Despite high levels of disengagement in urban literacy
classrooms, few teachers have seen fit to explore spoken word – the
performance of poetry – as a tool to engage students in literacy. Spoken word
poetry serves as a powerful means of self-representation for youth that are
traditionally portrayed as threatening, menaces to society that do not know
how to productively manage their temperaments. Drawing on prior, spoken
word, poetry research in education, the article examines the impact of a
performance poetry unit on students’ critical thinking, literacy and voice from
the perspective of a teacher/researcher in an urban classroom. Bridging the
critical and the performance aspects of spoken word poetry in a South Los
Angeles high school composition classroom, this article offers a concrete
example of this praxis and reports on a curriculum project that empowered
students to examine issues of privilege, social control and oppression in U.S.
society. The article concludes with pedagogical implications for using, and
going beyond, performance poetry as a teaching tool for creating studentcentred,
critical discursive spaces in schools.