By Staff Writer
In August of 2016, Natasha Hooper and Amen Ra were honored to represent the city of San Diego at the National Poetry Slam in Decatur, Georgia. Along with teammates Rudy Francisco, Anita Dias and Nicole Lawson, they placed 2nd in a field of 72 teams from across the country performing spoken word poetry.
In the championship round of the competition, Rudy, Natasha and Ra performed a group poem entitled ‘Islamophobia’ highlighting how observers of Islam are unjustly persecuted for the actions of radicals within the faith.
A video of the performance later went viral, garnering millions of views across multiple social media platforms.
Ra and Natasha were recently contacted by the Technological Institution of Buenos Aries to serve as keynote speakers at their annual South American Business Forum August 3rd to 5th. The theme of this year’s conference is “Challenging Identity” and they thought bringing the poets in to perform ‘Islamophobia’ in front of young business leaders from around the world would be a perfect addition to the spirit of the conference.
While the institution will cover room and boarding expenses, a flight from San Diego to Argentina is not in their budget. Hooper and Ra are asking the San Diego community they represent for help funding the flight.
The two have a Go Fund Me page and their campaign has raised half of their goal.
“As tensions continue to rise around current events surrounding terror attacks, we believe the relevancy of our poem is paramount as ever,” said Ra. “Our goal as performers is to try and reach at least one person in every audience who hears us. The potential is endless for what positive action could come from a room of influential minds gathered at a conference like this. We would love your support as we align ourselves with unity when others promote terror and separation.”
Click here to see a video of their ‘Islamaphobia’ poem and to donate to their campaign.
