24PearlStreet Workshops and Events

Porsha Olayiwola DISMANTLING THE TRADITION: ON FORM & POWER – LIVE Poetry July 12 to July 16, 2021 Number of Participants: 12 Price: $550 Format: 1 Week Asynchronous Workshop

Infrastructures hold tradition in place. Tradition creates social norms that last centuries. Infrastructure, both tangible and unseen, establish a system by which the norms never alter. This is true in history, social hierarchy, and literature. Classical form, in poetry, can operate as an oppressive infrastructure dictating how and what we write. This course will focus on using form poetry to debunk larger societal hierarchies. Inspired by Jericho Brown’s poetry collection, The Tradition, participants will engage classical form and create a ‘new’ form of poetry as they envision a future they’ve named. This course will be both generative and workshop-based.

LIVE TIME: 12pm-2pm EST.

Biography

Porsha Olayiwola is an individual world poetry slam champion and the author of the collection i shimmer sometimes, too. Olayiwola is the current Poet Laureate for the City of Boston. She is a 2020 Academy of American Poets Poet Laureate Fellow. Olayiwola is the Jacob Ziskind Poet-in-Residence at Brandeis University.