The corporeality of the word in Slam: when the poetic-narrative nature breaks the silence

Abstract

This research understands the corporeality of the word when it breaks the silence, especially when driven by engagements such as releasing the poetic-narrative nature, letting out the cry, unlocking gestures, unlocking the senses. Slam, or spoken word poetry contests, which is authorial and collective in nature, is a powerful means of raising this corporeality, especially since, by expressing the problems, injustices, racism, male chauvinism, but also the achievements and reflections of voices from the periphery, or far from the center, the narrator-poet embodies both the material and the ideas. So, in the first part of the article, the attempt at silencing is considered, as in the case of the mask of Flanders worn by Anastácia in colonial Brazil of the past; so that in a second moment the mouth and body of the black woman break the silence through the Slam. In the case of this study, we selected black Brazilian women authors who participate in the Slam scene. Our theory is based on Kilomba (2019), Hooks (2019), D’Alva (2022), Collins (2019), Spivak (2010), Gonzalez (1984, 2020), among others.