National Speech and Debate Tournament

2021 — Online, US

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Original Spoken Word Poetry

Event Description:

Original Spoken Word Poetry is a new supplemental event where students will write and perform original poetry. Original Spoken Word Poetry is poetry written for performance to express ideas, experience, or emotion through the creative arrangement of words according to their sound, their rhythm, their meaning. The maximum time limit is 5 minutes with a 30-second grace period. The delivery must be memorized, and no book or script may be used. No more than 150 words of the original poetry may be direct quotation from any other speech or writing.

Supplemental speech events will be asynchronous with no live performances, judging, or student attendance. Students will submit one video that is judged throughout the tournament. There are no entry limits; students may be entered in as many supplemental speech events as they choose, and students may enter in both supplemental speech and Extemp Debate. View more info about supplemental speech procedures, including recording instructions, in the National Tournament Procedures and National Tournament Manual.