learning journal 04.02: justifying a waste of time

The genesis of this post may seem really trivial (okay, okay, it really is), but I think there are some interesting cultural implications worth analyzing. So, onto the subject of my starting point: America's Next Top Model (ANTM). The current season is called the "British Invasion" because there are British models competing with American models for the title of America's Next Top Model. This show is mostly  a waste of time, which is why it's a perfect distraction from my homework when I just don't want to think about anything. But here's what I found interesting about this season:

Actually, first off I'll address a likely concern. Because this is a reality show, and they are largely scripted, I realize we have to take everything with a grain of salt. I might come back to the scripted element of the show, because I could definitely comment on that as well. Okay, now I'll get started:

• ANTM is pitting the American girls against the British girls. Although, in the end, this is an individual competition (because there will only be one winner), the television show seems bent on creating as much drama as possible, and of course they will exploit the cultural differences to the maximum. By doing this, however, the television show is creating an unfair comparison between the two cultures. It's never productive to ask "which is better?" when it comes to culture, so even though there will only be one winner, they are going to make a big deal out of whether or not it's an American or a Brit. By pitting the two teams against each other, they are unconsciously showing fans that one must be better than the other. It's not a celebration of two cultures coming together; it's a commentary on which one is better. 
• The cultures are represented unfairly. One episode there was a challenge where each team had to eat traditional foods from the other country. Problem is, they picked some of the most disgusting, weird, and off-the-wall food items (okay, there were some normal things), and the girls themselves commented on how disgusting "American" food or "British" food was. This is a perfect example of stereotyping based on the least amount of information possible. The girls, sadly enough, don't seem smart enough to figure out that the show was selecting perhaps the least appetizing foods. Oh, and that reminds me of something else. Often, the American girls are stereotyped as stupid and the British girls are stereotyped as snobby. This is a classic example of two cultures coming together and not understanding social cues. In all reality, most of the girls on the show act pretty stupid, but ANTM seems to highlight this more in the Americans. The Brits seem to be constantly judging and looking down at the Americans for being loud, obnoxious, stupid, and inexperienced. A lot of these differences could be explained by cultural differences, but I think most of it is explained by what the show chooses to broadcast (or not broadcast). They seem to want to represent both cultures negatively in some way, and they are definitely successful in that. 
• The judges seem to view the competition as a "celebration of two cultures coming together," but it's actually just a bloodbath. The rooms they sleep in are conveniently sectioned off into the "UK room" and the "Yankee room." 90% of the interactions between the two cultures are cat fights, so something is clear: the show is pretending to sell it as a celebration of culture, but are really selling it as drama, drama, drama. 

Okay, so what in the world does this have to do with my project besides the fact that I'm American and I'm going to the UK? Let me 'splain. I think if either culture looks to television and media (especially reality television) as a sole indicator of culture, both are in for a big shock. Television shows like ANTM are doing nothing to help people appreciate differences--they are merely exploiting them for drama and money. While they could have an opportunity to bring the two cultures in a way that they could learn from each other, they are focused on the negative differences and the ways cultures collide. Even when American television depicts Americans and British television depicts British people, they are still using stereotypes and caricatures which are unfairly representative of either culture. There are so many different aspects of culture that we can't rely on media to give us an accurate representation of culture. If I were to go to England with the expectation that they are all like the ANTM British models, I am setting myself up for a disaster. Why? Well, I think that as is true with most situations, you find what you are looking for. If I'm expecting Brits to be snobby and I focus on that as I interact with them, I will probably find enough examples to support my claim, and I will have missed out on great interactions with the people. I think the best way to enter a different culture is to expect there to be differences, but try not to make judgments on the people before you begin your actual interaction. That way your actions aren't tainted by previous judgment. 

In short, no one should use ANTM as an accurate representation of either British OR American cultures. I don't know who would, but I'm sure there is a whole slew of teenyboppers who are susceptible to believing such crap is actually all true. In fact, I wouldn't recommend watching the show at all! I am definitely going to keep watching this season, though, because I'm looking forward to who they crown the winner (will it be a Brit, telling us that they are better than us? or will they crown an American to reinforce ideals of American exceptionalism? I have to know!) 

In other words, do as I say and not as I do. The end.

annotated source 04.02

Benson, Arthur. "The Art of the Essayist." 1922. Quotidiana. Ed. Patrick Madden. 13 Oct. 2008. Web. 29 Mar. 2012

This essay, much like Alexander Smith's "On the Writing of Essays," explores the idea of the essayist persona instead of focusing on the essay itself. This also reinforces the notion that in order to write essays, one must be an essayist. Benson writes that essayists must be curious, realistic, alert, and "emotional in a reverential way." Describing these characteristics of essayists is interesting to me because it shows me more and more that essaying is a way of life, rather than a mere occupation (and if it were a mere occupation, it would be a poor occupation, because it's not the most lucrative career out there). This is relevant to my project because while in London I will continue my pursuit to be an essayist, and there I will have more time to actually focus my life on my project, which is essay writing. It will be an excellent time to both observe the world around me and write about it.

annotated source 03.30: agnes repplier

Repplier, Agnes. “Words.” 1893. Quotidiana. Ed. Patrick Madden. 10 Apr 2007. Web. 30 Mar 2012.


