Stan... Eminem's father figure.

According to the Eminem’s song “Stan” and its video there are many reasons I can understand now the context and the situation of the American youth. In the beginning the rap or hip-hop was considered as black music, but things change and this genre was not the exception. One of the main characteristic about rap or hip-hop music in African Americans is the lack of a father figure, most of the rap singers mention in their songs things related to that fact. Nevertheless, other reasons and facts influence hardly to the youth to take this musical preference and musical production. In some cases the teenagers don’t have someone who tells them what is correct or what not and in some way, they do what they want.

In the case of Eminem, who is one of the most important white rap singers nowadays, it’s very curious to understand or think about the reason why he is very popular and admired from many thousands of teenagers. He is called like “wigga”, what means nigga (African American word which is forbidden in the USA), but

with w to mean white. He seems to understand the logic of the themes which compose the lyrics of the rap songs. In his son “Stan” one of the main characteristic which was very clear was the absence of the father figure and it seems to be something which is passed from one generation to another; if like it was damnation. In the video, the teenager who wrote him a letter explaining him his situation and telling also the enormous love he had for him, we can see the importance of some artist can be to one fan. The fact Stan had many or lots of Eminem’s posters in his home shows something really interesting and it’s the way in which most American teenagers can see one artist as their father. The psychological pain in the American society about the lack of father is very important and one of the forms in which they can feel identified. In some part of the song, it’s mention the thing that Stan’s girlfriend is jealous from Eminem because all the time Stan is talking about him, and then we can think that exists a kind of love in a sexual way to Eminem from Stan. I think that happens is because Freud’s theory of Edipo’s complex, in which the children fall in love with their parents. I associated that Stan fan love to Eminem, he saw a father figure in Eminem and he again feels identified with the psychological problem of the absence of father figure.