Dub poetry is a form of

performance poetry Performance poetry is a broad term, encompassing a variety of styles and genres. In brief, it is poetry that is specifically composed for or during a performance before an audience. During the 1980s, the term came into popular usage to describe p ...

West Indian A West Indian is a native or inhabitant of the West Indies (the Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago). For more than 100 years the words ''West Indian'' specifically described natives of the West Indies, but by 1661 Europeans had begun to use it ...

origin, which evolved out of

dub music Dub is an electronic musical style that grew out of reggae in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is commonly considered a subgenre of reggae, though it has developed to extend beyond that style.Dub: soundscapes and shattered songs in Jamaican re ...

Kingston, Jamaica Kingston is the capital and largest city of Jamaica, located on the southeastern coast of the island. It faces a natural harbour protected by the Palisadoes, a long sand spit which connects the town of Port Royal and the Norman Manley Inter ...

, in the 1970s,Dub Poetry
''

Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

'' last on-line access in 9/17/2012. as well as in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, England and

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, Canada, cities which have large populations of

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

immigrants. The term "Dub Poetry" was coined by Dub artist

Linton Kwesi Johnson Linton Kwesi Johnson (born 24 August 1952), also known as LKJ, is a Jamaica-born, British-based dub poet and activist. In 2002 he became the second living poet, and the only black one, to be published in the Penguin Modern Classics series. His p ...

in 1976, and further popularized by artist Oku Onoura, which consists of

spoken word Spoken word refers to an oral poetic performance art that is based mainly on the poem as well as the performer's aesthetic qualities. It is a late 20th century continuation of an ancient oral artistic tradition that focuses on the aesthetics of ...

over reggae rhythms, originally found on the backing or "version" side of a 12 or 6 inch vinyl record. Unlike

deejaying A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music festival), mobile ...

(also known as toasting), which also features the use of the spoken word, the dub poet's performance is normally prepared, rather than the extemporized chat of the

dancehall Dancehall is a genre of Jamaican popular music that originated in the late 1970s. Initially, dancehall was a more sparse version of reggae than the roots style, which had dominated much of the 1970s.Barrow, Steve & Dalton, Peter (2004) "The Rou ...

dee jay. In musical setting, the dub poet usually appears on stage with a band performing music specifically written to accompany each poem, rather than simply performing over the top of dub plates, or

riddim Riddim is the Jamaican Patois pronunciation of the English word "rhythm". In the context of reggae and dancehall, it refers to the instrumental accompaniment to a song and is synonymous with the rhythm section. Jamaican music genres that use the ...

s, in the dancehall fashion.

Musicality Musicality (''music-al -ity'') is "sensitivity to, knowledge of, or talent for music" or "the quality or state of being musical", and is used to refer to specific if vaguely defined qualities in pieces and/or genres of music, such as melodiousness ...

is built into dub poems, yet dub poets generally perform without backing music, delivering chanted speech with pronounced rhythmic accentuation and dramatic stylization of gesture. Sometimes dub music effects such as echo and reverb are dubbed spontaneously by a poet into live versions of a poem. Many dub poets also employ

call-and-response Call and response is a form of interaction between a speaker and an audience in which the speaker's statements ("calls") are punctuated by responses from the listeners. This form is also used in music, where it falls under the general category of ...

devices to engage audiences.

Political nature

Dub poetry has been a vehicle for political and social commentary, with none of the braggadocio often associated with the dancehall. The odd love-song or

elegy An elegy is a poem of serious reflection, and in English literature usually a lament for the dead. However, according to ''The Oxford Handbook of the Elegy'', "for all of its pervasiveness ... the 'elegy' remains remarkably ill defined: sometime ...

appears, but dub poetry is predominantly concerned with politics and social justice, commonly voiced through a commentary on current events (thus sharing these elements with dancehall and "conscious" or "roots"

reggae Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, " Do the Reggay" was the first popular song to use ...

music).

Notable albums

Dub poetry has been established itself as a major form of black popular art and its breakthrough was made through Linton Kwesi Johnson's (LKJ)'s seminal album ''

Dread Beat an' Blood ''Dread Beat an' Blood'' is the debut album by Poet and the Roots released in 1978 on the Front Line label. It was produced by Vivian Weathers and Linton Kwesi Johnson. The "Poet" is dub poet Johnson and "the Roots" are Dennis Bovell, Lloyd "J ...

'', which was released in the UK in 1978.

Oku Onuora Oku Nagba Ozala Onuora (born Orlando Wong, 9 March 1952), known as the "father of Jamaican dub poetry" is a Jamaican dub poet and performer. Biography Orlando Wong was born in Kingston, Jamaica, in 1952.Habekost, Christian (1993) ''Verbal Riddi ...

's ''Reflection In Red'' in 1979, was the first Jamaican recording of a dub poem, followed by

Lillian Allen Lillian Allen (born 5 April 1951) is a Canadian dub poet, reggae musician, writer and Juno Award winner. Biography Born in Spanish Town, Jamaica, she left that country in 1969, first moving to New York City, where she studied English at the Ci ...

's ''Revolutionary Tea Party'' and

Benjamin Zephaniah Benjamin Obadiah Iqbal Zephaniah (born 15 April 1958)Gregory, Andy (2002), ''International Who's Who in Popular Music 2002'', Europa, p. 562. . is a British writer and dub poet. He was included in ''The Times'' list of Britain's top 50 post-wa ...

's ''Rasta'', both produced in 1983, and many others from the early 1980s onwards such as Anti Social Workers 'Positive Style' produced by leading dub producer The Mad Professor on Ariwa Records..

Toronto

Toronto, Ontario Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, Canada, has the second highest concentration of dub poets, preceded by Jamaica and followed by England

Afua Cooper Afua Cooper (born 8 November 1957) is a Jamaican-born Canadian historian. In 2018 she is an associate professor of sociology at Dalhousie University. She is an author and dub poet. As of 2018 she has published five volumes of poetry.

, and

Ahdri Zhina Mandiela Ahdri Zhina Mandiela (born May 10, 1953) is a Toronto-based dub poet, theatre producer, and artistic director. She has gained worldwide acclaim for her books, music recordings, film, theatre and dance productions.

are among the founding mothers of the Canadian dub poetry legacy. The Dub Poets Collective, established in Toronto in 2003, organized a total of five dub poetry festivals, three national and two international, between the years of 2004 and 2010.

United Kingdom

LKJ still runs LKJ Records in the UK, a label that publishes both his own books and music, as well as that of other musicians and poets.

continues to publish in the UK. He has written novels as well as poetry. He was put forward for the post of

Oxford Professor of Poetry The Professor of Poetry is an academic appointment at the University of Oxford. The chair was created in 1708 by an endowment from the estate of Henry Birkhead. The professorship carries an obligation to lecture, but is in effect a part-time po ...

in 1989 and British

Poet Laureate A poet laureate (plural: poets laureate) is a poet officially appointed by a government or conferring institution, typically expected to compose poems for special events and occasions. Albertino Mussato of Padua and Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch) ...

in 1999, and in 2003 was also offered an OBE, which he declined. Many dub poets have published their work as volumes of written poetry as well as albums of poetry with music.

References

External links

Kei Miller Kei Miller (born 24 October 1978) is a Jamaican poet, fiction writer, essayist and blogger. He is also a professor of creative writing."a smaller sound, a lesser fury: A Eulogy for Dub Poetry"
''Small Axe'' 14, November 2013. {{DEFAULTSORT:Dub Poetry Jamaican styles of music Reggae genres Genres of poetry