“My main goal is to make people laugh and
give them a great entertainment experience,”
Brinkman wrote in an email to SAiA. “My
secondary goal is to make them think and challenge them to see the deeper links between
seemingly unrelated subjects and ideas, and
to instill in them a deep appreciation for the
power of natural selection and the scientific
method. But I can only reach them in the first
place if I make them laugh and entertain them,
which is what separates a comedy rap theatre
show from a traditional lecture or textbook.”
Brinkman travels to schools globally to perform The Rap Guide and has taken his show on
tour to places along the East Coast, Canada,
and most recently, Norway. Most of the areas
he tours teach Darwinian Theory openly, but
of course, delivering a heated topic is bound to
get some backlash, especially when performed
in places that are generally more conservative.
Brinkman is very open to criticism:
“If no one criticized what I said or did, then
I wouldn’t have done a good job of communicating a scientific field that is inherently controversial,” Brinkman said. “At the end of the
day, it’s impossible to avoid offending everyone,
because some people are offended by banality
and equivocation while others are offended by a
disregard for the facts, so the best one can do is
try to offend people for the right reasons. The
show is deliberately provocative because in my
view, provoking emotions is also the best way to
be thought-provoking, but I acknowledge that’s
a stylistic choice on my part.”
The Rap Guide is heavily influenced by 90s
hip-hop artists like Mobb Deep and Biggie
Smalls, whose songs frequently describe thriving in dangerous, competitive environments
such as NYC housing projects. Brinkman uses
songs from these artists, including “Survival of
the Fittest” and “Hypnotize,” to suggest how
social issues like homicide and teen pregnancy
could be understandable through an evolutionary lens.
The show also tackles questions about evolved
sex differences in behavior. For instance, Brinkman states that female mate choice is a more
powerful evolutionary force in nature than male
mate choice, so women hold a greater power in
shaping the future of the species through their
mate choices. Brinkman has also found that
this gets The Rap Guide some backlash as well:
SciArt in America April 2014
“[in this case the show] is politically rather than
religiously controversial, although it shouldn’t
be. If there are facts to discover about evolved
differences in preference or predisposition, I
don’t see how those facts would jeopardize the
case for equality of rights or opportunities.”
But for every naysayer, both teachers and
students alike comment on how much easier
it is to understand evolution and the intricacies of hip-hop culture after listening to The
Rap Guide and working with Brinkman. Many
of his website’s Teacher Testimonials point out
how students are enlivened with a new passion
because hard-to-communicate topics have been
delivered to them in a way they can grasp and
work with.
Brinkman is also making a documentary on
The Rap Guide to Evolution called Darwin’s America, which will be filmed in the American South,
where the teaching of evolution in schools is
most hotly contested. “The idea behind Darwin’s America is to bring the show to places
where most people don’t believe in evolution
and get a sense of how they react to the performance,” Brinkman said, “and also [of] whether
I can prompt them to think differently about it
and maybe accept some of the science.”
Brinkman is taking the show to Bible-belt
states including Mississippi, Texas, Tennessee,
Oklahoma, Alabama, and Missouri and will be
doing a whole series of shows for both schools
and the public.
“Wherever we can get a crowd together.
In one of the scenes, I play dodge ball with a
bunch of Southern students, a kind of Evolution vs. Creationism elimination tournament.
It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while, and
now I have a great production company to work
with on it, so it’s an exciting time.”
The Rap Guide to Evolution has won the Scotsman Fringe First Award in Edinburgh, has been
nominated for a Drama Desk Award off-Broadway, and reviewed by The New York Times, The
New York Post, and Time Out New York. Listen
to his TEDxSMU talk about The Rap Guide to
Evolution.
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