'Lost Voices' Video: He Speaks as Her and She Speaks as Him with Potent Impact

June 27, 2015, 5:34 PM

Darius Simpson (left) and Scout Bostley delivered this imaginative, powerful spoken word performance at the College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational in Richmond, Va.

They and two Eastern Michigan University teammates collectively placed third in a judged competition against 68 other universities, including Harvard and Columbia.

The three-minute presentation of "Lost Voices" above shows how strong EMU's entrants are. Bostley, a Grand Blanc sophomore, and team captain Simpson, a senior from Akron, Ohio, tell how African Americans and women are marginalized. The whoa now grabber is that they take turns speaking in . . . well, watch for yourself and you'll see why this earns more than 1.8 million views in 11 days,   

Simpson, a political science major who also uses the name Darius King, is president of the EMU Poetry Society. Bostley is managing editor of The Eastern Echo student newspaper. She has a double major in English and women and gender studies.

“I am extremely proud of our team for taking third," Simpson, who coached the team, says in a university media release. "We brought something to the table that no one else did, and we will not be easily forgotten.”

EMU was the only Michigan school at the March 25-28 event. Others on the Ypsilanti team are senior Gabriel Green of Pontiac and senior Tiran Burrell of Detroit.

-- Alan Stamm


Read more:  YouTube


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