*Disclaimer: I had a bunch of awesome picture but Blogger won't let me post them :( *
Recently, I was introduced to the wonderfully intricate world of poetry. A friend I met here at Rhode Island College is a slam poet and performs in many venues around the city. I went to a slam toward the end of February that so happened to be the grand slam finals for the youth team he is on, which decided which six poets would make it to the Brave New Voices stage in Philadelphia in July. Watching the performers and listening to their stories full of passion and emotion opened my eyes to a whole new mode of communication utilized by many around the nation.
AS220 on Empire Street in Providence
is open to every poet, writer, composer, and just about anybody who wants their
voice to be heard. The first and third Thursday of every month is dedicated to
performing poetry- slam poetry in particular. Slam poetry was created as a way
to add competition to traditional poetry while still celebrating the works of
the poets. It is a way for artists to express themselves through spoken word to
an audience and a panel of judges. Slam poetry began as a way to advance and
enhance basic writings and readings. It keeps the audience interested and
excited about the piece, using different tones of voice and various gestures to
promote the message of the author.
I was asking my friend so many
questions about poetry, “slamming”, and about his experiences with his
teammates on the Providence Poetry Slam Youth Team. My main question was what
made slam poetry so different from normal poetry. He told me that “As a poet, a
slam is a way for me to get my competitive spirit out and still let my work be
heard”, and I thought it was great that poets are able accomplish both in one
setting. I also asked if he is affected either negatively or positively by the
scores from the judges after he slams. He explained that “Even though the
competition is based off of numbers, it becomes more an opportunity to
creatively construct a poem with different features and prove my point or
express my feelings”. He elaborated by saying that although the basis of a slam
is on numbers and a defined winner, that is not really what it’s about to the
poet on stage. The only thing that matters is how well one can convey their
story to an audience, how the audience reacts, and what everyone as a whole can
take away from the performance…not the numerical value that is placed on it. Slam
poetry is spoken word, and keeps people interested in poetry for many reasons.
Slams have developed the art into various competitions and created many new
outlets, while simultaneously bringing together a community.
After I left the slam, my mind was
running in circles, thinking about how many concepts I could connect between
the performances I witnessed and the things we’ve talked about in class. The
ideas and workings of August and Rodriguez were prevalent, as well as all of
the dominant ideologies described through SCWAAMP. Through further investigation,
I found three resources available for slam poets wishing to seek further
opportunities to showcase their work.
Throughout the night I could not
stop myself from thinking about the dominant ideologies described in SCWAAMP. I
was technically forced to think of
them because they were utterly apparent when the poets were performing. Every
piece heard that night had something to do with straightness, Christianity,
whiteness, American-ness, able-bodied-ness, maleness, or property ownership,
and sometimes, multiple points at one time! These beliefs are most valued in
our culture, but I noticed that each slam had something to do with these values
being detrimental to the poet’s life in some way. There was one female poet
that combined most of these troublesome values so eloquently in her slam that
the whole audience demanded and encore. She expressed the many hardships she
had to endure because she was not straight, not Christian, Hispanic, not
“technically” American, and a female. I started to feel sorry for her and her
struggles, but I realized towards the end of her piece that she was not looking
for sympathy whatsoever; she was proving her strength and resilience to the
awful ways of the world.
After
doing some research about the different slam teams and competitions, I came
across a website that had many different resources for poets.
Youth Speaks is a non-profit
organization that promotes youth development through spoken word presentations
around the country. One of the three links on the homepage is to Youth Speaks
Bay Area. This is based in the Bay Area of California, where this organization
all began. The main goal of Youth Speaks is to educate and empower children and
teens to realize the power in their own voices, literally and figuratively. They
promote presentations that teach youth how to make themselves heard, as in getting
their point across creatively and effectively. They also make themselves heard
by learning presentation skills and tactics to attract their audiences.
Another link is to Brave New Voices,
a national stage dedicated to hearing the voices of youth across the nation,
while challenging their stories against other teams in the competition. Created
by Youth Speaks, BNV is devoted to youth that want and need to let their voices
be heard. Many youth slam poetry teams across the country form local
competitions to see which team will reach “final stage” at the BNV festival
that year, including Providence Youth Poetry.
A
third link from Youth Speaks is to The Living Word Project. The Living Word
Project is a theater company derived from Youth Speaks that performs stories
experienced by its members through poetry, dance, illustrations, and films. Their
main purpose is to convey the importance of spoken word and not let it become a
thing of the past. They encourage the use of performance and spoken word to
educate others, while empowering its performers to share their experiences.
