According to you and to what we have been examined in the explanatory part, what does this line refer to? Clue: focus on the word "penitentiary".

These lines pose a critique towards societal impositions: Lamar feels irrelevant and deprived of any importance in American society. However, this feeling entirely depends on what white people have been telling him. Once again, double consciousness dominates the self.

As you may have gathered by now, Lamar's song has no filters: although he acknowledges the hierarchy that forces his community to remain "at the bottom of mankind", he does not feel inferior. On the contrary, he is proud of his identity and his African ancestry, so much as he does not hesitate in judging the oppressors.

Lamar's viewpoint is crystal clear: not only is there a social hierarchy in America, but also he identifies black as the ones "at the bottom". There is no possible equality in this scenario.

This sentence functions as an explanation of the previous one: Lamar claims that he may be experiencing life in a schizophrenic way but blames whites (the ideal interlocutors in this scenario) for it.

The. https://jamaicanpatwah.com/term/di/963

Again, these sentences make a parallel with "Gold comes rushing out the rivers straight into your hands": the all evoke the illusionary hopes and dreams of immigrants entering a new land and abandoning their own.

We should be familiar with this linguistic phenomenon by now, shouldn't we?

The's is not an actual English word. In this case, it is probable that the singer means there are.

In this verse, as well as in the previous one, 2Pac establishes a relation of identity between blackness, restriction and stress: being Black inevitably entails a heightened sense of danger, an alert about one's surroundings that can never falter without risking life itself. If this theme, closely related to the body, interests you, I recommend reading Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me, in which the author explores what being Black in 1990s Baltimore was like in a heartfelt letter to his son and, ultimately, to all members of the Black community.

Strapped means constricted. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/strapped#dictionary-entry-2

Here, the condemnation towards the lack of equality and straight-up racism in America is explicit.

Given what has been already noted on the previous song, do you remember what is the war on drugs? Which President of the United States promoted it?

It means "What does a mother have to do?" This verse alludes to what has been examined in the "Setting the scene" section: the single-parent families.

What topic, already mentioned in the discussion, does this sentence point to?

What 2Pac considered impossible actually occurred in 2009, when Barack Obama was elected President of the United States and then again in 2012, when he was reelected. Nevertheless, his presidency was filled with conspiracy theories (especially revolving around his being born in the Unites States) and controversies that tried to undermine the figure of the President. Ultimately, this may suggest that the United States was not ready for a black President.

At times, hopelessness alternates with a heartfelt responsability to take action and making changes to transform society once and for all.

Setting the scene: the song was recorded in 1992 and released six years later in 2Pac's posthumous album Greatest Hits. It features Talent, an R&B trio formed by Ernest “Bishop” Dixon, Marlon “Castor Troy” Hatcher and Keith “Casino” Murrell. As mentioned earlier, the song samples Bruce Hornsby and the Range's The Way It is and addresses the same social themes. A dive into the historical context: what happened in the 1990s? * A new President, the Democratic Bill Clinton, was elected and stayed in charge from 1993 to 2001. in 1996, he promoted the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act which restricted governmental assistance to families in distress. * In the early 1990s, the country entered a severe recession, which was apparently overcome by the mid-1990s. * Black businesses bloomed and Black celebrities (such as Micheal Jackson, Michal Jordan and Oprah Winfrey) started to appear and constituted the first "Black bourgeoisie". However, this was not the reality of common, middle or lower-class African-Americans: in some inner cities, between 30% and 43% of the population in poor neighborhoods (such as East New York, the South Bronx, South Central Los Angeles, Chicago's South Side) was jobless. Many of those "who had once held stable blue-color jobs, low-wage service jobs, such as in the fast-food industry" relied on occasional and informal activities (braiding hair, childcare, car repair...). * The abuse of drugs that had exploded the previous decade went on, especially among poors. * Mass incarceration persisted: in 1990, prisoners reached one million. "By 2000, one-third of all black males in their twenties were under the control of the criminal justice system—either in prison or jail, on parole, probation, or awaiting trial. The major reason for this disproportion in incarceration is the stark racism that continues to pervade the criminal justice system. […] The socio-economic and political consequences of mass incarceration for the black community have been profound. Hundreds of thousands of households have been destroyed". (https://www.amistadresource.org/the_future_in_the_present/social_and_economic_issues.html). As a consequence, in many instances, there were one-parent families: mothers were left to raise their children alone. https://www.amistadresource.org/the_future_in_the_present/social_and_economic_issues.html https://www.ncpedia.org/anchor/united-states-1990s#:~:text=Labor%20unions%20believed%20it%20would,countries%20with%20weak%20pollution%20controls