This essay explores the important role of words in writing, and in it Repplier mourns that writers often don't appreciate the power of words. She uses a metaphor I love: "Musicians know the value of chords; painters know the value of colors; writers are so often blind to the value of words." I think this is definitely true--writers often just throw words together without thinking about their specific impact. I can definitely attest to that, and this is why Repplier's argument in this essay is so relevant to me and my project. It's essential for me to continue learning to appreciate the value of words as a writer, and this essay is a helpful reference to help me out with that venture. 
Favorite Repplier quote: "For every sentence that may be penned or spoken the right words exist." 


Boom. 

T

annotated source 03.28

Schwabe, Liesl. "The Intimacy of Forks." Creative Nonfiction 41(Spring 2011): 16-19. Print

Creative Nonfiction is one of the literary journals I have explored lately. It's definitely a "reach" journal, as far as my own chances of publication go, but as I read the essays published in the journal, I find them stylistically within my foreseeable reach. "The Intimacy of Forks" is an interesting essay exploring a waitress' observations of customers who come and go from the restaurant she works at. It falls into the personal essay camp because it combines scene (and some narration or dialogue) with rumination and exploration of the author's mind. Here's one quote that exemplifies what I'm trying to describe: "Despite all the awkward interactions, moments of shared understanding flicker through most every exchange. We recognize one another in the simplicity of eye contact, which buoys my faith but can also break my heart. I will never forget the plaid shirt and the rolled jeans of the man whose hand shook so much he couldn't get his spoon to his mouth. Now, his wife comes in along to order take-out, which we rarely do, except for people we like" (19).

Fantastico. One of the characteristics I love about essays (and what often distinguishes an essay from a memoir) is the addition of personal insight (hindsight) into the narrative, where the writer is allowed to be transparent about feelings and judgments; in other words, in essays, authors "show AND tell," whereas in other forms of literature writers are told to "show, NOT tell." So, yes, good essay.

learning journal 03.28: literary experiments

As I have read and studied essay theory this semester, I have continued to experiment with that               

theory in my own writing. This piece I wrote trying to explore the ambiguity of truth and fact, to    

incorporate what I've learned. This is a current attempt:

Pictured Truth

~I have a black and white photograph of a couple sitting on the porch steps of a white brick house. The young man is sitting in an easy, relaxed position—a bit slouched, both legs bent but one more extended than the other. He is gangly, charming, and holding a ukulele. His plaid button-down hangs loosely on his body, and his jeans are folded up at the cuff, showing his argyle socks and broken-in loafers. His grin probably has more to do with the young woman whose arm is draped around his shoulders than it has to do with the camera. He is looking at the camera, but she isn’t; she is looking at him, and her smile is only for him. Her cheek is resting in her hand, and her knees are drawn nearly up to her chest; where he is gangly she is graceful, and her profile as she looks at him is delicately fine. Her shirt, plaid like his, is paired with white capris and ballet flats; her short wavy hair—which, from what I guess looking at the black-and-white picture—is light brown, and perfectly in place. She adores him.

It’s not only the way she is looking at him that suggests they love each other; he is leaning into her, one of his knees is touching hers ever so slightly. A sense of familiarity seems to exist between them that goes beyond the photograph; I may only think that, however, because the couple pictured are my grandparents, and the familiarity that exists between them now translates into my perception of the photo. They seemed so unaffected by future troubles, troubles that their present selves have born. Their black-and-white forms in this photograph are merely shades of the grandparents I know now; and yet, the shades are as familiar to me as the true, colorful forms I know now and remember from my childhood. I wrote true in the last sentence, something that slipped from my fingers but now seems erroneous: what was true then is just as much true as what is true now—just through a different lens, with a different exposure. My grandma is still graceful but perhaps not as willowy as she is pictured; the way she looks at my grandpa is still admiration but deeper, with a longer history. My grandpa’s crooked smile still exists even though change has altered his once lanky frame. The mischief visible in the picture is still there, though he now has fewer moments of seemingly careless ease.

Careless ease is probably another misconception as true was in the paragraph above. My grandma and grandpa took this picture shortly after being married in 1952, and they are sitting on the porch steps of their first apartment in Atlanta, where my grandpa was stationed in the army. There can’t be too many moments of careless ease in a soldier’s life, especially because shortly after this picture was taken he was deployed to Korea, where he saw and experienced the inexpressible terror of war that I don’t understand and never will. He spoke very little about the war throughout the next few decades; it wasn’t until the past ten years or so that he broke his silence and began telling his war story. He and my grandma wrote hundreds of letters throughout the time he was in the army. At first, they wrote while they were engaged, when he was in training and she was a senior in high school; they then married and moved to Atlanta while he finished he training. They resumed their letter writing again while he was in Korea—so while the rest of the family remained ignorant of details for decades, my grandma knew what he had been through and kept his confidence. So, in reality, her careless ease in this picture likely hid worries of losing her husband, of widowhood, of loneliness. Just looking at this picture alone, it seems like the couple had nary a care in the world; under the surface, though, there is much I could speculate about what was going through their minds. Worry, doubt, fear, anxiety, determination to just hold on, to just have hope.

I realize that what I know of them from my memories and what I know of them from this photograph represent a scant view of their lives together, of their relationship. I assume they clung to each other; I assume he told her about the horror of war; I assume so much that my perception has little chance of coinciding with their true selves and true experiences. I know little through their stories, stories from my dad, stories from my aunts and uncles, but I’m not sure I will ever understand who they were and are—the “truth.”  Identity, though, might never be truth; it is always in flux, and it is always impossible to pin down. So all I can do is cling to the shards of truth, and I will have to be satisfied that I will probably never understand the whole picture, understand their true selves.

