Healing is the theme of Tuesday’s annual Sexual Assault Awareness Month (SAAM) Slam Poetry event.
The event is put on by the University of Idaho Women’s Center to create a safe space for students across campus to voice their concerns, feelings or experiences surrounding the issue of sexual violence.
“Some performers have a direct experience with sexual violence and some haven’t been directly involved,” said Bekah MillerMacPhee, the event’s coordinator. “It’s pretty difficult to find someone who doesn’t have a connection to it. A lot of women have been socialized to fear sexual violence and spend a lot of time thinking about it.”
Bekah MillerMacPhee
MillerMacPhee has been coordinating this event since the beginning. After the F-word Live Poetry Slam two years ago, students wanted another space where they could perform in this way. That conversation led to the creation of SAAM Slam Poetry.
“Whether or not someone has a direct connection with this topic, they should come out to the event because it can be a really healing experience for survivors to share their stories,” said MillerMacPhee. “If this issue is going to get better — and in some ways, it has — it takes a community to help in the healing others because it allows us to engage in our own healing as a community to share support for each other.”
There are many who support this event but don’t attend because it is too hard for them. However, MillerMacPhee wants everyone to know the event is a safe space.
“I encourage survivors to hear what other folks have to say, to know that they’re not alone,” said MillerMacPhee. “They don’t have to talk about anything, they can just listen and take in the stories.”
Not only is healing part of the event, but a feeling of hope — hope for a time where sexual violence is less common.
“There is a lot of hope in these stories from how people have healed from their trauma,” said MillerMacPhee. “To hear that this is even possible is a really powerful thing.”
The two-hour poetry event takes place 7 p.m. Tuesday in the Bruce Pitman Center’s Vandal Ballroom.
Anyone is welcome to submit a piece for the event, which is more intimate than to F-Word Live, but the audience is just as supportive.
Nicole Hindberg can be reached at [email protected]