5 steps to holding your own hip-hop festival By Karen O’Donnell-O’Connor

Karen O’Donnell O’Connor is the Community Development Officer with PAUL Partnership and is a member of the organising committee of ‘Make A Move’ in Limerick. 

“Hip-hop is risky territory, but so worth it” - Catherine O’Halloran, youth worker

“Wake up! We need to open ourselves up and embrace what is around us" - Catherine O'Halloran, youth worker, Limerick.

Community organisations with a reputation to uphold with the general public, never mind their funders, enter “risky territory” when they agree to fund hip-hop activities.

Many people misunderstand hip-hop to be nothing more than a woman-hating, gangster-led movement dominated by hoodies.

The rewards however can be incredible, according to Catherine O’Halloran, one of the organisers behind one such festival that benefitted from an open-minded approach by its local development company.

Why are so many turning to hip-hop?

- It can be used as a community and personal development tool

FRONT COVER NEWS FEATURE

Robert McNamara reports

Hip-hop is a cultural phenomenon we all know about.

Whether we like it or not - or even understand it - it’s everywhere.

It’s on TV, the radio, the internet, in clothes shops and on the streets.

Kids love it, they engage with it; more importantly, they identify with it.

It’s a subculture that originated in the seventies on the other side of the Atlantic, in the clamour of the Bronx, a concrete jungle dominated by high-rise buildings and apartment blocks, far different to the rural/urban overlap of most Irish towns.

VOLUNTEER PROFILE - John Lyons, handyman and social entrepreneur

“I never imagined the volunteering would lead to paid work.”

John Lyons from Limerick worked in construction for 20 years, felt the brunt of the decline, began volunteering and, lo and behold, 18 months later he’s looking at being paid once more for construction related work.

Along the way, he and colleague Ursula Mullane have become social entrepreneurs, though he doesn’t accord himself any fancy titles.

“I’m just the handyman,” he says, modestly. “I saw an advert in the paper looking for volunteers to help the elderly and I said, ‘Yeah, by all means’.”

Payoff beckons for eagle-eyed volunteers

Two volunteers have set up a new company in the Mid-West after spotting a niche area of the construction sector that the multi-nationals are ill-equipped to compete in.

The two directors of Community Repair and Maintenance (CRM) could be in clover by year’s end, REPORTS ALLEN MEAGHER.