“Telling Our Stories” Teen Series to begin with Spoken Word Poetry

Poet and teaching artist Ephraim Nehemiah. 

Shore Cultural Centre will begin a literary based series for teens called “Telling Our Stories”. Shore is proud to be collaborating with Twelve Literary Arts on the first Spoken Word Poetry workshop. Twelve Literary Arts is an inter-generational teaching, learning, and professional development incubator for poets, writers, and performance artists located in Cleveland.

Teaching artist Ephraim Nehemiah will work with the youth to help them write and perform poems for a live audience. Students will be provided unique, existential writing prompts to inspire their process. Students also will be introduced to literary techniques and literary heroes/heroines that may influence the development of their individual voices. Strong writing forms the backbone of this course, but youth will also be introduced to performance techniques and exercises and that will take their literary expression to another level. The workshop is for youth in 9th-12th grade with beginning to advanced writing level and will run February 23th through March 30th on Saturdays 1-3pm. It is $50.00 for the full session. Registration information is online at www.shoreculturalcentre. You may register in advance to assure your place in the workshop, or you may attend the first open session on Saturday, February 23rd, during the Lake Erie Folk Festival for free prior to making a commitment. 

Ephraim Nehemiah’s poetry uses rhythmic call and response, evocative narratives and accessible subject matter to create a transformative experience for listeners across the nation. Ephraim is currently a program director and teaching artist at Twelve Literary Arts, and serves as the coach of top 10 nationally-ranked teams that competed at Brave New Voices and the College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational respectively. A finalist in several regional and national competitions such as 2017 Individual World Poetry Slam and 2018 Rustbelt Poetry Slam, Ephraim has also performed in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, The Cleveland Foundation, TEDx Talks, Button Poetry, the Saul William's World tour and others. 

For more information on this program, visit www.shoreculturalcentre.com or call Chris Cipriani at 216-289-8578. Shore Cultural Centre is located at 291 E. 222nd Street in Euclid, Ohio.