Insights and Reflections From Teaching Hip-Hop-Based Spoken Word Poetry for Social Justice

• In Event: 32.083 - Roundtable Session 12
  In Roundtable Session: 32.083-3 - Culturally Responsive Praxis Across Sites of Education

Abstract

This paper offers insights into the instructional and relational challenges cultural outsiders may face when attempting to use hip-hop pedagogies for social justice. Drawing on collaborative self-study research conducted by a Black, male teacher educator and two White female reading specialists who co-teach spoken word poetry workshops in urban middle schools, we argue: 1) teachers with limited cultural and content knowledge of hip-hop may struggle to negotiate real and perceived curricular constraints, 2) the intersections of teachers’ racial, cultural, and gender identities informed their respective practices and behaviors in a number of interesting ways, and 3) using hip-hop pedagogies for social justice in traditional school contexts requires a delicate balance of both transparency and discretion.

Author

• H. Bernard Hall, West Chester University of Pennsylvania