           

  Meanwhile, I just realized: I didn’t know my grandpa played the ukulele. 

learning journal 03.26: looking ahead

Because I'm in the Creative Writing MFA program, I have definitely become more invested in the idea of publishing. Writing my project proposal for this class has helped me to solidify my future publication goals, mainly because I plan to write extensively while I'm in London, so this will help add to my pool of publishable material. But it's also been helpful because it has made me more alert to the type of literary journals and other places where I could publish my work. I've been researching some literary journals lately in hopes that I could find some that publish the type of work I write. Also, it shows me what I could aspire to as a writer--shows me what kind of work is being published in the current literary atmosphere. I thought I'd share a couple examples of current literary journals where I could send my work:

Ruminate Magazine (http://www.ruminatemagazine.com/)
Ruminate's tagline is "chewing on life, faith, and art," which immediately interested me because I feel that my beliefs and faith come up in my writing, and sometimes it's hard to find a venue eager to publish spiritual writing. From what I can tell about the magazine, they publish mainly fiction and poetry, but they seem to have at least a couple of essays in each issue. So it might be harder to publish essays, but it's possible that they don't receive as many nonfiction submissions (and from what I've heard, that is often the case). So the fact that they publish less essays than they do short stories and poetry shouldn't necessarily discourage me from submitting. They publish quarterly, and they look for pieces that "resonate with the complexity and truth of the Christian faith." Although the essays I write in London may not be essentially "spiritual" writing, my faith has a way of creeping into my writing, so it's something that I often drift into. One of the essays I read could also be categorized as a travel essay, but it dealt with spiritual issues. This is an interesting magazine I'd love to continue exploring.

Ecotone Journal (http://www.ecotonejournal.com/)
The Ecotone website says that they look for work that "seeks to reimagine place." Thematically, place often comes up in my essays, because I think that so much of who we are as people comes from where we originate. So any attempt to explore myself as a person tends to come back to an exploration of place. Place will be an essential part of my field studies project, as I will be looking at the connection between British essayists and London, and because I will be in London there will be an added dimension of my own experiences with place. This journal seems to publish a lot more nonfiction than Ruminate does, which is good to know. I always love to know when journals either favor or welcome a lot of nonfiction and personal essay. Especially because my field study project as well as my master's thesis will be a collection of personal essays. Good to keep in mind!

annotated source 03.26

Arthur, Chris. "An Essay on the Esse." The Pedestrian vol 2, 2009. Web. 21 March 2012. 


This is yet another example of a theoretical essay that exemplifies what an essay can look like while commenting on the actual form. Very meta. Arthur's essay explores the "essay" as a literary genre, comparing it to "esse," which means "essential nature, essence, to be, etc.," and "esse," a type of wood-burning stove that was in his home growing up. These may seem like disparate things, but he comments on the connection (and the use of seemingly obscure connections in essays) towards the end, saying:


"Touch the Esse with the hand of the essay and all sorts of windows open up. It is cocooned in a delicate tracery of stories. Pull on one thread and it awakens the lives of those in foundry and warehouse, in canal barges and in shop, all the hands that touched this cube of iron. Pull on another thread and the ore from which the Esse was forged takes us back to the geological age when it was laid down in the earth..."
(I could have gone on, because Arthur's prose is so dazzlingly beautiful, but I'll spare you the reading time.) 


There is value in meta essays because a writer like me, trying to better understand the form and function of essays, can see how other essayists understand the essay--and they explain it in a way that follows the form they are writing about. Arthur's essay is extremely helpful because it accomplishes this meta-commentary. And it helps that his prose is, as I mentioned, dazzlingly beautiful. If you don't believe me, you should read this essay. The second paragraph is one of my favorites. Arthur is one of my favorite essayists, and this essay reinforces that favoritism. 

annotated source 03.23

Church, Steven. "Auscultation." The Pedestrian No. 2

This is a very moving essay by Steven Church that I look at as a contemporary interpretation of the classical essay. It explores the different avenues of one word/idea (auscultation, stethoscopes), and contains stories and observations of the world around the author, as well as a bit of personal experience from the author's life. This is a great example to look at because it follows the style of looking at the world through the eyes of the author without the author telling us about his/her whole life. Scott Russell Sanders said in an interview: "My writing is personal, but it's not confessional. I don't present myself as the focus of interest. Rather, I am a witness who glimpses things, has hunches about things, and wants to convey those glimpses and hunches to the reader..."

This Steven Church essay exemplifies this quote, a quote which is common of classical British essays. They weren't confessional in nature as much as they were observatory--personal in that they were writing about the world through their own eyes and interpreting thus, but not personal in that they were airing out their dirty laundry. If you get a chance to read this essay, you should definitely do so.

Here's a link to the full-text version in the online journal The Pedestrian: http://thepedestrian.org/issues/no2/3

Enjoy!

learning journal 03.21: beautiful sentences

I think it's important to pay particular attention to beautiful writing on a sentence level, and really dissect what works (and doesn't) in other authors' writing. I have taken 10 sentences from my recent reading and analyzed why they are as fantastic as I think they are. As I write essays, I want to pay more attention to my writing on a sentences level, and learn how to craft beautiful sentences.

