Angst vs. Optimism in Music Video – An Invitation to Philosophy

Is the world a dark, depressing slide into chaos or a beautiful, bright ascent into joy?  The following music videos provide an audiovisual starting point for students to discuss angst and optimism.  After showing the videos, invite students to comment on these two approaches to life, and to grapple with their own life philosophy.

You might show these videos in pairs, one optimistic and one pessimistic, and ask students to state in one sentence how they interpret the artists’ messages.  Or, you could play a couple of songs and ask students if they think the music and the videos express a positive outlook on the future or a negative one.

Once the class has discussed the songs, have them write a paper expressing their own thoughts about the future.  Where are we headed as a nation? A civilization? A species?

You could also ask the question, How optimistic is the music you listen to?  Is the music on the radio optimistic, pessimistic or an equal balance of both?  Then have them find a list of the top 100 singles and sort them into two columns to see if their prediction was correct.

Here are the videos, in no particular order:

Matchbox 20 -  How Far We’ve Come 

Louis Armstrong – What a Wonderful World:

Billy Joel -  We Didn’t Start the Fire:

Goo Goo Dolls – Better Days:

Five for Fighting – 100 Years:

Switchfoot – Stars:

Green Day – Good Riddance (Time of Your Life): This would also make for a good lesson in irony

Connie Talbot – Over the Rainbow: