Slam das Minas takes art, engagement and female poetry to Praça da Matriz
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Combining poetry, education and protest, the first official edition of 2023 of Slam das Minas RS takes place at 4 pm this Saturday, at Praça da Matriz, in Porto Alegre. As its name suggests, the competition is aimed exclusively at women, who can register for free on the site.
“A part of the afternoon is reserved for free (non-competitive) verse – which accepts the participation of men”, adds poet and slammer master Daniela Alves da Silva (Lella). A public school teacher, she has been a member of the collective since its creation in 2016 and, along with the other eight members, is responsible for organizing the event.
“It is a space for collective construction, which is based on the potential of female writing. Everything is done in an autonomous and self-managed way, where we share responsibilities”, highlights Lella. “Slam das Minas proposes to be a space for listening and acceptance so that women can freely express their experiences”, she adds. Harassment, sexual repression, sexism, racism and homophobia are recurring themes in the members’ poetry.
Although contested only by female competitors, the poetic battle organized by Lella and the other members of Slam das Minas has the same rules as other collectives of the genre: to participate, you must bring original poetry of up to three minutes, and the performer cannot using props, such as costumes, scenery or musical instruments. Thus, in the presentations, the performance is built only with the voice and body of the poets.
The jurors are randomly chosen from the audience, and are responsible for giving scores that will define the winner of that edition. “The only certainty is that in this group there will be ethnic and age diversity, so that plurality is guaranteed when evaluating the poets”, adds the organizer. Among the selection criteria, the relevance of the themes presented is an important point to be considered.
In Porto Alegre, slam began to form in 2016, precisely with the collective Slam das Minas, and the movement was consolidated in 2017 with the emergence of several other collectives that organize different slams in Rio Grande do Sul. Currently included in a universe of about 20 slam collectives in the Capital alone, the nine slammer masters that guarantee the protagonism of women and gender dissidents in Praça da Matriz also boost their competitors to higher flights.
“From these meetings, after three heats, a representative is elected for the final battle, who then guarantees a spot for the Slam Conexões, which always takes place in the second half of each year. From there, the winner is a finalist for the Slam Br , which is the national competition, followed by a world stage of slams”, explains Lella. According to her, some competitions even offer prizes for the best placed.
A battle of verses and spoken poetry that emerged in the 1980s, in Chicago (USA), and spread across Europe before arriving in Brazil, slam is different from freestyle rap (which, in this case, is characterized mainly by improvised lyrics from the rapper, expressing what he feels about a certain subject, but keeping a constant rhythm) and the battles of MCs in hip hop culture, highlights the teacher and poet. “At the same time, it’s similar, because it’s also expressed on the street,” she observes.
In the case of the event organized by women in Porto Alegre, in addition to the performances, the audience that approaches also finds other expressions in the same space. “We received many visual artists and artisans, among others, who exhibit their work in the surroundings”, says Lella. “The proposal is to shelter diversity, encourage respect, empathy, freedom of expression, protesting against the silencing of women in various arts”, she emphasizes.
Daniela, or Lella, values the strength of the collective, “founded on poetry”: “the slam is capable of changing people’s lives, setting up a space for reflection and cultural revolution”, he celebrates. In addition to her, other members of the collective focused on women disseminate this concept beyond the street, through workshops in schools and other activities that disseminate the collective’s concepts, carried out in partnership with universities or companies. “Our mission is to take the power of women everywhere. In the case of Slam das Minas battles, many poets start there and then feel safe to build their own journey.”
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