The University of Notre Dame Creative Writing Program, the Snite Museum of Art, and Spoken Word club of Notre Dame will co-host the second annual Wham! Bam! Poetry Slam! on March 20th from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m.
A poetry slam is a competitive event in which individual poets perform their work and are judged by random members of the audience. The rules for the competition are simple. Poems can be on any subject and in any style but must be original creations of the performers. Each poem must take less than three minutes to perform, and these performances may not use props, costumes, musical accompaniment, or memorization aids. Each poet will go through two rounds of performances. Judges are selected from the audience to rate each performed poem on the basis of the presentation of the poem and its content. In each of the two rounds of scoring, the highest and lowest of the judges’ scores are thrown out, and a tabulator calculates each contestant’s score.
Poets interested in competing may register from March 3rd until all 12 spots are filled. Registration can be done by either calling or emailing Coleen Hoover at (574)-631-7526 or hoover.14@nd.edu and providing name and contact information. Only registered poets will be considered for the competition, and the randomly selected competitors will be announced at the event.
This celebration of the creative intersection of literary performance and visual arts is part of the Snite Museum’s regular Third Thursday programming. Junior Marc Drake, president of the Spoken Word ND group on campus, will serve as the event’s master of ceremonies.
The opening reception will begin at 5:00 p.m. with the Slam starting at 5:15 p.m.
The event is free and open to all. All Museum galleries will be open for viewing. Free parking is available in the B1 lot south of the football stadium after 4:00 p.m.