This Week

We are not meeting for class on Tuesday. See syllabus and myemich for final assignments, due Thursday. No assignments will be accepted after Thursday.

Video Essay

video essay introduction: http://www.blackbird.vcu.edu/v9n1/gallery/ve-bresland_j/ve-origin_page.shtml

http://bresland.com/

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plutarch/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/montaigne/

http://claudiarankine.com/

plus: mullen vimeo: http://vimeo.com/18552888

Thursday March 28

Focus on the first part of Essay Packet 1, the short essays. We will pick up with the rest of the packet next week. For next week, write your blog on the Essay Packet 1, particularly the essays by D'Agata and Dillard.

Also, another exercise:

Creative Essay Writing Exercise

Choose one of the following to focus on:

  A memory from childhood;

  A particular person from childhood or who has been intriguing to you or   important in your life;

  An animal, place, phenomenon that intrigues you and you want to investigate further.

Then, write a detailed description that evokes every sense through the language you use to show this memory/person/phenomenon, without using the pronoun “I”; write at least 1-2 paragraphs.

Next continue or revise or expand what you have to turn it into a whole essay. You can add “I” or other characters and/or bring in other elements that will add to the work.

Department of English Language and Literature Undergraduate Scholarships

Department of English Language and Literature Undergraduate Scholarships

The applications for our English Department undergraduate scholarships are due on Wednesday.

Department of English Language and Literature Undergraduate Scholarships

Irene Little Wallace Scholarship (Excellence, Need, Majors):  This scholarship comes with a minimum, one-time award of $500.  We will be able to award this scholarship to at least five students in Winter 2013.  Students applying for the award must be undergraduate students in the Department of English Language and Literature (any program area) with a GPA of at least 3.0 and demonstrated financial need (can be a line or two description in the essay).   Applications are due in hard-copy to the English Department in Pray-Harrold (6^th Floor) and should be directed to the attention of Professor Melissa Jones.  Students who do not receive the award upon first application are encouraged to resubmit.  Deadlines for submission are listed below.  To apply, a student must submit the following:

·         Coversheet including:

Full Name and e-mail address

Student Number

Local Address

Permanent Address

Local Phone Number

Permanent Phone Number

·         A one-page summary of the following information:

Major

Class Level

Cumulative GPA

GPA in Major

Current Enrollment Hours

Planned Enrollment Hours Next Semester

·         A short essay describing academic and professional goals and achievements, including a statement showing evidence of financial need (500-700 words).  

Deadline for Winter 13 award: Wednesday, March 27, 2013.

Mariam Turbin Scholarship (University or Community Service, Majors and Minors): This scholarship comes with a one-time award of approximately $200.  Students applying for the award must be declared undergraduate majors or minors in the Department of English Language and Literature (any program area), must have a minimum GPA of 3.0, and must demonstrate leadership in University or community activities.  Applications are due in hard-copy to the English Department in Pray-Harrold and should be directed to the attention of Professor Melissa Jones.  Students who do not receive the award upon first application are encouraged to resubmit.  Deadlines for submission are listed below.  To apply, a student must submit the following:  

                                                   

·         Coversheet including:

Full Name and e-mail address

Student Number

Local Address

Permanent Address

Local Phone Number

Permanent Phone Number

·         A one-page summary of the following information:

Major

Class Level

Cumulative GPA

GPA in Major

Current Enrollment Hours

Planned Enrollment Hours Next Semester

·         A short essay describing the student’s leadership activities and the place of service in his or her life.

Deadline for Winter 13 award: Wednesday, March 27, 2013.

