What happens when a budding rapper combines his faith, a love of literature and a message of social justice? A historic thesis project is born. Last year Obasi Shaw made history as the first Harvard student to submit a rap album as an honors thesis. His album is called “Liminal Minds.” The album is his reflection on being black in America. It was also inspired by Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Canterbury Tales.” Obasi Shaw graduated summa cum laude minus from Harvard University in May 2017.
These days Obasi is a software engineer at Google in Seattle. He was recently promoted to Technical Program Manager and will be working on diversity-related initiatives at Google starting in September. He is currently working on a new album, release date pending.
Guest
- Obasi Shaw, rapper and creator of "Liminal Minds." Follow him on Twitter.
BONUS: Listen to "Liminal Minds" now! WARNING: This is the unedited version of his album, so it does contain profanity.
