Social Conflict & Identity

Language as a Weapon and a Shield

Four poems in the Edexcel Conflict anthology explore social conflict — the everyday battles over identity, race, class and belonging. Half-caste by John Agard challenges racial categorisation; No Problem by Benjamin Zephaniah confronts racism with defiant humour; The Class Game by Mary Casey attacks class snobbery; and Belfast Confetti by Ciaran Carson fragments language itself to convey the chaos of sectarian violence. In each poem, language is both the subject and the weapon.

Half-caste — John Agard

Agard, born in Guyana and living in Britain, wrote Half-caste to challenge the term “half-caste,” which was used to describe people of mixed heritage. The poem is a sustained rhetorical attack on the absurdity of the label. Agard asks: if Picasso mixes red and green, is that a “half-caste canvas”? If Tchaikovsky blends a black key and a white key, is that a “half-caste symphony”?

These examples expose the ridiculousness of calling a person “half” anything. The colloquial Caribbean dialect (“Explain yuself / wha yu mean”) is a deliberate political choice: Agard refuses to adopt “standard English” because doing so would accept the hierarchy that labels him as inferior. His dialect is his identity, and using it is an act of resistance.

No Problem — Benjamin Zephaniah

Zephaniah, a British-Jamaican dub poet, wrote No Problem as a direct response to everyday racism in Britain. The speaker lists the prejudices he faces — “I am not de problem” — and turns each accusation back on the accuser. The repetition of “I am not de problem” is both a denial and an assertion of identity.

The poem’s rhythm is rooted in dub culture — a blend of reggae and spoken word. Read aloud, the poem has a musical, almost chant-like quality that turns protest into performance. Zephaniah uses humour (“I am born academic”) and defiance (“Black is not de problem”) together, refusing to be defined by others’ prejudice. The final message is clear: racism is the problem of the racist, not the victim.

The Class Game — Mary Casey

Casey’s poem attacks class snobbery in Britain by listing the markers used to judge someone’s social status: “How can you tell what class I’m from? / I can tell by your hands.” She catalogues the differences between working-class and middle-class life: “a deck chair, or a yacht,” “a corgi, or a whippet.” The poem’s listing technique builds an overwhelming case that class divisions are arbitrary and absurd.

Casey writes in a strong working-class voice, using dialect and colloquial language (“me mam,” “bog standard”). Like Agard, her refusal to adopt “proper” English is politically charged — she speaks as she is, rejecting the idea that her accent or vocabulary makes her inferior. The poem’s direct address (“How can you tell?”) confronts the reader, demanding they examine their own prejudices.

Belfast Confetti — Ciaran Carson

Carson writes about the Troubles in Northern Ireland. “Belfast confetti” was a slang term for the shrapnel — nuts, bolts, nails — packed into homemade bombs. The poem describes a bomb explosion and its aftermath, but what makes it extraordinary is how Carson uses punctuation marks as shrapnel.

“Suddenly as the riot squad moved in it was raining exclamation marks, / Nuts, bolts, nails, car keys. A fount of broken type.” The metaphor of punctuation as debris is brilliant: the explosion shatters language itself. The speaker cannot complete a sentence: “I know this labyrinth so well — / Balaklava, Raglan, Inkerman, Odessa Street —” The dashes interrupt thought, just as the violence interrupts life. Even the street names reference the Crimean War, layering historical conflict onto present-day Belfast.