Words in Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam Book

Foreword     ix
Preface     xvii
A Brief Introduction to Poetry Slams     xxiii
More Slam Basics: A Slam Poet's Hypothetical Journey from a Local Slam to the National Poetry Slam     xxiv
Pre-waves; or, The Early Days     1
A Very Quick and Slanted Pre-Slam History by Someone Who Wasn't There     3
The Pre-Slam History of NYC Poetry and Bob Holman, as told by Bob Holman     10
Getting a Roof On It: The Reopening of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe     22
The Birth of a Movement: NYC Slam's First Year     26
The Vocabulary of The Poetry Slam: Part I     34
Marc Smith (So What!): The Truth About Who Invented the Poetry Slam     35
The Myth of Slam Poetry: The Poetry Slam Certainly Exists, but is There Such a Thing as Slam Poetry?     42
Playing Nice: The First National Poetry Slam     44
Slam's Tipping Point: The End of the Nuyorican's First Year     50
The First Wave (1990-1996)     53
Exploding Texts: Slammers Take It to the Next Level     61
An Interview with Maggie Estep, First Wave Icon     65
From Sea to Shining Sestina: The United States of Poetry and Other Poetry on Your TV     75
NYC Slam's First Bible: The Creation of Aloud     87
We're Here, We Slam, Get Used toIt: The Influence of Queer Voices In NYC Slam     93
1994: The Year Slam Explodes     94
Unfair Stereotypes of Other Cities Slams: One Nerd's Perspective     99
Rap Meets Poetry: The Birth of Mouth Almighty     103
First and Always: Graduates from NYC Poetry Slam's First Wave     119
Second Wave (1996-2001)     125
May I Introduce to You the Future: In 1996, Slam Transforms     133
Slam's Second Bible: How Slam Nation Spread the Gospel According to NYC Slam     137
How to Make a Living as a Slam Poet: Mouth Almighty and the Growing Importance of the National Poetry Slam     148
The Vocabulary of The Poetry Slam: Part II     158
We Don't Do Group Pieces: Nuyo Conquers, then Divides     161
And Two Become Three: Mouth Almighty Becomes NYC-Urbana and Nuyo's Championship Team Becomes louderARTS     175
60 Minutes: The Poets Slam Back!     184
Passing the Mic: Felice Belle and the Changing Face of the Nuyorican     188
What It's Like to be There: Nuyorican, NYC-Urbana & louderARTS at the End of the Twentieth Century     197
Rules to Play By: The Unspoken, Rumored Rules of Slam     213
Welcome to the AfterFuture: The Explosion of the Second Wave Poets     215
Third Wave (2001-2007)     237
2001: The Year Everything Changed     245
Words That Comfort: The Aftermath of 9/11 on the NYC Poetry Slam Community     248
Thank You and God Bless: Def Poetry Hits the Airwaves and Broadway     260
Taylor Mali: The Man, The Myth, The Industry     265
What the Heck Is Going On Here?: The Bowery Poetry Club Opens (Kinda) for Business     267
The Rise of Self-Publishing and the Slam     285
Slam's Biggest Non-Slamming Icon Speaks: John S. Hall Takes On Everything Right But Mostly Wrong with the Slam     286
Because This Generation Can Speak for Itself: The Birth of Urban Word and the NYC Teen Slams     303
Hip-Hop and the Canon: Slam's Influence     316
NYC Slam Grows Up: NYC's Slam Third Wave Faces the Future     318
The Good, The Bad, and The Poetry: The Impact of Slam, Inside and Out     327
The Afterword: Or, A Completely Invented Transcription That Nonetheless Felt So Real     351
For More Information     365
New York City Poetry Slam Teams From 1990 to 2007     366
Acknowledgments     370