Young People, Musical Theatre and Identity

The transition into adulthood presents an increasingly complex range of concrete and psychological barriers for young people. At a time in their lives when self-definition and community-identity are key to self-actualisation, formal education marginalises creativity and is driven by economic imperatives, with young people at the sharp end of a global mental health crisis. Meanwhile, in school and out, musical theatre persists as a dominant participatory form, with a heavy reliance on conventional productions of a limited canon of commercial musicals. Rarely does this accessible and popular form effectively examine the identities of non-normative contemporary young people, nor is it created through inclusive methodologies. In this chapter, the author explores how his creation of the script for the youth musical Something Inside So Strong, based on the songs of songwriter and activist Labi Siffre, sought to address how non-normative identity and a sense of community resilience can be developed. The process of this practice-as-research created fresh insights into the positionality of the artist-teacher, the relationship between collaborative dramaturgy and intersectionality and the challenges and limitations of both formal and informal education.