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*The following is adapted from an excellent Wikipedia entry about slam.
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Slam poetry is a postmodern form of performance poetry that occurs within a competitive poetry event, called a "slam", at which poets perform their own poems (or, in rare cases, those of others) that are "judged" on a numeric scale by randomly picked members of the audience. It can also consist of several poets performing without being judged.
The History
The modern slam competition is most widely believed to have been started by Marc Smith , at the Get Me High Lounge in Chicago, Illinois in November 1984 . In July 1986, the slam moved to its permanent Chicago home, the Green Mill Jazz Club, where it began to grow. In 1990 , the first National Slam took place in Fort Mason, San Francisco . Now, the National Slam boasts approximately 75 certified teams from all parts of the United States , Canada , and other countries. Although American in origin, slams have spread all over the world. Today there are strong slam scenes in Germany, Austria, UK, Netherlands and as far as New Zealand and Singapore.
The Rules
- Original poems only! Except for specially designated "cover" slams, each poet must performapiece of his or her own creation.
- 3 minute rule Time Penalties are enforced at the National Slam, and at many local slams as well, if you go over time. The standard time limit for a poem is three minutes (including a grace period of around ten seconds), after which a poet's score is docked according to how long the poem exceeded the limit.
- No Props, Costumes, or Musical Accompaniment except during a special competition. This ensures that a poet will not win a slam simply by wearing clothes appropriate to his piece or having brought with him a monkey and an accordion.
- Scoring is done by members of the audience chosen at random, provided they don't know a slammer or have any other biases. This tends to be loosely enforced at the local level, as sometimes slams are so small, or slammers so notorious, that there is nobody in the audience that doesn't know them. There are usually five judges, who rate each poem on a scale of 0-10, with one decimal point. As the slammasters say, "Zero is the poem that should never have been written. Ten is simultaneous orgasm from everyone in the audience." Of the scores the poem receives from the five judges, the highest and the lowest scores are dropped, and the remaining three are added together, giving the poem a total score of 0-30. In practical terms, however, scores of lower than 7 are exceptionally rare.
The Finals
Top poets compete in Finals at the slam in April. Poets must sign contract before competing. Boise currently takes 5 team members, sometimes a coach or alternate as well but only the top 5 poets are guaranteed Team status.
Boise Slam Team Finals Qualification:
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September to March, poets who get 1st place get 3 points towards being in Finals,
2nd place = 2 points, 3rd place = 1 point. - September to March, poets who attend a Reading and Workshop Series workshop (held at 5 pm at Boise State University same day as the slam) get 1 point towards Finals.
- Hosts of Boise Poetry Slam get 1 point per hosting
Replacement process: If team members drop out or are unable to perform according to the contract (attendance, etc.) and are dropped from the team, the Slammaster has the discretion to replace them (we only need 4 on the team so if one person drops they do not necessarily have to be replaced). If they are replaced, the first person asked to join the team will be the first runner-up from Finals, then the next runner-up, and so on until the Finals roster is used up. After that folks can be asked according to their number of points from the season.
