Abstract: “Approaching Spoken Word through an Intersectional Lens”
Spoken Word, a subgenre of poetry, is a unique art form and rhetorical tool in which an artist performs his or her work publicly. Thus the work becomes inherently performative, ceasing to fill the qualifications of the genre if it is not performed. Consequently, it requires engagement from the audience in live-action response, judgement calls, and identity assignment. Unfortunately, the Spoken Word often lends itself to an atmosphere of identity politics and identity essentialism, causing the artists to remain labeled and defined by singular, reductive identifying features. Spoken Word’s practitioners then become trapped in a cycle of reductive identifiers that limit the subject matter and meaning of their poetry, as well as hurt their audience’s sense of their authenticity and legitimacy of voice. The most effective approach to the genre that prevents falling into this trap of identity essentialism, for both the artist and the audience, is that of the theory of intersectionality: the intertwining and overlapping of varying demographical, identifying features of a poet. This project analyzes the work and performances of Suheir Hammad and Sarah Jones as they approach their poetry intersectionally, incorporating multiple aspects of their character to create an overarching poetic voice. Following their work, this project then analyzes the work of Andrea Gibson, a gender-queer poet who takes the process of dismantling identity essentialism to a further extreme, one that finds the imperfections in intersectionality. I ultimately determine that intersectionality, though imperfect, is the most effective approach to the Spoken Word genre because it demands that the performer and the audience both maintain an awareness of the varying characterizing aspects that create their poetic voice, their identity, and their authenticity. It allows for a new type of ethos for the artist, a validity that comes from a perspective that is aware of more than one type of human experience, or moreover, that is aware of the composite of multiple human experiences. Avoiding the limitations of reductive identifiers, a Spoken Word artists allow themselves to reach a broader audience, enter a wider range of literary and sociopolitical conversations, and maintain a sense of authenticity that would not exist independently of intersectionality.
