Delta Novice
2024 — Pasco, WA/US
Spoken Word Poetry
Event Description:
Original Spoken Word Poetry is a new supplemental event where students will write and perform original poetry. Original Spoken Word Poetry is poetry written for performance to express ideas, experience, or emotion through the creative arrangement of words according to their sound, their rhythm, their meaning. The maximum time limit is 5 minutes with a 30-second grace period. The delivery must be memorized, and no book or script may be used. No more than 150 words of the original poetry may be direct quotation from any other speech or writing, and such quotations must be identified in a printed copy of the speech. An introduction is permitted, but not required. A successful performer will craft a piece that elicits critical thought, reflection, or emotion. As opposed to traditional Poetry, Spoken Word Poetry is created to be performed aloud and may feature rhythmic flow, vivid imagery, word play, gestures, lyrical elements, and repetition. Spoken Word is special because it allows the performer to pull from generations of oral tradition and performance. Spoken Word combines elements of rap, hip hop, storytelling, rhyme, repetition, improvisation, and word play. It allows the performer the liberty to tell their story creatively. Spoken Word can be about any topic the performer wishes to speak about, and it often highlights issues that directly affect the performer like social justice, race, politics, community, inequality, gender, identity, or mental health. At its core, it’s all about heart and the emotions and opinions of the performer.