10^th OCTOBER 2011

"MEN ARE" by THE JOEYS _ TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

Men are, men are, men are.

Men are strong

Men are tough

Men are surely, men are rough

Men have mates

Men drink beer

Men are brave and don't show fear

This is an extract from the rap "Men Are" by The Joeys, an Australian band. By the title "Men Are", you can understand that the song may be a description of men's characteristics and behaviours. This extract is made of seven short lines.

In the first four ones the text talks about  men are and their features. Instead from line five to seven it describes  their passions and habits. The descriptions are only made by adjectives. They are arranged into very short lines to express true and incontestable facts, they are definitions which do not need explanations.

In the whole song there is an anaphoric use of the words "men are". In the first line this repetition gives the idea that the speaker is thinking about men trying to describe them in the most complete way. In lines three and four, six and seven, there is a rime between the words "tough", "rough" and "beer", "fear". They make the rap more fluent. The language is of everyday life, with simple and common expressions.

From the first line to the end, the focus of the song is on  men. The speaker gives always  more informations about them and each adjective makes this description more complete and exact.