I met Michael Dyson when he was a new professor and I was a fresh undergrad, and he's since moved to Harvard and Georgetown. He blew my hair back with his cutting-edge scholarship, incredible ability to adjust his speaking style to the crowd, and even -- yes -- ability to rap.
I once saw him in an academic conversation in 1990 when he started with a staid, academic answer that somehow flowed into a rendition of Snoop Dogg's song "Gin and Juice", then back to academic speech without breaking cadence. I still haven't wrapped my mind around that, and it's 2008. I wish they had YouTube back then.
