What is the problem we are addressing?
Living in Doha for most of my life, I noticed a lack of accessible open expression spaces that focus on different types of art. There was not -to my knowledge at least- a space that welcomes spoken word, poetry, and music talents without any restrictions to age, gender or ethnicity, and free of charge. Spaces that also support these talents and help them grow their different talents. Often if such spaces exist, they either come with preconditions or they are very expensive. If such initiatives exist, there is a lack of consistency and investment in participants.
What is our solution?
Words & Strings offers a welcoming open space that embraces spoken word, poetry and musical talents from all backgrounds and ages. We bridge the gap between talents and the lack of space for them to shine a light and nurture them by hosting regular events where they can participate and share their talents, holding workshops to help them grow and be more confident with them sharing their talents, and building a supportive environment and community of like-minded people who can help and learn from each other. We also use our website to publish and feature some of our poets and their works. Words & Strings have been doing all that for over 5 years now and we are proud of the work we have done and our growing community.
An overview of our impact
- The audience’s numbers have increased dramatically since we started in 2015, we used to have around 40-50 people in the audience, and in the last couple of events we had about 300~ people. Also, the number of performers has increased, from around 9 or 10 performers per event in the first year, to around 15 performers in the last couple of events, with additional performers in a waiting list.
- We have seen improvement in the quality of performances of regular performers, due to our events and workshops.
- We have been featured in Doha News, Marhaba Magazine and Gulf Times.
Examples of implementation
- Since 2015, we have been holding regular events, workshops and our community have been growing steadily. One of our regular poets, Abir Bouguerra, has gone on to publish a book of poems. Another regular performer, Manan Bhavnani, was very shy and hesitant about performing his poems on stage, but since then he performed at our stage in different languages, and he has been working on different writing projects of his own. Both have participated in our events and workshop from early on and showed amazing growth and support.
- If you are not sure about performing or you feel nervous, if it is your first time performing, know that this is a very safe and supporting environment. We usually end our events with a small segment called “on the spot” where people from the audience can sign up on the spot to perform, and that encourages many that were not even thinking about performing before. Participate in our workshops if you would like to improve your skills and talents, whatever your confidence and skill level, we have something for you.
What are our future goals?
Words & Strings have been growing for over 5 years now, although this year has hindered some of our plans, but we are still hopeful for the future and what we can achieve. We hope to see a venue we can partner with to host our events regularly. We also plan on having international poets and spoken word artists to visit us, to participate in our events, share their experiences and expertise with our community in the form of workshops and talks. We also plan on publishing a book of poetry featuring some of our amazing poets, to celebrate them and their growth. In addition, we hope to have different types of partnerships that will enable us to interact with wider audiences that may have not heard of us before.
How can someone else implement it? What do they need?
All someone needs to implement this innovation, is a supportive team and a vision that revolves around uplifting members of the community. Another important thing to have is a venue or a partnership with a space willing to have the events and workshops in.
