Teaching 'Romeo and Juliet' with Pop Culture

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Every year I introduce Year 10 students to their first Shakespearean play, Romeo and Juliet. They love the quick, witty conversations between the characters, the intense fight scenes in the streets and of course, the young and tragic love. While students always enjoy reading the script aloud in class and imagining the scenes, introducing popular culture into the study of the famous play can aid students in analysing the story in a new context. By using pop culture texts like films, YA fiction and songs, "we make Shakespeare's young lovers speak to our current understanding of youth culture" (Conaway, 2011). While students enjoy reading the story in the context of the Renaissance, they often relate more to the play if it is retold a new way. Conaway (2011) writes that "popular music and films...have helped to make Romeo and Juliet our contemporaries" by helping students to see them as young lovers, but also youth who endure conflict and rebel against their parents' requirements.

In an effort to introduce Romeo and Juliet in a new and more relevant way, I've compiled a list of contemporary texts teachers can use to provide modern versions of the tragic play for their students to analyse and compare with the original play.

Songs

Check Yes Juliet, by We the Kings

Love Story, by Taylor Swift

Romeo and Juliet, The Killers' take on the Dire Straits' original

No Romeo No Juliet ft. Chris Brown, by 50 Cent

Enchanted, by Taylor Swift

We Found Love, by Rihanna

Star Crossed Lovers, by De/vision

And a simple search of the lyrics "Romeo and Juliet" provide lots of songs for students to pick from.

Classic Interpretation Films

Romeo & Juliet (2013) directed by Carlo Carlei, starring Hailee Steinfeld and Douglas Booth

Romeo + Juliet (1996) directed by Baz Luhrmann, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes

Romeo and Juliet (1968) directed by Franco Zeffirelli, starring Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey

Adaptation Films

West Side Story (1961) directed by Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise, starring Natalie Wood and George Chakiris

Warm Bodies (2013) directed by Jonathan Levine, starring Nicholas Hoult and Teresa Palmer

Romeo Must Die (2000) directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak, starring Jet Li and Aaliyah

And perhaps Disney's Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Little Mermaid and Lady and the Tramp also have elements of the Shakespearean play as well.

YA Novels

Son of the Mob by Gordon Korman

Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell

Still Star-Crossed by Melinda Taub

The Fault in our Stars by John Green

Juliet Immortal by Stacey Jay

Saving Juliet by Suzanne Selfors

And of course searching in Goodread's Listopia for "Romeo and Juliet" books produces hundreds of books which parallel the story.

Using pop culture texts when teaching Romeo and Juliet helps to keep the text relevant and fresh to students who may get bogged down in Shakespearean prose. There are not only songs, films and novels but also graphic novels like Classical Comics, podcasts like NPR's Season One of Serial and cartoons like Gnomeo and Juliet. Whatever suits your class' individual needs, as all interpretations of the classic play can be "valid and stimulating; they should be able to live alongside" the original play to "support his incarnation of the poetry" (Hamilton, 2000). Whatever method one uses, it is important only to engage students and keep them interested in the timeless story so that they can better understand Shakespeare's original work.

References

Conaway, C. (2011). Teaching Romeo and Juliet in and against Modern Popular Culture. Retrieved from http://www.thisroughmagic.org/conaway%20article.html

Hamilton, L. (2000). Baz vs. the bardolaters, or why "william shakespeare's romeo + juliet" deserves another look. Literature/Film Quarterly, 28(2), 118-124. Retrieved from http://gateway.library.qut.edu.au/login?url=http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/2034602?accountid=13380