Spoken word artist Sarah Kay coming to Rowan

As part of Project V.O.I.C.E. (Vocal Outreach Into Creative Expression), spoken word artist Sarah Kay will be performing at Rowan University next week. Kay hopes to encourage other young people to use poetry as a way to better understand themselves and the world around them.

Kay created Project V.O.I.C.E. in 2004, which, according to its Web site, is “a national movement that celebrates and inspires youth self-expression through Spoken Word Poetry.” Her Web site notes that Kay competed as a member of the Bowery Poetry Club’s Poetry Slam Team at the 2006 National Poetry Slam in Austin, Texas.

A New York City native, 21-year-old Kay said that she has been doing spoken word since she was 14, but she says that she has been writing poetry since she was little.

“When I was a freshman in high school, I decided I wanted to be a theater director, mainly because I love theater and I have cripplingly bad stage fright,” Kay said.

Her mother told her that she would have to conquer her stage fright in order to become a director. She added that when she saw “SlamNation,” a movie about competitive spoken-word poetry or “slam poetry,” she found a way to combine her love of theater with her love of poetry.

She said that she no longer does slam anymore because she is “not a very angry person,” and she was tired of the “repeated themes” in slam poetry. She explained that after she left, she could “discover new themes that no one was talking about.” Kay said she also stopped doing slam because she was more excited to educate people as part of Project V.O.I.C.E.

Freshman English major Megan Reese said that she helped bring Sarah Kay to Rowan University by suggesting her as a performer for the Writer’s Series to Dr. Deb Martin of the Writing Center.

Reese, who currently works under Martin as a tutor and will be Martin’s secretary next semester, discovered Kay after developing an interest in slam poetry from her creative writing teacher in high school.

Reese said that Kay has become a sort of mentor for her in that she is one of the best poets that she has learned about.

“She has been a mentor to me because of how young she is but yet how far she has gotten in written world,” Reese said. “She was on HBO’s Def Poetry Jam when she was only 18 years old–18! That’s how old I am now. She is everything I aspire to be.”

The event will be hosted by the women’s and gender studies and the writing arts department’s Harrah’s Emerging Writer’s Series. In the afternoon, Kay will be teaching two spoken-word workshops for university students, one for undergraduates and the other for graduate students.

Reese said that the times and locations of these workshops will be announced soon.

Kay said that her performance will be more about trying to create a full show instead of having individual separate pieces. She hopes to present a flowing, 45-minute to an hour long spoken-word presentation to the audience.

She said that she is performing as part of the Writer Series because she teaches people self expression using spoken word in middle school, high school and college as part of her job. Kay said that she enjoys teaching people the tools and skills of spoken word to further express themselves.

The performance will take place on Nov. 23, 2009 in the Student Center Pit at 11:15 a.m. For more information about Project V.O.I.C.E, visit project-voice.net.