This project is in line with the Institut Pierre Werner’s slam educational activities, in particular the 2021 Teen Poetry Slam project. Giving young people a voice and developing pupils’ confidence in using a language were the aims of the ‘A voix haute – Lautsprecher’ project.

In a series of slam workshops, young people aged between 14 and 18 were asked to write lyrically on the theme of “peace”, a subject chosen together before the project began. They were coached in writing and presenting their texts by professional slam poets Bas Böttcher and Florian Cieslik on the German side and Ozarm and Ayun on the French side.

Slam texts are made up of three equally important elements: idea, text and performance. In the workshops, the pupils learned techniques for finding ideas for their own literary texts, writing techniques and practical exercises for presenting them on stage. To bring the project to a close, some of them were able to present their creations at a public performance evening, where they had the chance to hear what the audience had to say. It’s an exercise that requires a lot of courage and self-confidence.