Following the success of their latest production, ‘Questions of A Man,’ Dylan Quinn Dance Theatre (DQDT) have developed the ‘Questions of A Man: Youth Education’ programme. Through this unique programme, DQDT will be working with young people from three Enniskillen Schools, aiming to engage them in dynamic and creative gender equality discussions over the next couple of months.

In the ‘Questions of A Man’ production, DQDT performers Dylan Quinn and Jenny Ecke shed a light on issues including gender equality and sexual assault..

Explaining why they chose to base the production on these issues, Dylan said: “It’s something that I have been interested in for a long time, something I’ve been exploring since my days at dance college. I suppose it comes from seeing a very unbalanced and unequal society but also a society that as a result of that unbalance, puts pressure not just on those who suffer most from gender inequality, women, but also on men in terms of stereotypes that they have to stand up to and uphold which has a significant impact on mental health.”

He added: “I always struggled with injustice in terms of sexual violence, that we would be locking up people who were breaking into homes yet people who were committing sex crimes managed to get off on a technicality or weren’t punished in the same sort of way and yet it is a huge part of our society.”

Commenting on the decision to develop ‘Questions of A Man’ into an educational programme, Dylan said: “Having seen some of the things that my children have experienced, and remembering my own experiences growing up here, I felt that if I wanted to try and have a long lasting impact, that was hopefully going to engage in real change in some people’s behaviour, it needed to have more concentrated work with young people.”

The ‘Questions of A Man: Youth Education’ programme is currently taking place at Enniskillen Royal Grammar School, Erne Integrated College and St. Joseph’s College as part of Learning for Life and Work and Performing Arts classes during November and December. The programme seeks to support the development of better mental health attitudes for young men by exposing some of the unhelpful stereotypes society places upon them. It will also help encourage healthier relationships between young people of different genders and sexualities and promote acceptance.

Dylan commented: “I hope that it will give young people the skills to understand that what they believe is normal is not necessarily normal and that it is okay to question behaviour that they feel uncomfortable with. That for young men that this stereotype of what it is to be a man is not a natural thing, that it is a societal gender pressure that doesn’t really exist in biology, it exists because society has dictated that it exists.”

He added: “Also for the young women who are participating in the programme, that they can have the confidence to go ‘no this is wrong and I don’t have to accept this anymore.’ It’s about giving them skills to manage a situation.”

The weekly classroom sessions facilitated by Dylan will involve discussions and explorations around issues of gender, language, equality and sexuality.

Commenting on the format of the sessions, Dylan said: “Rather than it being me standing at the front of the room chatting to everybody, it is about engaging discussions and debates or ideas. Some will be done through movement or theatre skills, particularly for those who are doing it in a performing arts way.”

“We are trying a whole range of different ways to interact with the young people so that it becomes a real experience for them and they get to question their behaviour themselves or question the behaviour of others,” he added.

The ‘Questions of A Man: Youth Education’ programme has been developed in-line with international approaches to help create a gender-equitable future and is supported by Hope For Youth NI.