Bryn Mawr Spoken-word Artists to Join
Brave New Voices Poets on Great Hall Stage
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| Lily Mengesha '10 |
Three Bryn Mawr students will share a stage with some of the nation's top young performance poets this Friday, Nov. 9, as the Brave New Voices Tour stops at Thomas Great Hall from 6:30 to 11 p.m.
The Brave New Voices tour is a program of Youth Speaks, a nonprofit presenter of spoken-word performance, education and youth-development programs based in the San Francisco Bay area. Its annual Brave New Voices festival brings together winners of poetry slams from all around the country and is one of the prime identifiers of fresh new talent.
The tour takes the Brave New Voices spirit — a commitment to dialogue and political engagement through oral arts with a hip-hop sensibility — on the road throughout the year.
The event's organizer, Kathy Huynh '09, hopes the poets will go beyond entertaining to "provoke critical awareness and thinking of social issues that plague society in a deep and creative way via spoken word."
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| Nicole López '10 |
The visiting poets:
Ben Alisuag is a native of Hayward, Calif. who is now a student at the University of Pennsylvania. As a member of Penn's poetry collective, Alisuag has participated in numerous competitions, including the National College Union's Poetry Slam Invitational 2006, where he received one of the awards for "All-Around Bad Ass Poet." After winning the 2006 Philadelphia Youth Slam, Alisuag led the Philadelphia team to the finals of the Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam on the stage of the famous Apollo Theater.
Adriel Luis is an Emmy-winning poet — for his "Slip of the Tongue," adapted as a short film in 2005. The former San Francisco Slam champion continues to take spoken-word in new directions: one of his poems has become the basis for a classical-orchestra set, and his book How to Make Juice is an innovative experiment in "visual poetry."
Shannon Matesky was born and raised in Berkeley, Calif., and now lives in Chicago, where she is a student in DePaul University's acting program. A three-time member of the Youth Speaks Slam Team, she was recently featured in the 6th season of HBO's Russell Simmon's Def Poetry Jam.
The Bryn Mawr poets:
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| Shayna Israel '08 |
Shayna Israel '08, an editor of the Bryn Mawr arts and literary magazine Kaleidoscope, served for two years as co-head of the newly revitalized Women's Center and is an important figure in both the performing-arts and activist communities on campus. Born and raised in Brooklyn, she has performed her poetry at numerous venues around campus and throughout the Philadelphia area.
Nicole López '10 is a rising star in the College's spoken-word scene. The Florida native, who serves as a student assistant at the Office for Intercultural Affairs, is working with Israel to form a Bryn Mawr women's rap crew. She recently performed at a Bryn Mawr symposium on Latino studies that drew scholars from around the United States and Europe and has performed at the celebrated Nuyorican Poets Café. She cites the poet the poet José Angel Figueroa as her greatest inspiration.
Lily Mengesha '10 is one of the founding members of People IN Color, a Bi-Co group that addresses controversial social issues through performances such as theater, comedy, dance or music. Last spring, she helped lead a group of Philadelphia middle-school students in writing and performing a series of sketches dealing with identity issues.
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