What relevance does Shakespeare have for young people today?
Shakespeare is about English classrooms, poetry, the ‘Royal’ Shakespeare Company, essay writing, exams and posh people, right?
Wrong!
The Hip Hop Shakespeare sent two practitioners to work with students at Abbotsholme School on Thursday 29th April. The workshops were about exploring the connections between Shakespeare and the themes and ideas relevant to young people today, as often expressed through Hip Hop lyrics. The practitioner’s aims were to enable the students to realise that Shakespeare was writing for the people of his time and that many of his ideas are appropriate in today’s society. Perhaps more importantly, the tradition of using metaphorical language, imagery and rhyme to connect with the beating heart of youth culture is predominant in both Shakespeare and Hip Hop (even though young people may not have made the link ever before!)
All of Year 10 and all of Year 11 were fortunate enough to work with Loriane and Malachi from the Hip Hop Shakespeare Company. They started with some warm up activities and then a tricky lyrics quiz. You would not believe how challenging it is to categorise the lyrics of Jay Z and other Hip Hop artists and actually tell the difference between their lyrics and some of Shakespeare’s own lines. In fact, despite being familiar with some of the lyrics, the students found it difficult to decide what was Shakespeare and what was Hip Hop!! The fact is that both Hip Hop and Shakespeare deal with issues such as revenge, hatred, anger and love, and they both use lyrical imagery to convey their point of view, so without the music, it is difficult to separate them.
After a demonstration of a Sonnet 16 set to a Hip Hop beat, the students had to set some of Shakespeare’s words to a beat in their own groups. They became familiar with the Iambic Pentameter rhyme scheme and its function within the rhythmical beat of Shakespeare’s language.
William Shakespeare - Sonnet #18
Shall I compare thee to a Summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And Summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And oft' is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd:
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Finally, the students had the opportunity to write their own rap or poem and perform this in front of their peers. In the words of one student ‘some of the poems were surprisingly great’! It wasn’t surprising for the teachers! The students had really engaged with the themes and ideas, participated enthusiastically in the workshop and Loriane and malachi had provided them with the inspiration they needed to step out of their comfort zone and write some beautiful words on the page…and then perform to their audience.
This was a fantastic day for all involved. Loriane and Malachi enjoyed working with the Abbotsholme students, the students explored some new creative avenues and the teachers appreciate that the students’ new knowledge and understanding of iambic pentameter, rhythm and the social context of Shakespeare will benefit future coursework. Perhaps the Year 10 and 11 students will also realise that, if Shakespeare were alive today, perhaps he would have been a rapper.