Michael Eric Dyson Quotes

63 quotes in 1320 categories

• He was not hip-hop's most gifted emcee. Still, Shakur may be the most influential and compelling rapper of them all, he was more than the…
• Gangsta rap often reaches higher than its ugliest, lowest common denominator, misogyny, violence, materialism and sexual transgression are not its exclusive domain. At its best,…
• The writer's gift can make us see ourselves and our morals differently than our reality suggests.
• The language of faith is crucial because it affords human beings the privilege of intimacy with the ultimate.
• Justice is what love sounds like when it speaks in public.
• Tony Morrison said, 'Can't I love what I criticize, criticize what I love.'
• There is no conscious choice of heterosexual identity any more than there is a homosexual one. The last person in the world who wants to…
• There's a dark underside to philanthropy. People who give a bunch of money are deferred to, even when they are wrong. The emperor cannot be…
• When Dr. King was murdered, I had no idea who he was. But as soon as I heard his words on television that night when…
• When you look at a guy like a Jay-Z or look at a guy like a Nas, you don't necessarily qualify them as conscious rap…
• You cannot hear the name Martin Luther King, Jr., and not think of death. You might hear the words 'I have a dream,' but they…
• We can't exempt ourselves from the same moral calculus that we are willing to apply to others.
• Hip-hop has globalized a conception of blackness that has had a political impact, whether or not it had a political intent.
• Hip-hop is about the brilliance of pavement poetry.
• I don't think you can bury words. I think the more you try to dismiss them, the more power you give to them, the more…
• I don't worship the Bible, I worship the God who gave the Bible.
• I have no interest in romanticizing poor black people, having been one of them myself in our beloved hometown of Detroit.
• I used to tell people when I preached at a church, 'If you want a great sermon, be a great audience.'
• I went to a segregated school; I was born a Negro, not a black man.
• My ambition didn't grow out of nowhere. It was planted in me by a community that nurtured me.

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