EN375.01 Personal Writing
Meg Petersen
Summer 1997
Ellen Reed 21
R 204 12:00- 2:40 MTWR
x2684 home 536-4210
Office hours TR 11-12
Materials:
Notebook for in-class activities
Computer disks
Required Text:
Plymouth Writers Group
(1996) Writes of Passage: An Anthology of Teachers Writing Campton
(NH) Press (available in the English department office)
Books for Literature Circles (you will need two of these):
Barnes, Kim (1996) In the
Wilderness: Coming of Age in Unknown Country New York: Anchor Books
Conroy, Frank (1967) Stop-Time
New York: Penguin
Karr, Mary (1995)
The Liar's Club New York: Penguin
Kaysen, Susanne (1993) Girl,
Interrupted New York: Vintage
Rodriguez, Richard (1992)
Days of Obligation: An Argument With My Mexican Father New York: Penguin
Santiago, Esmeralda (1993)
When I was Puerto Rican New York: Vintage Books
Objectives: Students
will explore different forms of personal writing: letters, memoirs, personal
narratives and fictionalized narratives. Through a variety of exercises,
students will learn to mine their lives for topics of narrative.
They will develop ideas, draft, revise and give and receive feedback on
their work. They will discuss
autobiographical narratives in class.
Evaluation:
30% six
papers based on personal experiences- the form of these papers is open,
as is the topic.
20% reading
discussions, including role sheets
30% final
portfolio
15% participation
and attendance (including in-class activities)
5%
final reading
Papers: Topic and form will
be open, as long as the papers have their base in personal experiences.
I expect them to be completed pieces or chapters (open to revision, of
course), but there is no specific length requirement. You will receive
full credit if you hand in a typed paper on the day it is due. NO
LATE PAPERS WILL BE ACCEPTED.
Reading Discussions: You
are expected to come to class having read the assigned reading prepared
to begin a discussion. You should have your role sheets for discussion
circles completed before class. For the readings in Writes of Passage
and other handouts, please prepare a journal entry with questions, observations
about style and a general response to facilitate discussion in class.
Try to reflect on how well you could relate personally to the material,
what questions it raised for you, how it affected you and what you noticed
about the way it was written.
Final Portfolio: For
your final portfolio, you are to select three of the six papers completed
in the class, revise them and submit them for grading. Your
portfolio should also include a statement about yourself as a writer relative
to the writing you have done in this class, and about the papers you are
submitting. You may include anything else which helps present a fuller
picture of who you are as a writer. Think of it as a way to present
yourself as a writer.
Participation and Attendance:
A great deal in this class depends on your participation. We need
you in order to become a full and functioning writing community.
There is no substitute for being fully there, willing to share your writing
and give your feedback on other people's work. Part of every class will
be devoted to writing workshop. During this time you will be expected
to draft, edit, revise and read and hold conferences with others about
your writing. Failure to use this time wisely will not go unnoticed.
Final Reading: On
the last day of class, as a celebration of our efforts and a chance to
simply give our writing, without looking for feedback, we will have a final
reading. Each of us will share something that we wrote over the course
of the month. We will simply receive our gifts and enjoy them.
Class Structure
12:00- 12:30 Reading discussion
12:30- 1:15 Writing
Activities
1:15- 1:45 Sharing
1:45- 2:30 Writing
Workshop
2:30- 2:40 Sharing
and Wrap-up
Tentative schedule:
5/19 Introductory
Activities
Interviewing activity
truth vs. Truth
Part I: Pieces of Autobiography
Freewriting
"I remember"
Journaling 10
minutes/day
Image notebook
5/20 Readings about
childhood: WP Cranberry Bogs (11) How I Saved.. (14) Suffocation (36) Taming
the Beast (100)
Life Web
Brainstorming your life
Graphing your life
Begin Discussion Group
#1
5/21 Book discussion group
meeting
Paper #1 due
Bring in a childhood picture
Writing from artifacts
Places
5/22 Coming of Age: WP Becca
(19) Belinda Cotton (39) To Mark Weitz.. (79) The Night the Kitchen Ceiling
Fell (88)
Write your heart
portrait of a memory
5/27 Book Discussion group
Paper #2 due
Part II: Letters
person in your past
5/28 Advice Column
questioning memory
leads into questions
person you learned
something from
discussion group meeting
5/29 Initial meeting of
discussion group #2
Paper #3 due
Danticat, Edwidge
"Women Like Us" in Krik? Krak! (handout)
family members
Family stories
Wrap- up of discussion
group one
6/2 Part III: Personal Poetry
WP- Petition (10)
The Blushing Letter (52) Dawn (57) I Hate
Tomatoes (87) All the Way
to Boston (99) Wormwood Revisited (116) At Forty (122) everyday epiphanies
6/3 Discussion group meeting
Paper #4 due
emotional words activity
6/4 Coming to Terms:
WP Leona's Touch (6) Freeing Sammy (43) Random Cosmic Violence (49) Getting
a Life (123) What Binds Us Together (136)
24 hours
Dialogue between young and old self
Memory detective
6/5 Part IV: Personal Stories
Discussion group meeting
Paper #5 due
time stretch and shrink
6/9 Reading from Writing
Women's Lives (handout)
handling problems
of time and pace
things that happened to you
6/10 Discussion group meeting
Paper #6 due
remember/don't remember
6/11 psychic distance
End Discussion Group
#2
6/12 Final Portfolio
due
Final Readings