SLAM: The Roots of a Growing Poetry Movement
by Julia H. Jackson
“Do not forget what’s left, because this is all we have, and you won’t found your roots online. We have no dances or chants if we have no history. Just rants—no roots, just tears. This is all I have of my family history that’s real. And now it’s yours.”
–from Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio’s “Kumulipo,” performed at the White House on May 12, 2009
Last spring, President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama hosted an evening of poetry, music, and spoken word for students from Howard, American, Galluadet, and Georgetown Universities. Readers included Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio, a Hawaiian poet who later represented her state on HBO’s Brave New Voices, and Lin-Manuel Miranda, creator of the Broadway musical “In the Heights.” There was something different about the way these readers shared their original poems; these were not recitations, nor were they readings in any traditional sense. These performers brought passion and theatricality to their words; theirs was a form of slam poetry. Today we examine The Roots of Slam Poetry.
Of all the words in the English language, “slam” and “poetry” don’t seem to naturally connect. And yet, the slam poetry movement has been growing strong ever since its birth in late 1980s Chicago, when construction-worker-turned-poet Marc Smith coined the term while performing at his favorite jazz club. In its essence, poetry is usually defined by its poet, but the slam poetry movement arose out of a desire to raise the stakes with local, regional, and eventually national competition.
In the introduction to his book, The Spoken Word Revolution: Slam, Hip Hop, and the Poetry of a New Generation, Smith states that in the 1990s, “poetry reared its motley head” all across America. Cafes and bars such as the Nuyorican Poets Café in New York City, the Green Mill Jazz Club in Chicago, and Boston’s Cantab Lounge started hosting regular competitions in which poets were judged on their content, style, performance, and emotion.
Slam poets such as Saul Williams, Taylor Mali , Mayda del Valle helped publicize the burgeoning movement in the 1990s with their performances, both in their own communities, as well as televised competitions. Williams played the main character in the 1998 film Slam, which followed a young inmate who discovers his passion for poetry in a writing class in jail. Slam poetry teams and nonp
rofit organizations sprung up across the country, including the NYC-Urbana Slam Team, the Austin Slam Team, the nationwide program Youth Speaks , and Poetry Slam, Inc., the heart of the movement.
The slam movement picked up its pace in 2002, when television hip hop entrepenuer Russell Simmons began hosting Def Poetry Jam on HBO. The show followed a national competition every year until 2007. In 2008, the Def Poetry producers created Brave New Voices, a new poetry competition that spotlights teenage voices.
Why is slam poetry important? Well, think of it this way: slam poetry is a way to expose talented young writers by challenging them to recreate their inspirations on stage. Poets are judged not only by their command of language, but by the ferocity or subtlety with which they speak. Many slam competitions have paved the way for writers who might not normally be nationally recognized, perhaps because of the communities they represent, perhaps because of the content of their work. Either way, slam competitions act as a platform for writers of all backgrounds and ideologies to voice their opinions, aspirations, fears, and desires.
“However it begins, it’s gotta be loud
and then it’s gotta get a little bit louder.
Because this is how you write a political poem
and how you deliver it with power.
Mix current events with platitudes of empowerment.
Wrap up in rhyme or rhyme it up in rap until it sounds true.
Glare until it sinks in.”
–from Taylor Mali’s “How to Write a Political Poem”
