Why Shakespeare Should Not Be Taught in High Schools Anymore
Shakespeare's work should no longer be taught in high schools. The first reason is due to
the violence of many of his plays and the negative messages it portrays to young high school
students. The second reason is Shakespeare's plays are written about one cultural view, and one
man's take on it. Finally the language that is used in Shakespeare's work has not been used in
hundreds of years and it is irrelevant to learn about it in today's day and age.
To begin, many of Shakespeare's plays consist of violence and negative messages. For
example in Romeo and Juliet, Romeo kills himself with a poison because he thinks Juliet had
killed herself. When Juliet awakens and sees Romeo dead, Juliet stabs herself with his dagger.
This message is showing that Juliet couldn't live without Romeo, and vice versa, so she killed
herself. Recently in the news, many schools have banned the new television series 13 Reasons
Why because it portrays negative messages and involves suicide and bullying. The Hamilton
Wentworth District School Board has recommended that its staff not use the show as a teaching
aid because of its “glamorization of suicidal behavior and [depicting] negative portrayals of
helping professionals.” (Glese Chatelaine.com) A principal at St. Vincent Elementary School in
Edmonton recently sent home a letter telling parents that kids aren’t even allowed to mention the
series on school property. (Glese Chatelaine.com) This is proving that we can watch Romeo and
Juliet a play about young lovers who commit suicide over each others deaths, but were not
allowed watching a television series over a girl committing suicide because of bullying? If a
television series is being banned because of the violence and the overall “theme” of suicide,
Romeo and Juliet should be banned along with it. Another example can be Macbeth, another
violent play written by Shakespeare. Macbeth kills King Duncan so he can take the Scottish
throne for himself. Along with killing Duncan, he kills his friend Banquo for ironically being
suspicious of him killing King Duncan and he murders Macduff's family because of similar
reasons. This negative message is proving that you can kill whoever you like to get what you
want. Since so many of Shakespeare's plays mainly focuses on violence and inappropriate
content, it should no longer be allowed to be taught in high schools and taken out of the
curriculum.
Along with Shakespeare's plays having incredible violence in them, all of his plays he has
written come from one cultural view. With Shakespeare being taught in classrooms all around
the world, there are kids of many different cultural backgrounds, religions, and ethnicities.
Students are learning about a caucasian mans views from over 400 years ago. In fact
Shakespeare's play The Merchant of Venice has been a topic of many debates and disputes.
While many would say it's a “classic” and “one of the m...