In Tupac's perspective, crime is a consequence of poverty. What do you think about it? Do you think crimes are response to people being unable to afford life?

Although in the previous verse, Huey Newton seems to be a source of inspiration for the singer, hope seems to be nowhere to be found in this verse. As any African-American, even Huey ends up being another victim of police brutality. Considering the bigger picture, it can be hypothesized that 2Pac was even questioning the actual impact and ideals that animated the Black Panther Party itself.

There is a missing word here: what is it? Clue: the following verb is in the present tense, so...

Do you notice anything strange in this line? For an answer, see the comment on the line "My mama didn't raise no fool".

In this disheartening scenario, 2Pac seeks refuge in the pleasant memories of an idealized childhood, which is perceived as the only moment in space and time where he may find solace.

In the society in which the narrative voice lives, both poverty and blackness have a negative connotation. In other words, being Black adds up to being poor.

This is directly connected to what has been said about the pervasiveness of drugs (of crack, in particular) among poor families.

Your.

The verb blast can have multiple meanings; in this case, the most probable is shoot (sparare in Italian) https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/blast#dictionary-entry-2

This linguistic phenomenon has already been analyzed in other song: what is it?

This last stanza again presents the theme of the lack of equality with an explicit reference to racism. In this case, Hornsby refers to unfair treatments and racial barriers in the work environment: white candidates are preferred over Black ones just for the color of their skin. The critique sharpens even more if we consider that it is contained in the same stanza in which there is a reference to the Civil Rights Act: the author places the two events - the Act and employment discrimination - on a line of continuity. In other words, it seems that since 1964 nothing has changed and discrimination lives on as bias and prejudice persist.

The possibility of changing becomes increasingly more evident in this part of the song, which gives shape to a conversation between a child and an old man. The resignation seems to belong to the viewpoint of the old man, whereas the child questions the very existence of the "rules" who discriminate them for the color of his skin ("you don't look like they do") and the origin of the authority of those who created them. At this point of the song, resignation seems to resemble a compliant attitude, which may be even benefitting from an injustice society. Notice that the singer evidently sides with the boy, ultimately converging his point of view with his own.

This first stanza describes a specific image: the songs opens with a symbolical "line" where people in distress are waiting to receive some help from the government.

Hornsby's posture seems clear: in these verses, he states that legal measures can only "go so far", that is, they can only operate up to a certain extent. He hints at the fact that another change has to occur: a cultural one. According to the author, indeed, equality can be achieved only in a co-constructive process that implicates the law on one side, and the culture on the other. In other words, what Hornsby is trying to state is that acts can be signed into law and assure people their rights, but it is equally important that people change their mindsets.

According to you, what is Bob Dylan criticizing in these verses?

Once again, Dylan calls for equality between Black and White people and (ironically) challenges the audience to specify the number of years that takes for someone to be free.

This is the opening of the song, which starts and procedes by asking multiple rhetorical questions to the listeners. In this case, Bob Dylan is calling into question the essence of humanity by describing an activity as simple as walking. The "roads" may hint at the long history of difficulties and hardships that Black people have experienced. The call to equality is unmistakable. https://www.litcharts.com/poetry/bob-dylan/blowin-in-the-wind

According to you, what makes us human?

Notice how the structure "before […] how many" is repeated throughout all the song. https://www.litcharts.com/poetry/bob-dylan/blowin-in-the-wind