1) The first step is to gather some background information about “protest songs”. Check these websites and try to define briefly
what a protest song is.
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_song : read the first paragraph and give your own
definition.
- http://folkmusic.about.com/od/toptens/tp/CivilRightsSong.htm : name two or three
famous civil rights movement protest songs.
- http://folkmusic.about.com/od/toptens/tp/Top10Protest.htm : name two or three famous
anti-war protest songs.
2) The second step is to choose one song of these songs to work on and find information about it to report to the class.
Your mission is to talk about a singer and his or her protest song: you will have to tell the class what
you have found about this singer, the context of his or her song and its
message AND why you have chosen this particular song.
- have a look at the websites selected for the song you have chosen and note down the information about the song you have chosen on your
worksheet.
a/ Joan Baez: ‘We shall overcome’
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x10s93_joan-baez-we-shall-overcome_music#rel-page-1
http://www.k-state.edu/english/nelp/american.studies.s98/we.shall.overcome.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Shall_Overcome
http://hubpages.com/hub/The-Best-10-Protest-Songs
http://folkmusic.about.com/od/toptens/tp/CivilRightsSong.htm
d/ Bob Marley: ‘Get up stand up’
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xta3k_bob-marley-get-up-stand-up_music
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/b/bob+marley/get+up+stand+up_20021743.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Marley
http://www.spinner.com/2007/07/13/20-protest-songs-that-mattered-no-20/
http://www.musicbanter.com/lyrics/Bob-Marley-The-Wailers-Get-Up-Stand-Up.html
e/ Last, but not least, an Irish song this time. This one is much more recent song, by the Cranberries: ‘Zombie’:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xlcoxh_the-cranberries-zombie_music
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/cranberries/zombie.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zombie_%28song%29
http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=3168
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles
3) The third and final step is to complete your worksheet with further background information about the civil rights movement, the Vietnam war or the Troubles in Ireland (for Ireland, the context is much more complex so you are allowed to have a look at a French website) and to prepare to present your result to the class. You will have to tell the class about the song you’ve chosen and to justify why you’ve chosen this one.
If you need some more information on the context, these websites might come in useful:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_rights_movement
http://www.lonestar.edu/library/kin_music3.htm
http://www.sfheart.com/protest/index1.html
Cette "webquest" a en partie été conçue à partir de quelques éléments trouvés sur le site
http://englishingambier.over-blog.com/article-30797685.html
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