IWPS Prelim - 1st round: 4 min time limit, 2nd round: 2 min, 3rd round: 1 min
Marc Bamuthi Joseph, originally from NYC, is an arts activist currently living in Oakland, California. He is a National Poetry Slam champion, Broadway veteran, GOLDIE award winner, featured artist on the past two seasons of Russell Simmons’ Def Poetry on HBO and a recipient of 2002 and 2004 National Performance Network Creation commissions. In recent years he has toured through Tokyo where he was presented during the 1st International Spoken Word Festival and Santiago de Cuba where he joined the legendary Katherine Dunham as a part of the CubaNola Collective. He has entered the world of literary performance after crossing the sands of “traditional” theater, most notably on Broadway in the Tony Award winning The Tap Dance Kid and Stand-Up Tragedy. His evening-length work Word Becomes Flesh represents the completion of his third play, having already staged De/Cipher (Theater Artaud and Yerba Buena Center, 2001) and No Man’s Land (ODC, 2002). Word Becomes Flesh has found a home in the seasons of Seattle’s On The Boards, Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art, Washington, D.C.’s Dance Place and New York’s Dance Theater Workshop among other national venues. In 2007, his work, Scourge, will be presented internationally in Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands. His performances have been described as everything from “electrifying” (The Houston Chronicle), to “ever-elegant” (The Washington Post) and have compelled The Seattle Times to name him their “cutting edge performer of the year” for 2003. In their recent review of Word Becomes Flesh, the New York Times declared his work to be “eloquent. . .seamless. . .and remarkable.” Bamuthi’s next project, The Breaks, is an international travel diary across planet hip hop, based on Can’t Stop Won’t Stop by Jeff Chang. He will develop this piece while completing the prestigious Arts Institute Fellowship at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
The Annual Queer Slam is open ONLY to self-identified queer poets.
Hosted by the one and only Tara Hardy.
Chad Goller-Sojourner is a Seattle based writer, solo performer, and recipient of a distinguished 2008 Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Performing Arts Fellowship. In 2007, he was selected to participate in the Central District Forum for Arts & Ideas: Creation Project, which was funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). In July 2008, his highly anticipated solo show, Sitting in Circles with Rich White Girls: Memoirs of a Bulimic Black Boy, debuted at Seattle’s Brownbox African-American Theatre. Chad’s work has received overwhelming support from various arts communities and organizations including: Richard Hugo House, Mayor’s Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs, Artist Trust, The Bent Writing Institute, Seattle Poetry Slam, King County: 4Culture and the National Performance Network.
Additional works include publishing a chapbook entitled Born One Thousand Years Too Early: Fat, Dark-Skinned, Gay and Adopted by White Folks A Fragmentary Journey Towards Alignment which has been described as poignant, chilling and prophetic. Chad also served as the creator, artistic director and executive producer for People of Color Against Aids Network’s: Standing In The Gap ─ And Speaking Their Names ─ Black Gay Poets Honor Their Ancestors ─ A Spoken Word Requiem. Currently Chad is working a coming of age memoir based on his life.
The Democracy Slam puts ALL the power of the judges in the hands of the audience. EVERY audience member will be given a vote in who is the best poet of the night!This slam is open to all.
Samantha Thornhill travels the globe performing poetry, delivering lectures, and facilitating writing workshops. Both a poet and published author, Samantha is a rising voice in the world of words. Her performance poem, Little Odetta, inspired by the late folk legend, is forthcoming from Scholastic Press in the form of a picture book. Also, her young adult novel Seventeen Seasons is soon to be published by Penguin Books.
Samantha earned her Master of Fine Arts in poetry from the University of Virginia while coaching the VA slam team. A sought-after educator, Samantha believes that inside each person exists a lover of words. In New York City she fulfills her position as poetry professor at the Juilliard School. She also serves as writer in residence at the Bronx Academy of Letters where she teaches creative writing and journalism courses to middle and high school youth. She presents her work in schools, universities, festivals, conferences, museums, places of worship, and poetry venues.
Raw and refined, diverse in subject matter and style, Samantha relates to a wide spectrum of audiences. She is a native of Trinidad & Tobago.
