Youth take the lead: Digital poetry and the next generation

Abstract

Digital literacy projects offer an exciting means of engaging young people in poetry. Many such projects fall short of realising their full potential however, overlooking students' technological expertise and ability to learn from one another. Youth slam and spoken word () offers possibilities for developing these projects, making creative use of both new technologies and student‐centred learning techniques. 's artistic and didactic achievements demonstrate what young people can achieve if we relinquish our privileged positions as authoritative teachers/artists. This article considers how participants have used digital technologies to create innovative artworks, develop new notions of literacy and inspire their peers to explore their own artistic, socially engaged identities.

Key words:

• Poetry slam
• spoken word
• digital literacy
• student‐centred learning

Notes

1. Both this and the following quotation are from interviews with participants in the YSSW programme WordCup 2010. This programme and the investigation I conducted into it are described in greater detail later on in this article.

2. Unless otherwise indicated, the names of all participants quoted in this paper have been replaced with pseudonyms in order to protect their identities. Single quotation marks are used to indicate this substitution. Where quotation marks are absent, individuals’ real names have been used, either because the quotation is taken from a previously published text or because participants have requested that they be identified.

3. This quotation is taken from an article written by Taylor (2002) about the Respect Slam!, the forerunner to SLAMbassadors UK.

4. This term was coined by Kirkland (2009) to reference identities, in his engaging case study of young people's digital/online literacy practices.