Teen Haiku Death Match

The writing and sharing of haiku is a deeply entrenched cultural practice in the poetry slam community, and the participants of the Haiku Death Match have been historically celebrated for their wit and use of well-crafted images.

Haiku is a short poetic form popularized by a Japanese poet named Matsuo Bashō. In the early 1670s, Bashō and his students devised an event called “the seashell game”: poets competed head-to-head with their original haiku and a winner was selected by a judge. In the early 1990s—over 300 years later—a poet from the Illinois poetry slam scene named Daniel Ferri created the Haiku Death Match, infusing the Japanese practice with a slew of Western conventions ranging from the roast to the rap battle. The slam-style haiku, also known as “ku,” is just 17 syllables (or less) and contains no title. As many as 32 poets can begin the competition, battling one-on-one until one “haikuster” is left standing.

Miami Book Fair’s Teen Haiku Death Match will start with an interactive workshop on the art of haiku. Students will learn about the history of haiku, followed by crafting their own haiku and preparing for the head-to-head competition that follows. The Haiku Death Match workshop and competition is free and open to all teenagers, ages 13-18.

Workshop: 10 a.m. – 12 p.m. To participate in the workshop, please arrive by 9:45 a.m. to sign in.

Haiku Death Match: 12 – 1 p.m. To participate only in the Death Match, please arrive by 11:30 a.m. to sign up.

If you have any questions about the workshop or competition, please contact the Speak Up Program Coordinator, Cecily Schuler, at cschuler@mdc.edu or 305.237.3258