From Page to the Stage: Slam Poetry for Beginners

Instructor: Michael Baumann
Date: Tuesday, July 12
Time: 6:30-9:30 pm
Location: IWC
Cost: $57 nonmembers, $39 members, $33 student members/teacher members/senior members/military members

Since its birth in 1985 Chicago, slam poetry has become one of the most powerful ways to share our stories and opinions. Slam poetry is not nice, but honest. Slam poetry is not pretty, but political. Slam poetry is not repetitive, but rhythmic. Not image, but scene. Not fiction, but nonfiction. Not rhymed, just well timed.

Slam poetry is not impossible, but possible: in this workshop, participants will move through the process—from brainstorming to drafting to slammifying to memorizing—and eventually learn how to perform poetry. After learning strategies for transforming a story into a slam, participants will learn who they can talk to and where they can go to take their page to the stage.