This week, I’ve begun my third stint in the Rhodes Institute for Regional Studies. RIRS is an innovative summer program in which Rhodes’ best and brightest students get to create their own independent research projects (each of which has some relation to the region) and work with one faculty member for eight weeks to complete it. The projects span a really incredible range of topics and disciplines and the close-contact, collaborative and intensive environment in which we work all summer is exciting. My favorite part of RIRS, however, is the first week, when we give our research Fellows a crash-course in Memphis culture, history, politics and arts. For five straight days, we have the Fellows all day long– and even a couple of nights– which can be a bit overwhelming and exhausting, but which inevitably makes for some incredible conversations and experiences.
I mention this today for two reasons: First, because “Memphis Week” of RIRS is really exhausting. Therefore, today’s entry on my song-pick from the 90s will be brief. Second, because it just so happens that as a result of this being “Memphis Week,” I’ve spend all day for the last couple of days with a bunch of young people who were born in the 90s. Several times today, as I was chatting with some of them, I wondered to myself what they would pick as “the” song of the decade in which they were born.
I feel fairly confident that it wouldn’t be this. Here’s my pick, Boyz II Men‘s (1992) “End of the Road”:
I know it’s cheesy. I am aware that I have chosen a boy-band. But I can’t help myself, I loved Boyz II Men then and I still do now.
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Nostalgic? Check out my Day 11 entry from the 2011 version of the 30 Day Song Challenge.