Yuri Miki (Japan)

Tokyo-based spoken word artist/slammer/slammaster.

Yuri Miki is the head of “KOTOBA Slam Japan”, her country’s National Poetry Slam organisation. She’s also the first female national champion and has won this title two years in a row (2017/2018), making her one of the most noted slammers in Japan, Asia. 

She started her poetic career as a teenager when she won a newspaper award for her haikus. At the time, she played classic piano, sang in a punk rock band, too. Her works are often for empowerment for Asian women, freedom from sexual repression, a hybrid of classical Japanese elements and punk and avant-garde style. She organised “Ueno Poetrican Jam 5 & 6”, the largest poetry festival in Japan’s history, attracting about 2000 people.