Madalene and Jack McClow Memorial End Scholarship (Teaching, Need, Majors or Minors): This scholarship comes with a one-time award of $1,000.  Students applying for the award must be declared undergraduate majors or minors in the Department of English Language and Literature (any program area), must have a minimum GPA of 3.0, must have demonstrated financial need, and must be seeking a teaching certificate.  Preference will be given to students who are preparing to enter their final semester and will be doing their student teaching in the fall.  Applications are due in hard-copy to the English Department in Pray-Harrold and should be directed to the attention of Professor Melissa Jones.  Students who do not receive the award upon first application are encouraged to resubmit.  Deadlines for submission are listed below.  To apply, a student must submit the following:  

                                                   

·         Coversheet including:

Full Name and e-mail address

Student Number

Local Address

Permanent Address

Local Phone Number

Permanent Phone Number

·         A one-page summary of the following information:

Major

Class Level

Cumulative GPA

GPA in Major

Current Enrollment Hours

Planned Enrollment Hours Next Semester

·         A short statement describing the student’s teaching goals and financial need (the latter can be a brief description of self-sufficiency, dependence on loans and work study, etc). 

Deadline for Winter 13 award: Wednesday, March 27, 2013.

Creative Essay Writing Assignment

Creative (nonfiction) Essay Writing: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/753/01/
 
Writing A Creative Essay Exercise (from: http://www.chsbs.cmich.edu/Robert_Root/AWP/cnf.htm)

Kim Barnes: “What is a Word Worth?”

        I often speak to my writing students about "bringing their intellect to bear" as they compose their personal essays.  What I mean by this is that the best literary nonfiction should work at a number of different levels, including the level of intellectual stimulation.  The problem we face as writers of nonfiction is how to challenge our individual stories--how to take the narrative itself and expand its breadth and reach to encompass more of the world.

        One exercise that I use to help my students achieve this goal involves building an essay from a single word. First, the students each choose one word--any word--to which they are particularly drawn, a word that resonates for them.  A young man just discharged from the military chose "paratrooper"; a middle-aged woman of Scottish descent chose "bagpipes."  I then require that the students write five sections of nonfiction revolving around this single word: The first, third, and fifth sections must be personal memories triggered by the word, and they must be written in present tense no matter the actual chronology; the second and fourth sections must be more analytical, intellectual, philosophical, and explore the word in a more scholarly way.  I direct the students to study the word's derivation and history. They often find passages in religious texts and mythologies that inform the word's meaning in their own experience.  Some discuss the word's appearance and use in contemporary literature or film.

        The goal of this exercise is to weave the word's broader application into the writer's personal experience.  Ideally, the five sections weave together and inform one another and bring to the essay a kind of intellectual unity as well as a greater depth and complexity.

latest updates

There are some poetry and creative writing performance events this weekend, come if you can: http://murielrukeyser.emuenglish.org/welcome/rukeyser-symposium-2013/

For next week follow the syllabus for assignments. You should have Cooper's Maps To Anywhere (the book) which we will be discussing.

As always you should write a response on your blog to the week's reading every Tuesday. If you haven't already, this week you should write about the first half of Cooper's Maps To Anywhere.

Have a good Break

Follow the syllabus. Readings for the week after the break are posted on myemich (Goldberg and Essay Introduction).

Write your blog post response on either or both of these.

Also of Interest:

http://murielrukeyser.emuenglish.org/welcome/rukeyser-symposium-2013/

Fiction Workshop Guidelines

Read the work and give feedback in terms of the elements of poetry and fiction that we’ve talked about. You can offer suggestions, comments, positive feedback, and critique (what’s working and what could be stronger, etc?). Write on the work and mark places in the text that you want to address.

             Language (mark places where the language used is dynamic and interesting, and places       where itcould be revised to be stronger, etc)

Concrete and sensory detail

Description

Imagery

Metaphor/simile

Sound (of language, sound that is evoked through the language

Visual (line breaks, stanza breaks, use of white space on the page, etc)

Syntax

Look out for abstract, cliché, “overused” language and offer suggestions to make these

places stronger

Think about all of the above elements of poetry in terms of the fiction writing. Also, comment and give feedback on the elements of fiction writing:

  Plot (situation, conflict, “drama”)

  Setting

  Character(s)

  Dialogue

  Narration, point of view, verb tense and general writing style, etc.

