***Actually, I once had a rather surprising experience doing a theatre class with a bunch of young teen students. We were looking at "You've Got To Be Carefully Taught," and some of the students thought the song was racist (instead of anti-racist). I was caught off-guard by this. But in discussing the issue further, I realized that they were hearing the message of the song the wrong way, due to the way the lyrics are naturally accented. In other words, they were hearing "you've GOT to be taught" (i.e. "this is what you HAVE to do") as opposed to "you've got to be TAUGHT" (i.e. this is how it happens, by being taught). Once they understood that the key word was "taught" and not "got," they changed their opinion of the song. ***
That seems rather surprising to me, since "taught" is accented as much as "got" almost every time it comes around in the song. I would think the issue was more that the students didn't initially understand the bitter irony of the song. Of course, it helps a lot of the song is experienced in context, in terms of how it's set up in the show. I'm guessing maybe you were examining the song in isolation and out of context, at least initially, and that may also have had a lot to do with the students' misinterpretation. |