1. “Through the broken casements we watch the flitting shadows of the dead, and the saddest shadows of them all are the shadows of our own dead selves.” (“On Memory,” Jerome K Jerome. Quotidana.) I really love the mouthfeel of this sentence. Reading it out loud emphasizes the alliteration of the s, as well as the repetition of the word “shadows.” Typically when I end up repeating a word three times in one sentence, it just sounds like I couldn’t think of any other word to use or any better phrasing. Jerome, on the other hand, seems to repeat intentionally—and I think he is successful because of his adjectives (“flitting,” “saddest”), which in and of themselves may not be the most original or astounding adjective, but the combination of the words together leaves an eerie chill in my mouth as I picture the shadows of my dead self. Excellent.

2. “Such, thought I, shall be my method this evening; and since it is that day of the year which I dedicate to the memory of such in another life as I much delighted in when living, an hour or two shall be sacred to sorrow and their memory, while I run over all the melancholy circumstances of this kind which have occurred to me in my whole life.” (“An Hour or Two Sacred to Sorrow,” Richard Steele. APE.) First, I could probably dedicate a whole annotation like this to the phrase “sacred to sorrow,” which just kills me with its beauty. “An hour or two shall be sacred to sorrow and their memory.” Really, though? How can he have written something so beautiful? I don’t know that I could even tell you why it entrances me so, except that the pairing of “sacred” with “sorrow” is genius. Besides that phrase, I love the flow of the sentence. It seems to start and end with an almost business-like precision, leading to and falling away from the climax of the sentence, which is, of course, my favorite part.

3. “It was not the least of the satisfactions in my survey, to go up stairs, and pass the shops of agreeable females; to observe so many pretty hands busie in the foldings of ribbands, and the utmost eagerness of agreeable faces in the sale of patches, pins, and wires, on each side the counters, was an amusement, in which I should longer have indulged my self, had not the dear creatures called me to ask what I wanted, when I could not answer, only to look at you.” (“Twenty-Four Hours in London,” Richard Steele. APE.) I always admire long (correct) sentences. I always try to write long flowing sentences, and I’m never quite sure if I succeed or not. This sentence is delightful because I can picture perfectly what Steele is observing, and I can sense a fondness in his tone for the women he is observing. The style is charming yet almost strictly observatory in nature, making it a good example for what I’d like to achieve in my “Observation and Analysis” essay.

4. “So I saw things, but never about myself.  I saw a meteor light up the sky for an instant, saw two tons of butter carved into an astronaut, saw nine bald eagles sitting on a bank by a river.  I saw a pork tenderloin as big as my face, saw two hundred crows in a tree beside a sandwich shop, saw a field look green where all that yellow met all that blue.” (“Still Things,” Amy Butcher. Brevity 38.) This is more than one sentence, but I felt that all three depended on each other for maximum impact. The reason I like these sentences is the juxtaposition of images held within: the meteor, butter carved into an astronaut, eagles, pork, crows, and a field. Each of these images is interesting in and of itself, like the carved butter, but put together the writer achieves a mesh of startling images that the reader imagines as they go through the list. What is most effective is that the list of items is preceded by “I saw things, but never about myself.” As I read what follows, I can imagine the author seeing these things—observing the outside world, but for some reason not able to see herself.

5. “High on the walls mirrors with blind patches were hung, multiplying the flickering of the firelight and reflecting shifting images.” (“Dr. Henry Selwin,” W.G. Sebald. The Emigrants.) Sebald’s writing can be so entrancing, and this sentence exemplifies this perfectly. As I read this sentence, I close my eyes and see the scene he describes, see the light refracting as it passes through the mirrors, distorted by the blind patches but still reflecting the images. His use of the passive voice is interesting, and I typically try to edit out most of the passive voice in my writing and my students’ writing, but in this sentence I feel that the passive voice is preferable because it puts emphasis on the mirrors themselves, not whoever hung them. On top of all that, I feel this sentence encapsulates much of Sebald’s writing; it’s almost like his essays were the mirrors with blind patches, reflecting images that are shifting, not stagnant, and multiplying the influence of whatever he’s writing about.

6. “The silent symbolic notes that are sounded in the heart by the gesture of laying a dead infant on a swan’s wing and placing it thus cushioned in the grave, play gently over a range of comforting tones with unobtrusive virtuosity.” (“Swan Song,” Chris Arthur. Words of the Grey Wind.) Chris Arthur is a beautiful sentence rock star, if you ask me. This particular sentence is interesting because it subtly uses music to carry the reader through the image: “notes that are sounded in the heart…play gently over a range of comforting tones.” He is dealing with the topic of death so very gently, and his words are crafted as carefully as the scene he describes where a dead infant is buried on a swan’s wing. He is able to pack so much punch into this one image of the infant on a swan’s wing that the image carries the entire essay. Love it.

7. “To me there is no room for naifs or solemn primitives in the essay; it's a performance of extreme sophistication, the argument rising or falling on the basis of verbal nuance, persona pirouette, exposure of unconscious contradiction in oneself and others.” (“A Resurgence of the Essay,” Phillip Lopate. Random house: <boldtype>.) I like this sentence for its concision and straightforwardness. Despite its concision, though, it’s not plain or undecorated. Phrases like “persona pirouette” and “exposure of unconscious contradiction” color the sentence and add interest to the matter-of-fact tone that Lopate creates throughout this essay. Also, his diction is subtly consistent: he uses “performance of extreme sophistication” and “persona pirouette,” and I suddenly see the essay as a dance. Also, I really like the word “naïf.”

8. “Besides, this is what is practiced every day in Westminster Hall, where nothing is more usual than to see a couple of lawyers, who have been tearing each other to pieces in the court, embracing one another as soon as they are out of it.” (“Nicolini and the Lions,” Joseph Addison. APE.) Although Addison and Steele’s essays are grouped together in APE (I’m not really sure why), it’s amazing how different their styles are. Here is a perfect example from “Nicolini and the Lions” of how subtly hilarious Addison is. Upon first glance, it seems so matter of fact that it couldn’t possibly be funny, but upon revisiting the sentence, you really can’t help but smile. The comparison between squabbling lawyers and lions tearing each other apart and then embracing is delightfully executed.

9. “This is a mystery I am content to witness without understanding, like my toaster, my computer, my wife’s love, my children’s wonder, my father’s long wisdom, and the ways we resist and rely on each other, we grow and emphasize, meet another soul along the way, and resonate.” (“Buying a Bass,” Patrick Madden. Wabash, Fall 2011). I couldn’t help but include a sentence from this essay that I completely enjoyed. I remember Patrick Madden saying once that “beautiful writing is correct writing,” and I haven’t really gotten it out of my head since. This sentence takes on a sprawling, Brian Doyle-esque quality, but still maintains grammatical correctness and precision. Besides being sprawling and correct, I love the transitions and tone shifts in this sentence. From “my computer” to “my wife’s love, my children’s wonder, and my father’s long wisdom,” the sentence deepens in meaning. It subtly goes from lighthearted, from a computer to a toaster, to sincere, and I love it.

10. “Before perhaps she’s even developed ears, she resonates sound in her bones and tissue, her whole body trembling like a tuning fork to the everyday noise of our lives—the howling passing of trains, the white noise of the 180 and 41 freeways, barking dogs, the nightly oscillating drone of the police helicopters, and on better nights the soft sounds of her brother reading to his mother’s belly, talking into the button, his voice vibrating through the amniotic drum.” (“All of a Dither,” Steven Church. AGNI.) This sentence kills me. I don’t even know if I could put into words all that I love about it. It’s another long sentence, sprawling and still correct, so I admire that about it, but just like the previous sentence, the beautiful structure of the sentence is only the skeleton, and what fills in between the cracks—“howling passing of trains,” “nightly oscillating drone,” “soft sounds of her brother reading,” “voice vibrating through the amniotic drum”—is what gives it punch. With the last two sentences, I love the fact that they both talk about family in a way that resists sentimentality and portrays love without being sappy. This is something I’d love to incorporate into my essays because I want to write about family and I want to write optimistically without being naïve or sentimental. As these last two sentences show, I have examples to help me in that endeavor.

annotated source 03.21

Prose, Francine. "Learning from Chekov." Reading Like a Writer. New York: Harper Collins, 2006. Print.

First of all, I wanted to point out how fantastic it is that the author's last name is "Prose." As an aspiring writer, I would die for a last name like that. Anyway, one of my professors recommended this essay to me  as we were discussing my upcoming prospectus and thesis, because I am going to be taking on the same themes about classical essay style, writing from a tradition, etc., that I will be working with for my field study project. Anyway, this essay talks about Prose's experience teaching the "rules" of fiction as she was reading Chekov's short stories. She writes that she would give her students a hard and fast rule of something never to do in fiction, and then as she read Chekov on the bus ride home, she would find that he broke the very same rule she was giving to her class, successfully writing against the rules she was prescribing for her students. It's an interesting discussion about the rules of writing, and how writers prescribe them and break them, and I will keep this essay close as I am exploring the "rules" of essay writing.

annotated source 03.19

Steinberg, Michael, Thomas Larson, Mimi Schwartz, and Phillip Lopate. "The Persona in Personal Narrative: Crafting the Made-Up Self." Association of Writers and Writers Programs. Chicago, 2012.

This AWP panel was one of my favorites. The panelists are all essay superstars, so it was interesting to see them talk about how they construct themselves in their essays. They speculated on their own writing and other authors' writing to consider whether or not the self on the page was just a construction of the author. They varied in opinion--for example, Phillip Lopate (who is delightfully snarky, by the way) talked about his own writing, reading two different pieces that were written decades apart, but are both clearly written in a singular voice. I think they'd all agree that no matter what the essayist does to construct his or her persona in writing, the self is multifaceted, thus leading to a large variety of voices and tones and "selves" that can come from one individual while still remaining true to the author's identity. This was a helpful source because I am always seeking understanding of my genre, and knowing the current discussion on the creation of self in personal essays will help me to be more aware of how I construct and portray myself on the page.

learning journal 03.16: steven church

Some people go through their whole BYU experience without knowing this, but BYU does a weekly reading series where visiting authors will come and read their work every Friday @12 (noon) in the library auditorium. If you go to the English Reading Series website, you can watch the past readings they recorded. That was my shout-out for the day.

So this week, the author was Steven Church, who is a nonfiction writer. He teaches at University of California Fresno, and he's published three books and a ton of essays. I'd read his book Theoretical Killings, which is a fantastically weird genre-bending conglomeration of essay and fiction and essayistic fiction. It is awesome. He definitely plays around with genre in Theoretical Killings, but other essays I've read by him are more "traditional" personal essays. They are awesome. HE is awesome. Let me tell you a little more and hopefully you'll see how useful this was for my writing and my project.

Last night, me and five other grad students in the MFA creative writing program workshopped essays with Steven. I don't know why, but I was SO NERVOUS about the workshop. We had submitted an essay to him and to each other, so we all showed up having read each other's essays. As soon as I sent my essay, I was second guessing myself all over the place, wondering why in the heck I sent that essay, thinking it was a piece of crap, he was going to eat me alive, I'd get shunned, things like that. I was having some major intimidation issues. But as we started talking to Steven, I felt so at ease around him that the whole workshop experience was a complete delight. He is the most down-to-earth person, very real, not like a lot of self-important writers. He seemed honest and willing to help us and discuss writing with us. From the workshop last night and the reading and Q&A today, I took some notes that I want to remember as I head into the field and continue writing:

• The best essays come when you pretend you're talking to someone--nonfiction is a conversation between the reader and the writer: This is something I've definitely noticed as I have studied personal essays. They are personal because the writer is much more transparent in telling the reader what's going on. I think a lot of people (including myself) are drawn to this genre because we like to think we can know the author from what they write, and with personal essay this is largely true. He also said,
• Genre is fundamentally arbitrary but important: There is a seemingly never-ending debate about genre, and the rules of genre, and what makes one thing an essay and another a short story and another a poem, etc etc. I appreciated what he said because I think genre is important and I like to write in my genre and such, but I know I have room to experiment as long as I let my reader know what stuff I'm making up, a process that Church calls signposting (or letting the reader know what is imaged and what is real). 
• Do some research when writing an essay: I love essays with a research element. I think research is fundamentally important to essay writing because essaying has so much to do with exploring and being curious about the world around you, and as Church said, often the best essays are essays with research in them. He says he often starts out an essay with an idea or with some research instead of with personal narrative, and then the personal narrative usually just shows up. 
• "Kill your darlings" or "dismember your baby": These slightly disturbing adages (the "kill your darlings" adage you might have heard before) mean that during the revising process, you have to look at an essay as a whole and decide what's important to that essay, and sometimes you have to cut things you initially loved or cut things up and scramble them around. Basically, don't be married to a first draft. This is something I need to practice more. When I'm writing, I have a hard time going back and taking out parts that I may love but may not be essential or necessary in the essay. But the good thing about it is that you don't have to necessarily throw those passages away, just set them aside, and if they fit into a different essay at some point and time, great!

Anyway, I really learned a lot from Steven Church's visit. It's always important to get the perspective  of multiple authors, and it's something I crave. Even though I become weirdly nervous about it sometimes. I have an inferiority complex, okay? Really, though, as I start my project, this and other bits of advice from Church and other contemporary essayists will be very valuable, because they have experience in the publishing world, experience that helps me know what I can do to improve as a writer and eventually publish my essays. 

learning journal 03.14: observations from an outsider

In yesterday's prep class, we discussed the idea of "defocusing" in the context of our projects, and Ashley mentioned the benefits of looking at a current situation with new eyes, looking at the broader perspective, trying to widen our gaze from the little details that we tend to focus on every day, pretending that we are going into a situation for the first time instead of seeing it as a routine, etc. This was an interesting thought to me because my seventeen-year-old sister is visiting me this week and attended class with me yesterday. After the discussion about defocusing, I handed Hailey (my sister) a piece of paper and told her to write down everything she observed from class. Although she focused a lot on physical description instead of behavior, there were quite a few telling bits of information that I'd like to think about:

• "boy next to me doesn't have shoes on." I have, in fact, noticed this several times. Yesterday he was barefoot but had shoes under his desk, so he apparently slipped them off when he sat down. Sometimes he shows up with no shoes at all, and I wonder if he is distantly related to hobbits. It would have to be a distant relation, though, because he is very tall. I'm not sure if there is a "mandatory shoes" rule in the BYU honor code, but the girl next to me says that there is a shoes rule at BYU Hawaii. This doesn't surprise me. 
• "every few seconds the girl in front of me runs her hand through her hair." also, "girls touch their hair a TON." also, "all the girls (minus one) that have their hair in ponytails use a black hair tie." I often wonder about BYU girls and hair. I have short hair, and I don't find myself touching my hair a lot, but perhaps I touch it more than I realize. I think this is probably true of every girl. Running a hand through their hair seems habitual for most girls, as if they are always subconsciously thinking about their appearance. It seems like even college-aged girls haven't gotten past the teenage obsession with looks, even though their obsession has become second nature, habitual, from years of practice. Middle-aged and older women seem much less conscious of their hair, even subconsciously they don't seem to worry about it as much. One could argue that most women past college age are married, and marriage tends to make one less worried about looks. Yes, this is a sweeping generalization, but I think it still contains a grain of truth. Well, come to think of it, my married sisters are still concerned about their hair. Concerned is the wrong word, though--very aware, yes. Also, I know my mom is definitely aware of her hair. So it's likely that the old "marriage makes one less concerned with physical appearance" is complete bogus. Maybe, though "less" concerned and "not" concerned is an important distinction to make--college girls definitely seem more concerned, and it does seem to fade with age whether or not marriage has anything to do with it. Concerned might have been the wrong word in talking about my older sisters and my mom, but I would use the term more frequently with college-aged girls. 
• Moving on. "a lot of people bit their nails." also, "most people are doing something other than listening to the interview [about polygamy]." Biting nails is often a sign of boredom, which is why I group it with the "not paying attention" observation, but the more I think about it, the more I realize that nail biting is much more complicated than a simple act of boredom. I have bitten my nails for much of my life, and have stopped and started again several times, and it usually doesn't have anything to do with being bored in general as much as lack of occupation with my hands. Sometimes, when my hands aren't occupied with something else, I'll find myself biting my nails almost subconsciously, although I am much more conscious about it than I used to be--like during a movie, for example. When I bite my nails during a movie it is a cross between inoccupation and nerves (depending on the intensity of the film). So it may have had more to do with hand inoccupation than anything else. Although I'm not ruling boredom out. The "not paying attention during the interview" observation was also, on first thought, a sign of boredom. But then my thoughts go back to nail biting, because a lot of times when I listen to things on the radio or watch something on TV, I feel like I have to be doing something else while I'm listening. I don't know if this means I listen less (which it may), but nevertheless sometimes we pick up habits or quirks that we repeat whenever we're unoccupied, or listening, or paying attention in some way though it doesn't seem like it. Especially with the internet so readily available, a lot of times we have a split attention span, and we can typically pay attention to two things at once, albeit not giving either action as much attention as we would by focusing solely on one thing. It's probably a generational thing, so in this class when we don't have laptops, we resort to doodling or looking through other papers or talking to our neighbors in an attempt to fill a void that is created by not having a laptop to distract us. We like to be distracted, so we will find a way. I don't want to say, though, that we are all bad listeners or that we don't learn anything in class. I will come to the defense of my generation in this respect because I think we learn in different ways, but it doesn't mean that we learn less or learn more slowly. It's just different from what came before us. 

As you can tell, I'm terrible at true participant observation--even reading another person's observation--because I constantly and immediately move to analysis instead of dwelling only on observation. I am this kind of person, though, admittedly so. My brain can go wild thinking about such small details. I think that's why I am a writer, or at least am trying to be. My field study project is not a matter of merely observing others around me, but drawing conclusions and finding connections and analyzing and writing all of that down, trying to make sense of the world around me. So it's probably good that I'm not doing a traditional field study because I always jump to conclusions in a big way. 

annotated source 03.16

Norris, Dana and Scott Whitehair, Shannon Cason, Kelsie Huff, Kevin Gladish. Memoir without a Net. AWP Conference. Chicago, 2012.

This was a storytelling panel, in which the panelists showed how creative writing can be performed in a storytelling context. Apparently, storytelling is exploding in different areas of the nation because people are realizing how exciting memoir and personal narrative can be when performed in storytelling format. Although the storytellers in this panel more closely aligned with memoir rather than essay, this was still valuable because it showed yet another context in which creative writing can reach more people. The act of presenting stories and thoughts to a live audience could be scary yet, I'm sure, invigorating. Although I don't know if I will use this format specifically as a way to present my work, it is useful to see how animated and fun a performer can make the presentation of a story. If I end up presenting at a conference and reading my work, I think it would be fun to use storytelling aspects to make my presentation more engaging to the audience. Again, this is mostly for after my project is completed, but it's still useful to keep a larger perspective of where I want my work to go.

annotated source 03.14

Hemley, Robin and Melissa Pritchard, Joe Mackall, Stephanie Elizondo Griest, and Christopher Merrill. The Writer in the World: A Look at Immersion Writing. AWP Conference. Chicago, 2012.

This panel was especially relevant to my project (and field study projects in general) because it discussed immersion writing in the context of journalism, travel writing, and memoir. Immersion is when a writer immerses him or herself into a different culture in order to understand and gain insight from another culture's perspective. Immersion writing combines the view of the writer, but focuses on accurate reporting and representation rather than relying mainly on the writer's imagination or memory. This description aptly defines the difference between the different genres: "In immersion journalism, the writer uses the self to write about the world. In immersion memoir, the writer uses the world to write about the self. And in travel writing, there's a bit of both." My project will probably align the closest to travel writing, because I want to use the context of London to write about myself, but also write about London and its diversity and wonder from my own perspective. This panel was excellent, interesting, and very relevant to my project.

annotated source 03.12

Levy, EJ and Kyoko Mori, Maureen Stanton, Ryan Van Meter, Patrick Madden. Is the Midwest Reshaping Creative Nonfiction? A Tribute to Fourth Genre. AWP Converence. Chicago, 2012.

This was a group of writers who had published Fourth Genre, a journal of creative nonfiction, reading personal essays that dealt in some way with the Midwest. I felt like the label of the Midwest was more of an excuse to get five essayists together to read great essays, because the focus was more on their work than it was on the relationship to the Midwest. The Q&A right after the reading was where the Midwest was discussed in depth, however. This was useful to me because it demonstrated the style of personal essays that are currently being published. While some were more traditionally essayistic, others were mainly narrative; all were enjoyable, traditional or not, but personal essays are more loosely defined today than they might have been when Classical British essayists were writing their essays. I might perhaps be a little too narrow-minded in saying that, though, because I'm sure that many other essays were being published alongside the Classical essays, while they may not have been defined as such based on our current qualifications of the traditional genre. Questions of genre are typically fascinating and frustrating at the same time, because it is so often loosely defined and fuzzy around the edges. I will have to be careful not to be short-sighted when I attempt to define what I feel like IS the classical British essay.

annotated source 03.09

Walters, Pat and Lulu Miller, Kate Snodgrass, Gary Garrison, Lydia Diamond. NPRU Kidding Me? It Can Totally Happen. AWP Conference. Chicago, 2012.

This is a more outside-the-box source, but this was one of my favorite panels because it showed how diverse essays can potentially be; radio shows sponsored by NPR contain creative works extended from fiction to nonfiction, and this panel discussed an "exciting and largely untapped platform for writers to get their stories to the masses." The panelists looked at different shows--Radiolab, This American Life--to demonstrate the value of sound and radio editing adds to creative writing. They explained what narrative radio is, and what types of prose work best on the air. I enjoyed this panel because, as a writer, I want my writing to reach as many people as possible, and this panel showed me that there are many other options besides print publication. This is relevant because once I complete my project, I will look at publishing my essays, and knowing there are different options is both exciting and comforting.

annotated source 03.07

Seeley, Tracy, Joy Catstro, Marcia Aldrich, and Jocelyn Bartkevicius. Modernist Nonfiction: Virginia Woolf and Her Contemporaries. AWP (Association of Writers and Writers Programs) Conference. Chicago, 2012.

This panel at AWP featured scholarly papers presented on four different modernist nonfiction writers: Virginia Woolf, Alice Meynell, Margery Latimer, and Meridel LeSueur. Even though Virginia Woolf is best known for both her fiction and her argumentative essay "A Room of One's Own," she was actually a propagator and writer of lyrical (personal) essays. Alice Meynell was also an essayist (see my annotation of her collection of essays), and one panelist discussed her contribution to the essay canon even though many of her essays didn't seem very personal upfront. This panel was helpful because it discussed what modernist writers have contributed to creative nonfiction, and I was able to see how their discussion can inform my own analysis of Virginia Woolf and Alice Meynell's writing. The panelist presenting on Virginia Woolf mentioned that her dissertation adviser was shocked that she was writing her dissertation on Virginia Woolf without looking at her fiction--the fact scholars don't hold Woolf's personal essays in high esteem is troubling. But as more scholars emphasize the value of her essays, the more people will become familiar with her contribution to creative nonfiction. Vamos arriba!

learning journal 03.05: selling out everyone you love

(See today's annotated source for more information about the particular panel I'm expounding on)

The AWP panel entitled "Selling Out Everyone You Love: The Ethics of Nonfiction" was entirely relevant to not only our current class discussion but also my project in general. It was relevant to our current class discussion because the panelists explained the problems and ethics they've had to confront as they write about those they love. This made me realize that getting approval from IRB is important because there are ethics involved with writing nonfiction--even creative nonfiction--that I need to be aware of as I write my collection of essays. They gave a few pieces of advice that I'd like to comment on:

1. "Remain humble about recollection." One of the panelists said (only half jokingly) that there are more versions of memories about a story than there are people in the story. Because of this, everyone has their version of "the truth," which can make the writer's version of the truth be different from other's. "The truth" is a touchy topic in nonfiction because there is often so much grey space around the space of memory and recollection. Being humble about recollection will be helpful because it gives the writer an opportunity to acknowledge that their memory isn't necessarily the most correct, and to acknowledge that what actually happened ("the facts") may be different from our memory. This piece of advice wil be essential because when presenting a memory or story where other people are involved, a writer must always be careful and humble in recalling such information. A writer has to put forth his or her own perspective on the story or memory as accurately as possible, but allow other people the liberty of disagreement. 

2. "Make sure you know what you are saying and why." This is essential because it emphasizes that everything you write about--especially when dealing with another person--should have a purpose. There is no use sharing personal information about other people when there isn't a clear and specific purpose for doing so. As far as my writing goes, I always try to ask myself if the meaning of the piece would change if I omitted any information, and if not, is it necessary to add to the essay or story? Unnecessarily disclosing information about others will never turn out well.

3. "Be fair when you write about others." I have to say, first off, that many of the panelists were memoirists and not essayists, which is big difference because the memoirists more often write in detail about experiences like divorce, abuse, and other such traumatic experiences that can more directly affect other people involved in the story. Essays typically focus around an idea rather than a story, but typically involve some sort of story that informs the idea. Because of this, essayists still need to be aware of these ethics, although they might not deal as directly or as often with traumatic or potentially damning information about others. However, it is always essential to be fair to other people when you write about them. Including another's story in your writing is potentially dangerous ground, so one good question to ask is this: "would I want this to be said about me?" And this leads me to my final point:

4. "Selling yourself out." One of the panelists said that he often sells himself out as much or more than he sells other people out. This is important because if the writer takes on a certain amount of responsibility in the matter, he or she won't place all of the blame squarely on another person's shoulders. A common tone in essays is self-deprecation because self-deprecation allows writers to incriminate themselves and question their own motives as much or more than other people. This goes back to the idea of humility. If writers acknowledge that they are imperfect, that their memory is imperfect, they might be more approachable and readers will be more likely to connect to their writing. No one wants to read nonfiction from an arrogant person who places blame on others without admitting their own guilt. The classical British essayists that I will be studying are many times a perfect example of humility and self-deprecation--they will be a good place to start when I attempt this attribute or tone in my own essays. 

And that is the wealth of insight I received from this particular panel (: 

annotated source 03.05

AWP (Association of Writers and Writers Programs) Conference 2012. Chicago, Illinois.
Panel: Bremer, Krista and Lee Martin, Cheryl Strayed, Stephen Elliot. "Selling Out Everyone You Love: The Ethics of Nonfiction."

I was excited that so many panels in the AWP Conference had to do with creative nonfiction, because I am going to use them as sources to help inform my project. Many of these panels were very practical, and all very helpful in one way or another in learning about creative nonfiction and the different nuances of the genre. This particular panel was applicable to what we've been talking about in class (especially with the IRB) because it dealt directly with the ethics of writing about other people, particularly people who are close to the writer. Basically, they all said that at one time or another they've had to deal with problems related to sharing information about others, but they've found a few solutions to help minimize the potential damage: humility, fairness, intention, transparency, and fearlessness. I will need to keep their counsel in mind as I write about other people, whether or not I'm writing about people I know well. More about this panel in today's learning journal.