INDUSTRIAL CULTURE POETRY IN AMERICA

Industrial Culture Poetry recognizes the working man and the woes brought to him by Industrial Culture.  It may use romantic natural images as a reference for what might have been.  It does not actually use them in an overly glorious or nostalgic way. It uses many industrial images such as smoke, heat, drugs, sewage, traffic, capitalism.  It more than anything else brings to the forefront the negative attributes of the culture so they may be changed to improve the common man's lot.

From the mid 1940's to 1965 the spoken word (stand up) poetry scene was dominated by homosexual issues and surrealism.  The homosexual issues were the break out of the closet that was coming at that time.  The surrealism was just the incomprehensible images that Salvador Dali made famous.  At the end of their dominance in poetry (Be aware their genre continues to this day but without the domination) there was also the "Happening" movement in art.  Very similar to surrealism but distinctly different than contemporary performance art.

This thirty year Industrial Culture Poetry domination was brought about by the "paradise lost" concept.  (The Romantic poetry and art movement was also created because of the "paradise lost" concept)  At the birth of Industrial Culture Poetry the military industrial complex was all powerful and America was flexing it's muscle in all parts of the world.  It became obvious in the Vietnam Conflict but it was world wide.  The people of America just could not see it.  Much like today in the Mid East conflict.  The state controlled media and education system will not give the people enough information so they can think for themselves.  In any case the creative ones saw that paradise was lost and tried to regain it by distributing, through their poetry, the flaws of industrialism.

In the early 1980's in America the media/education system began to praise the military/industrial aspects of the Capitalist society.  It seems that the Industrial Culture Poets made a last stand (In Dayton Ohio at the three last coffee houses; Front Street, EFX, and Plan-B - all were closed by the mid '90's)  but could not overcome the consumerism obsession by their society.  About this time "Slam Poetry" was invented/created.  It is where poets stand up in front of an audience, usually a bar, therefore a drunken audience, and are numerically judged by audience members that may or may not know anything about poetry.  Also, at this time "Rap" music created by African Americans came into vogue.  This rap type spoken word seemed to work well for a slam and a drunken audience. Slam poetry essentially became "White Boy Rap".  Concerns about the military/industrial Capitalist complex did not fit this genre and went by the wayside.

I would like to point out that Romantic Poetry permeated during all the span of these genre's.  It seems that Romantic Poetry and Art is a mainstay.  However,  you have to be aware, that creativity and the need to create bring about the new poetry movements.  It is a lot like the Artist/Poet sees a society that has terrible flaws and he is compelled to right them with creativity.  Those that did not see the flaws or saw no need to express them, continued with traditional Romantic Poetry.  I personally would say (and have said) that Civilization died after Romantic Poetry so all the true intellectuals are trying to create something new.  Something above and beyond this 10,000 years of failed Civilization.

Jack Bowman 2002

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