Examining Culture, Performance & Spoken Word
Explores the form, function and content of Spoken Word, in terms of language, rhythm, historical developments, social- political contexts, as well as key artists of poetry, rap, dub, slam, lyricism and spoken word as live and direct purveyors of culture. By examining performance as text and artist/creator narratives, commentaries and cultural discourse, students survey the continuum through African storytelling traditions to contemporary global evolutions of lyricism and spoken word. Students explore the varied modes of oral/aural dissemination – including the stage, the page, audio recording, theatre, film and digital media – and analyze orality and voice as tools of cultural affirmation and resistance. The course includes a writing/performance intensive component.
Meet the Founder
MOTION is an award-winning screenwriter, playwright, poet and emcee. Her work has been featured across Canada, the U.S, Caribbean, Europe and Africa. She is a writer and Supervising Producer on TV series Coroner (CBC/CW), Diggstown (CBC/FOX) and The Porter (CBC/BET), and co-writer of the Canadian Academy Screen Award-winning feature film Akilla’s Escape with director Charles Officer, which premiered at TIFF 2020. She is also a writer and Co-Executive Producer on Revenge of the Black Best Friend (CBC Gem). She is an alumna of the Canadian Film Centre, writer of Oraltorio: A Theatrical Mixtape, author of poetry collections Motion in Poetry and 40 Dayz (Women’s Press), and creator and Course Director of Griots to Emcees: Culture, Performance & Spoken Word at York University.