Punk songs of the sea: Shanties, the politics of participation and pedagogies of resistance in popular music education

The resurgence of sea shanties in popular music and culture has been mostly visible through social media during the COVID-19 pandemic. It has renewed interest in these maritime work songs as a participatory and collaborative endeavour. In this article, I examine the sea shanty as a contested form of popular music through which questions of power, resistance and pedagogy can be critically explored in contemporary formal music settings. Using punk pedagogy with a critical lens, the article reframes shanties as ‘punk songs of the sea: communal, DIY musical forms that challenge current hierarchical notions of musical ability and cultural value’. Adopting a critical cultural and historical perspective, this article synthesizes scholarship, music classroom practice and media discourse rather than presenting new empirical data. It traces the historical roots of sea shanties and their engagement with colonial values, examines the numerous revivals through folk-song movements and places them within contemporary political contexts, notably marked by anti-fascist and nationalist appropriations. Attention is given to the pedagogical responsibility to engage critically with the racialized and imperial history of the shanty song form. In this article, I argue that through participatory, critical and punk pedagogical lenses, sea shanties offer a powerful resource for popular music education. Shanties support inclusive participation, encourage collaborative approaches to music-making and promote the development of students’ critical consciousness. In the article, I outline implications for music education settings and suggest that participatory assessment is central to contemporary popular music education.