck with the knowledge he may be funding it. Interestingly, Jay-Z’s verse could not be more different. He adopts the same themes prevalent in Kanye’s original version, rapping about the continued vitality of his record label and his own career. This verse is famous for the lines, “I’m not a businessman/I’m a business, man!/Let me handle my business, damn.” With utter confidence, brilliance and swag, Jay-Z establishes himself as the forerunner of Hip Hop.

Finally, Lupe Fiasco chimes in on this beat, and continues Kanye’s insight into the subject of blood diamonds. He dedicates the entire track to the history and contemporary relevance to the diamond trade, and like Kanye, struggles with his role in the system. He too feels conflicted by the pressure of his culture and profession to flaunt expensive jewelry, even though he is cognizant of the ramifications of the trade. All three accounts merit a listen; while they vary in content they are similar in flow, lyricism and skill.

If you’re not familiar with the term, it’s when people dress up as characters, especially characters from video games. This may seem harmless. Until this happens.

Yeah.

Let’s face it. Video games are sexist. This may be because they cater to a group of adolescent boys who have not yet ventured completely into the world of the opposite sex and have based their knowledge of romance and women on what they learn from the media. And cosplay, at least in this form, only reinforces the sexism.

I have read many defenses of cosplay. It’s for fun. It means nothing. It’s an art form. Well, yes. Everything, in a way, is art, right? That, in no way, excuses and justifies blatant misogyny.

And don’t give me bullshit about these women are simply embracing themselves and their bodies and their sexy sides or some moronic excuse like that. If the woman in the above picture was obese, would she have received the overwhelming popularity that she has? Would she be celebrated as a woman simply celebrating her body? Women who feel the need to dress like this are adopting the sexist construct of beauty in order to feel valued.

The woman in that picture is Jessica Nigri, in case you were wondering/you wanted to Google more pics of her. She makes her own costumes and does this on her own time. But that doesn’t meant that the art form she is participating in deserves merit. Art has connotations of purity and an almost untouchable nobility but I beg to differ. This is art but at the same time, it’s disgusting.

And NO, I’m not slut-shaming. I’m not commenting on what she’s wearing and telling her not to wear it. I’m just begging people not to adhere to a fucked up notion of beauty.

-End rant-

Google Maps is a universal resource for finding restaurants and friends’ houses, for ensuring we can drive from Illinois to Colorado without somehow ending up in Connecticut. How many countries does Zimbabwe border? Where in the world is Hvolsvöllur? And, naturally, street view is the patron saint of identifying shady areas in unfamiliar cities. But outside of pure practical functionality, Google Maps also carries with it a great potential for other uses.

The thing about the street and satellite views is that they are, plain and simple, massive, nearly inexhaustible visual resources. Ninety-eight percent of the time, you will see nothing out of the ordinary. But every here and there are gems. While puttering around in street view, one comes upon single frames with colorful digital aberrations, misaligned shots. Outside a police station, the view is suddenly blocked by seagulls and one bird, right up in front of the lens, is carrying a giant log of food. I’ve begun curating screenshots of interesting things. It’s found art, of a sort.

Spotting low-flying airplanes from an aerial perspective provides another pastime— one was a plane so close I’d mistaken it for an airport icon; another could only be found by the shadow it cast on the ground. Planes and the like aren’t anything out of the oddslot tips ordinary, but unlike much of the everyday activity one expects to see captured, some things are strangely absent.

Street view, in fact, gave rise to MapCrunch, which drops users in street view in random global locations (which was subsequently crashed by an influx of traffic last year from a mostly fruitless game involving finding one’s way to airports from random, unmarked locations). It generates locations at which one would never think to look, and while the majority of images are perfectly mundane, the randomization allows people to turn up rows of dilapidated stonework houses, slopes of silvering foliage, cattle standing in the road.

These tools can provide hours of recreational exploration, transporting you to far-flung locales and hidden side streets, remote mountain roads and surprises smack dab in the middle of the busiest intersection. We’ve grown so used to using maps as utilitarian resources, practical and straightforward, that sometimes we forget that there is much more to be seen.

Update: Aaron Hobson has a haunting collection here.

Who knew that while buried nose-deep in LSAT books I would find some solace in reading comprehension sections based on art history? Studying for the LSAT has been one of those chores I have to do, but keep putting off, surmounting in misery at each and every of my attempts to study. Recently, however, I have been overjoyed at finding passages based on art – discussing impressionism, realism, and cubism. While the exam itself is arduous, I am finding tremendous pleasure in these passages – the time flies and magically I get every answer right. Slowly, I am beginning to realize that, no matter what situation I am in, whether studying law or medicine, in class or at the doctor’s office, as long as there is a little bit of art, I will be just a little bit happier than I otherwise would be.

And thus, I now have decided that I will have a file of my favorite paintings with me at all times. Or, well, images of my favorite works on my iphone, ipad, computer…you get the idea. Life without art? I’d say no, thanks!