Slam poetry is a competitive performance in which poets deliver their own,
short pieces, and are judged by randomly chosen audience members. This
form of performed poetry is an underexplored text type in audiovisual
translation (AVT). To fill in this gap, this paper provides an introductory
account of current practices in the translation of slam poetry, both at local
and international competitions held onsite and online. After that, the paper
describes the challenges entailed in making slam ...
Slam poetry is a competitive performance in which poets deliver their own,
short pieces, and are judged by randomly chosen audience members. This
form of performed poetry is an underexplored text type in audiovisual
translation (AVT). To fill in this gap, this paper provides an introductory
account of current practices in the translation of slam poetry, both at local
and international competitions held onsite and online. After that, the paper
describes the challenges entailed in making slam poetry accessible for the
d/Deaf and Hard of Hearing by means of intralingual subtitles added to
pre-recorded sessions. The focus of the analysis is placed on the translation
of literary style constrained by the immediacy inherent to this form of performance, in which speech rates are typically high. Translation challenges
and solutions are illustrated with examples taken from a small corpus of
four poems. The study is based on the authors’ experience in collaboration with the non-profit organization Associació RED927 Literatura Oral
responsible for the main slam poetry event in Barcelona (Spain).
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