TEDYouth 2011
Carvens Lissaint: "Put the financial aid in the bag"
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At TEDYouth 2011, performance artist Carvens Lissaint shows how to use language, metaphor and imagery to express a powerful idea -- as in this spoken-word performance, a stirring plea to make college education more accessible.
Carvens Lissaint - Performance artist
Carvens Lissaint is a slam poet, performance artist, and member of the Hip Hopera Theater troupe. Full bio
Carvens Lissaint is a slam poet, performance artist, and member of the Hip Hopera Theater troupe. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
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I want everyone to put their hands on top of their head.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah. Put your hands on top of your head.
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Just relax. Just stay calm. Everything will be nice
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and smooth if you just participate and just relax, okay?
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Yeah. All right, now put your hands down.
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Don't be no hero. Put your hands down. Okay?
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All right. Now. Cool. Good.
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I want you to run all that financial aid.
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Yeah, sucka, put the scholarships in the bag, yeah, yeah.
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Put the scholarships in the bag. Yeah, you too, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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Yeah, you. Yeah, yeah. You over there, go put the Pell Grants in the bag.
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Put the Pell Grants in there too. Yeah, you. Go. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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You, go over to that booth and get me some of them subsidized, some of them subsidized loans.
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It ain't a game no more. I know you're hiding the money somewhere here.
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With all this tuition you got me and my homies payin' --
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Woo! -- I'm about to get gangster-scholar up in here.
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Up in here. I'm about to go N.W.A. meets Beastie Boys
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if I don't see the cash, man.
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Cause we're not gonna take it. ♪ Oh ...
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Oh, you thought I was playing.
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Oh, you thought this was a game. Back up, back up. Mind your business, that's all.
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What do you, think this is a game? What?
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Huh? You don't even know me.
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I'll say something else. Don't call me crazy.
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Do not call me -- Rives, tell 'em don't call me crazy before I go crazy.
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I'm telling you, now I'm about to go crazy. I'm about to go Tupac Thug Life in here.
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Like, "I ain't a killer but don't push me. Revenge is like the sweetest joy --" Woo!
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I'm about to go Biggie Smalls Brooklyn type, like,
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"Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis. When I was dead broke --"
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Woo! I'm about to go KRS-One
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cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs-type wild.
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Like, "Wa da da dang, wa da da da dang,
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listen to my nine millimeter go bang." You know what?
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You are dumb. You are really dumb.
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Hide your kids, hide your wife, 'cause we gettin' financial aid
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all up and in and around here. You think this is a game?
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You think I want to be out here doing this?
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Do you know how hard it was to find these guns?
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All right, I'm sorry. You understand?
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I'm just trying to get my education. You know what I mean?
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I'm just trying to fight for the opportunity that my great-great-great-grandfather died for, you know what I'm saying?
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You know how my ancestors did sit-ins,
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just so I can sit in a classroom.
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And all these years, all y'all been doing
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is strangling the life out of my bank statement,
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leaving my pockets as vacant as parking lots.
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Professor Willie Lynch taught you well, huh?
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Keep the body, take the money.
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Force feed my people deception and failure.
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Condition our brains to malfunction at the sight
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of success. Just keep the cycle going.
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Make us pay for an education that will end up failing us.
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Put us in debt so we're giving back
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the money we earned from our back-breaking work.
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This seems all too familiar.
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Sounds like the rust of shackles locking their way onto my degree.
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Sounds like the Thirteenth Amendment in reverse.
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Lecture halls shouldn't feel like cotton fields,
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shouldn't sound like muffled freedom songs trapped
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in the jaws of a generation's dreams. Oho! Oh, it all makes sense.
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Give us enough to get by but not enough to provide for ourselves.
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Keep us psychologically feeble so we lose our purpose in the process.
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Stop thieving our aspirations out of our sleep.
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Don't call it financial aid
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if you're not helping anyone with it.
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We have fought.
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We have fought way too hard
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to let green paper build a barricade in front of our futures.
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I will not let you potentially rob food out of my children's stomach.
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Best believe I'm going out blasting.
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I ain't no killer, but don't push me.
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I wish it didn't come to this, but I have to for my cousins
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in Haiti who don't even know what a college looks like,
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for my best friend Raymond sitting in cell block nine
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instead of a university,
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for the nooses hanging my GPA by its neck.
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There is no other option.
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There is no other way.
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Just, please, put the money in the bag.
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Put the money in the bag. I just want to go to school, man.
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I just want to get my education. I just want to learn. I just want to grow.
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Put the money in the bag, please.
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Just put the money in the bag.
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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Carvens Lissaint - Performance artistCarvens Lissaint is a slam poet, performance artist, and member of the Hip Hopera Theater troupe.
Why you should listen
Carvens Lissaint is a Haitian American performance artist. Raised in Upper West Side Harlem, New York, he lives in Washington Heights. He established himself as a spoken word artist in 2006 and went on to win multiple poetry slams across the country and coach award-winning teams. He made his transition into musical theater in 2007 as a part of the Hip Hopera Theater troupe, working with Edward A. Reynolds West Side High School in collaboration with the Metropolitan Theater Opera Guild. He also debuted his high-energy one-man show Walk (directed and co-developed by Queen God-Is, choreographed by Nicco Anann) at Dance Theater Workshop and off Broadway at the 2009 Hip Hop Theater Festival. Carvens lives, eats and breathes art hoping to share his light and become a better being of the Universe.
Carvens Lissaint | Speaker | TED.com