ENG 4017 Creative Nonfiction

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ENG 4017 Creative Nonfiction

Monday, December 22, 2014 12.22 GradesYou should have received an email with your grade sheet pasted in.

If I do not hear anything from you by 12.24, I will assume everything is as you think it should be and I will post grades to Keanwise.

Happy holidays!Posted byS. Chandlerat2:16 PMNo comments: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Wednesday, December 10, 2014 12.10 Planning for reading + finishing portfoliosNote: I will read through the craft essays and get back to you with comments (for Blog 14) by sometime Saturday.
Program (tentative = let me know if you change your title or anything else)
Mary Ellen In a Jam
Patrice Heavy Doors
Christina
Holly BLT Special
Patricia Soundtrack of Silence
Stephanie Ordinary Tragedy
Briana
Melissa
Cristal Hibiscus Flowers next to Dirt Roads
Matt Signaling
Florie Burning Mountain
Osza The Void

Food
Osza cupcakes
Christina brownies
Patricia subs
Florie spinach dip
Matt savory something
Holly Taco casserole palisade
Mary Ellen ziti-brocolli
Patrice raw veggie pizza
Stephanie chips
Briana mac cheese bits
Melissa baked goods


Portfolio
I've checked the links for everyone who sent me the url for the portfolio, and they all work.

As I was reviewing the pages, it dawned on me that you have not turned in (and I have not graded) the revised short essay. . . though we talked about which one you wanted to revise. So this is the plan.

Post your best short essay (on the revised essay page) for essay 3/4.

Then, for your "best" essay, post the version of the essay you choose to read for our last class.


For next week:
If anyone has questions or wants to go over the version of the essay for the reading - be in touch and we will find a time to meet.

Completed portfolio due at the end of class Wednesday, December 17.

Everything sounded great this evening as I was listening to you practice. We should have a great reading next week! Take care and see you then.




Posted byS. Chandlerat6:40 PM1 comment: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Wednesday, December 3, 2014 12.3 Rhetorical analysis presentationsGreat job on your presentations! So now we have an idea of what some of the venues are looking for, and which ones might be interested in our work. Well done.

Next week will be planning for the final reading. As announced in class, I am still lining up for the location. At present I am thinking it will be CAS 351, or CAS 308 - I will give you an update next week.

Practice for final presentations.
During the first part of next week's class you will practice for the final reading/presentation. As we discussed, during most readings, the author gives a short presentation about where the piece came from or how it was written. Since this is a writing class, anything you might add about how the piece developed, how you revised it, etc - would work. Your introduction + your piece should come to about 8-12 minutes. You will have time in class to practice giving your intro + presenting your reading.

Let me know if you are bringing guests - so I can make an estimate on the space.

We will create the program (the order for readers) in class next week.

Creating your portfolio
During the second part of class next week, we will walk through creating your portfolio site using google.sites. It is an app available to you through your Kean google account. The model portfolio os posted to the right.


Blog 14: draft craft essay or any essay you would like to work on for revision (and receive some comments)
See you next week!Posted byS. Chandlerat5:53 PMNo comments: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Thursday, November 20, 2014 11.19 A little bit of everythingAlthough the posts listed below, have been talked about/used - even graded - I haven't yet sent you the "tally sheet" for credit given. I will be providing feedback/counting what's posted (and what is not) beginning Thursday evening. So this is a heads up to make sure the following list of blogs are posted so they can be reviewed.

Update: There WAS a Blog 8 (only it was labeled Blog 7). The first Blog 7 was the Draft Long Essay 2 (which everyone turned in - and attended a conference to talk about)
Blogs:
Blog 7: Long essay 2 draft
Blog 7: Write some notes about which essay you will revise, and what you will do to revise it.Blog 8: not assigned! (I just skipped over this number?)Blog 9: Post Brainstorming Short essay 1Blog 10: Revised (best) Long EssayBlog 11: Post Short Draft Essay 1Blog 12: Short essay 2 brainstorming

Craft essay
We started class by reviewing the "moves" the authors of the craft essays made. We noted that, in general, the authors made statements about where ideas came from, about writing process, and about what they learned (generalized reflections about themselves as writers).


We then took a look at the assignment for your reflective writing to introduce your portfolio. We noted that it is similar to (makes the same kinds of moves) but different from (in that it considers a body of writing, rather than a single composition) the sample essays in your text. Your task, is to use the moves - and the kind of detailed analysis - from the craft essay in your text book as a model for you analysis of the writing you have produced for this text.

We took a quick look at the form of the portfolio (set up through google.sites= available through our kean.google account) you will use to turn in your work.

Workshop:
After this work, you spent the rest of class "catchng up" the assignment of your choice, while I had one-on-one conferences with each of you on blogs + short essays (2 brainstorms 1 draft).

For the next class(es):
November 26: This is an open workshop for you to work on any of the assigned projects. The lab will be open, but you are not required to attend class. The complete draft for the short essay is due by the end of class (Blog 13: Draft short essay 2). Due for next class (12.3) is Blog 14: Rhetorical analysis of publication venue.