  “resolution” or ending

Feb 26 - 28

Follow the syllabus for Thur!

If you missed the in-class writing exercise, talk to someone in class and have them tell you about it.


Fiction Exercises you should be doing to include in the portfolio; if you don't know what it is, ask someone in class:

Rewrite paragraph:

 1. Rewrite 1-2 paragraphs of a story word by word, replacing each with another word of the same type/part of speech

2. Continue and/or finish the story by writing 1-2 more paragraphs which maintain the same sound/tone/sentence structures as the previous paragraphs.

Other Fiction Exercises:

Dialogue à story

Postcards story

500 word story from description of place, emotion, or etc

200 word description of a place à story

4 qualities (show a character with these qualities in a story but don’t use the words for the qualities)

For Next Week

We are continuing to talk about fiction writing and reading.

Bring fiction packets 1, 2, & 3 back to class with you on Tue. 

Write your blog for Tue on any stories from the packets that you haven't written about previously. Also, write about any elements of fiction writing from Goldberg and Lamott that you have found interesting or helpful to think about.

Continue to work on the postcard exercise. Turn it into a story that includes character(s), plot (situation), and dialogue.

Listen to some real dialogue in the world somewhere (in the student center, in the library, at a McDonald's, etc), then transcribe it (write it down) and bring this to class on Tue also.

This Week

You should be reading Fiction Packet 3, writing about that on your blog, reading Lamott for Thur., and working on your fiction stories (see 2 exercises in previous posts below).

Fiction Exercise for this week:

Description

Format:           

Under 500 words. Double-space if writing prose, using 12-point Times Roman font.

The Assignment:

1.      Write a description of a place, thing, or emotion, aiming to provide unique detail, without giving away the name of what it is that you are describing:

Place, Thing, or Emotion

Describe a place, but without naming the place. E.g., a place you know very well in Ypsilanti or in your home town.

Describe an emotion, but without naming the emotion.

Describe a thing, without naming the thing.

The aim in all three cases is to avoid abstraction and cliché and to pay attention to vocabulary.

Note #1: Try to avoid writing a riddle or making a puzzle where the reader is put in the position of guessing at what the identity is of the described place, thing or emotion.

Note #2: Do not describe a person or character.

2.      Put a character into that place or emotion (emotional state) to whom, or in which place, something happens.

3.      Turn this into a work of “Microfiction”:

Very short stories are variously referred to as microfiction, sudden fiction, flash fiction, postcard fiction, palm of hand fictions, among other terms.  Word counts vary as well, though most examples of these genres run under 500 words.  Also in productive dispute are the requisite features of a successful short short fiction.  Some writers call for a clear sense of beginning/middle/end and a conflict/resolution.  Others allow for stories that are akin to portraits, slice-of-life vignettes, or works of prose poetry.  Feel free to explore any of these options when writing your own microfiction.  

Feb 13 Fiction Exercise

*Write a 200-word description of a place. You can use any and all sensory descriptions but sight: you can describe what it feels like, sounds like, smells like and even tastes like. Try to write the description in such a way that people will not miss the visual details. Put a character in that place and have her/him do something.

Fiction Exercise + stuff for next week

*Make a list of four qualities/characteristics that describe a character real or imagined. Place that character in a scene and write the scene so that the qualities are conveyed through significant detail. Use no generalizations and no judgments. No word on your list should appear in the scene. Use detail and description to SHOW the qualities through the scene and the actions of the character.

For next week: follow syllabus for reading assignments (posted on Myemich) and write a blog response on the readings before class time on Tue. Check myemich to make sure you have the most current syllabus; some folks may have had an earlier version. 

Feb assignments:

12: Burroway (myemich): Writing Fiction

Fiction Packet 2 (myemich): read, come to class prepared to discuss stories

14: Goldberg readings (myemich); Fiction Packet 2 con’t