UC Berkeley Students Use Poetry to Think Through Issues of Free Speech

The Daily Californian's Ryan Tuozzolo writes about poetry as a political tool on the Berkeley campus: "Founded in 1974 by Rob Sean Wilson, the Berkeley Poetry Review works to provide a platform for an array of ideals, focusing largely on those that subvert the status quo. As editor in chief of the publication, Berkeley student and former Daily Cal writer Lindsay Choi reads every submission received by the journal. They lead the editorial board in considering which poems to publish." More:

...Choi described the publication’s focus on poems that are subversive, but not violent. “We do have a commitment to publishing things that are radical,” the editor noted, at the same time pointing out, “We’re filtering through submissions for things that we think could be harmful.”

While such decisions have at times sparked controversy and prompted questions of publication ethics, Choi remained firm in their resolution to prevent the Berkeley Poetry Review from espousing harmful material: “I just, personally, strongly believe that choosing not to publish something because it’s violent is not censorship,” they asserted.

Though founded almost 30 years after the Berkeley Poetry Review, student-driven spoken word poetry group CalSLAM possesses a similar dedication to the role of poetry as self-expression, while also not shying away from calling out violent rhetoric. CalSLAM director Ricky Santuario detailed the mission of the club.

“We understand that a lot of our open mics are free speech zones, and people can speak whatever they want to speak. That doesn’t mean that they will be free of accountability.” Santuario said. “We want folks to feel safe in our space.”

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