December 3. In class you will give your rhetorical analysis presentation. This it informal (do not stress over it). You are not required to stand in front of the class - though you are welcome to. I can click through the points in your blog post if you prefer. The idea is for us to share information about the different expectations of journals where you might publish CNF.

If there is time left after the presentations, we will work on setting up the portfolio using the google.sites ap from your Kean account. The model portfolio is posted to the right, if you want to fool around with it ahead of time.

Have a great Thanksgiving!Posted byS. Chandlerat6:15 AMNo comments: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Wednesday, November 12, 2014 11.12 Journal ChoicesNote: You all should have received the Revised long essay with comments. If you have questions, be in touch.

Tonight's class was mostly focused on preparing for the rhetorical analysis assignment. We reviewed the assignment sheet (posted to the right) and conducted an analysis of Brevity.

The first request on the assignment sheet is for you to talk about "what kind of" CNF the journal publishes. We generated a list of categories for the different kinds of CNF we have read this term. Some of the "kinds" of publications we identified include the following.

personal essays (essay-y writing with the focus on self, like Lopate and The Patch, lots of analysis the point either embedded in the analysis or stated straight out)cultural/political essaysJournalistic pieceslong or short essaysclassifications by topic/focuspreferences for particular forms (narrative, experimental, reflective, multimodal/visual, etc)location based (may be about a place, or sometimes only writers from a particular geographical region are accepted)special interest (travel, horticulture, war, motherhood stories, religious)student publicationsWe then conducted an analysis of just 3 of the stories from Brevity, in terms of the categories listed on the sheet and came up with the following.
Ordinary shoes: (noticed = woman author, woman characters, mostly women commenters)Subject: realization, mother/daughterVoice/tone: reflective, somber, nostalgicForm: personal essay, traditional, memoir (though she does skate with the mother in the photograph)artistry/literariness: 3
27subject: coming of agevoice: objective, descriptiveform: poetic, literaryartistry: 4
Cakesubject: forbidden self fullfillmentvoice: intimateform: narratve/reflectiveartistry: up there

If you haven't chosen a journal yet - send me an email and I will add your choice to the list.
Journal Choices:
Briana Literal Latte
Christina Defunct
Cristal vela
Florie The Normal School
Holly Sweet
Mary Ellen The Collagist
Matt Gul Coast
Melissa Creative Nonfiction
Osza Paper Darts
Patrice Terrain
Patricia Zone3
Stephanie The Pinch

Read: Zion, 402+ On writing Zion, 410 by Stanton, Pope, Teacher training, 388, Composing 'Teacher training'" 394.
Blog 12: Short essay 2 brainstorming
As discussed in class, next week we will start with some talk about writing "process" essays or craft essays as they call them in CNF. These readings are to give you an approximate model for the reflective introduction to the portfolio assignment. After that, the rest of the class will be workshop, with conferences on the short essay scheduled in class. During this class, you will have an opportunity to work on the draft short essay 2, the portfolio introduction, or the rhetorical analysis presentation.
Posted byS. Chandlerat3:22 PMNo comments: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Wednesday, November 5, 2014 11.5 Short CNFJournaling: You started by writing a scene where you are with someone you love. I asked you to use dialog if you can remember it. Describe what you were doing. But NOT to interpret your actions or say what they meant.

Next I asked you to write a definition of what you believe constitutes "love."

We then spent way longer than I anticipated analyzing our definitions of love. We looked at the kinds of actions (thinking/feeling) and qualities implied in the language. We considered what kind of agency or control someone invested in that definition would feel as the lover or as the beloved. We noticed that most of the definitions were about giving rather than receiving love. We also considered, valence, outcomes (results of believing in un/conditional love, love as selflessness etc) and the power dynamics, and we talked about whether we were able to choose our definitions of love, or whether they just "happened" to us.

Although we didn't have time in class, the intention was that after thinking about these features of our definitions (actions, qualities, agency, valence, outcomes and power dynamics) = you would go back to your definitions and characterize your ideas about love. Finally, I was going to ask you to go back to your description, and see how/whether your "description" of what happens in a loving relationship matches your definition.

This kind of brainstorming can open up ideas within a piec. It's one way to "see through" cultural assumptions or ways of talking about who we are and what we do. It can help define questions and/or construct ways to think about the possibility of choosing new definitions for belief systems whichwe might otherwise think of as "given".

Short essays. We spent the rest of class talking about short form CNF, first talking about Accident, and then Fallout, and for five minutes at the end checking in on the other reading assignments.

As I said in class, I will be grading the long essays and probably will not be replying to your blogs until just befoer class next week, which means it will be of much use to you if you put out questions abotu material for your short essay. So - if you want some input on the short draft - email me.

For next week:
Read: http://brevitymag.com/category/current-issue/ Try to read at least 9 stories from the Fall/14 issue (the link is on the landing page). In class we will use a discussion of Brevity as an example of how to do the Rhetorical Analysis of a Publication Venue.
Blog 11: Post Short Draft Essay 1

Also, in addition to posting your Long essay = please send it to me as an attachment. Have a great week and I hope to have these back to you by next class.

Posted byS. Chandlerat4:23 PMNo comments: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Wednesday, October 29, 2014 10.29 Journal mining and more about truthWe started class with some work on coming up with a title for the revised long piece. We noted that the title sets up or frames the essay for the reader in important ways. It both gives the main idea away by stating it outright, but because the reader has so little context, often s/he does not "get it" until s/he has read the whole essay - when the title can take on a deep rich resonance with the ideas, events, and feelings from the essay. Think of how "The Patch," "Silent Dancing," "Out There," and "Stripped for Parts" told us about what the essay was about on multiple levels.

The revised essays are due next week, as a blog post.

Mining your journal. The writing prompt tonight was really more of a reflective analysis. I asked you to look back through your in-class writing to look for patterns. I asked you to look for any kind of pattern that came up. They might be patterns in content, emotions, or the particular materials you worked with.

Content: repeated ideas or subject materials. These may involve different material - but evoke the same themes or topics.
Emotions: is there a dominant emotion in your entries? We did some work earlier where you made a list and noticed yoru dominant emotion. Was the emotion for that list the dominant emotion for your journal as a whole?
Particulars: do you refer to the same people, places and things = across ideas and feelings?

Your observations of patterns included: lots of references to family, mothers, coming of age, relailizations, jobs, co-workers, relationships.
There were also some observations about persona - some of you presented your selves as listeners, watchers. Others noticed that they presented experience as "not one thing or another" but the good mixed up with the bad, and/or with time mixed up (moments stretched into multiple events or longer times). Or you noticed the kinds of experiences you wrote about: "can't explain" or "don't understand" (not sure what happened) expereinces, or stories about me + a man. Another observation was that the WAY you wrote changed as you wrote into an entry - that as you approached the emotion of the experience, the writing kind of fell apart. Some of us write questions, some of write tragedies and comedies.

So what do we make of this? Journal mining can be used to get a glimpse of your unpremeditated self. It might suggest what you are interested in, how you represent things, what you are stuck on (or not); what you might want to write about that you are not letting yourself write and what motivates you to write the things that you do write.

The point of this exercise is to think of journals as a snapshots of who we are. They portray what we are thinking, feeling, wondering about at a particular point in time. And that allows us to see ourselves - from the new perspective of where we are.

More about truth and creative nonfiction

We talked briefly about Jill Talbert abd Dinty Moore's discussion of truth in creative nonfiction, and then came up with a set of general points in the debate.
1. It's the truth that counts.
changing minor details doesn't change the larger truth versus all details are part of the larger truth and or why change them?
2. CNF as a label makes a contract with readers for a certain kind of "truth"= no lies
Nobody expects 100% truth, all truth is selectve and memory is partial, versus writers should tell the best truth they can tell, no intentional lies, and there are writerly ways to confess and finesse when info is missing or uncertain
3. CNF is a literary form and therefore has certain obligations to the way the piece sounds (the art of the sentences/words).
truth can ruin prosody versus there are many writerly alternatives to lying
4. What is important is the lived truth - not necessarily the facts.
truth is what you remember versus checking facts, revisiting memories with other witnesses can create fuller more valuable truth

We argued both sides of all these general statements - and then you took some time to write a personal position statement on "truth" in creative nonfiction.

Short essays:
At the end of class we took a few minutes to take a look at the assignment sheet for the short essays. You have the option to create multimedia pieces - or to stick with text. For your brainstorming for Blog 9, I encouraged you to think about medium and content - and to cast a wide net. If you have an idea you'd like to try but are unsure of how to realize(create it as a multimodal text) put it out there and your classmates and I will be there with some ideas.

For next class:
Read: Lord, "I met a man," p. 115; Braner, "Soundtrack," p. 29; McNight, "Mother's Day," p 120; look around Mike Steinberg's blog http://www.mjsteinberg.net/blog.htm (don't forget to read the comments), Bresland, "Les Cruel Shoes," p. 31 (read it first in your book - and then check out http://vimeo.com/17548246Les Cruel Shoes) Blog 9: Post Brainstorming Short essay 1
Blog 10: Revised (best) Long Essay


Thanks again for the great class - and see you next week!Posted byS. Chandlerat2:07 PMNo comments: Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest Older PostsHomeSubscribe to:Posts (Atom)Blogs Fall 2014BrianaChristinaCristalFlorieHollyMary EllenMattMelissaOszaPatricePatriciaStephanieCourse DocumentsCNF Syllabus Fall 2014CNF Calendar Fall 2014Assignment SheetsRhetorical Analysis ProjectShort essaysLong EssaysLinksSample PortfolioEssay Daily (check out "homes for the essay" link listUndergraduate Creative Writing JournalsBlog Archive 2014(39) December(3)12.22 Grades12.10 Planning for reading + finishing portfolios12.3 Rhetorical analysis presentations November(3) October(6) September(7) April(8) March(4) February(5) January(3) 2013(24) December(3) November(7) October(7) September(7) 2012(25) December(5) November(8) October(7) September(5) 2011(33) December(3) November(8) October(10) September(11) August(1)About MeS. ChandlerView my complete profile

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