The first article I read this week was The Popularity of Formulaic Writing (And Why We Need to Resist) by Mark Wiley, and to be quite honest, I do not agree with Schaffer’s formulaic writing model. I believe that formulaic writing motivates predetermined structures on students rather than allowing them to discover their own voices and develop personal insights. Wiley mentions, “Schaffer claims this format replicates what is found in high-scoring essays on district-wide tests and AP exams.” For me, this sentence is key because it clearly reveals that formulaic writing functions as training for standardized testing. It teaches students how to write an essay for one audience: teachers. And guess what? Students may simply memorize the model. When students memorize a concept or structure, they do not actually learn it.
I know this from personal experience. I may or may not have passed Geometry in community college because I memorized how to solve equations and use the Pythagorean theorem just to pass a test. Did I pass the class? Surprisingly, yes. Did I actually learn and remember how to solve those equations? Needless to say, HECK NO. I memorized rules for one semester, and then, boom, I had no clue what I had learned.
Writing, however, is different. I learned to write because I underwent a process of self-discovery, and writing became part of my everyday life. To this day, I am still learning, growing, exploring, and expanding my knowledge and practice of writing. Writing is an infinite journey without a designated route in my eyes.
What I am trying to say is that Schaffer’s model teaches students that writing is limited. Formulaic writing requires students to follow rules. I believe writing has no limits. The limit does not exist! Yes, I totally stole that line from Mean Girls, but I digress. A structure-based model should not determine whether we know “how to write.” One consequence of enforcing Schaffer’s model is that students learn to follow patterns rather than develop as writers. Sure, students may produce organized papers, but they fail to develop a deeper connection with their ideas, ownership of their voices, and intellectual independence.
First, when students fail to develop a deep connection with their ideas, they struggle to express who they truly are. Our ideas emerge from our experiences, and our experiences often reflect what matters most to us. Following a rigid formula prevents creativity and imagination.
Second, formulaic writing discourages ownership of voice because students write to fulfill expectations rather than express authenticity and agency. To me, Schaffer’s model makes writing feel like the product of a predictable recipe rather than an expression of identity.
Third, let’s talk about the dependency that formulaic writing creates. Many students, especially high school students, arrive in college knowing only the standard five-paragraph essay because it has been taught for years. Once they get to college, they struggle because that structure is not always what professors require. Unless you have a very rigid professor, college writing is more flexible and adaptable. Intellectual dependency becomes a problem because formulaic writing encourages mechanical thinking rather than inspiring students to become independent thinkers. Without a template, many students can complete writing assignments, but don’t become writers because writers make their own decisions.
Now, let’s talk about the pedagogical method as a whole. Wiley mentions, “Teachers can simply refer to this rubric in responding to student writing, making the task of evaluation much simpler, more uniform, and less time-consuming.“
I have always said, and will continue to maintain, that teachers are not entirely at fault. Most of the time, they are following a curriculum and are expected to teach formulaic writing. Therefore, my critique is towards the educational systems and pedagogical methods rather than toward teachers themselves.
Wiley gives the impression that he sympathizes with teachers because he recognizes the difficult conditions many of them work in. Although teachers often face overcrowded classrooms and limited resources, students are primarily the ones affected by this quick-grading method. They become dependent on formulas, and that is something I don’t support because it hinders their ability to become independent thinkers.
In this quote, Wiley pretty much summarizes the idea of students handing over their intellectual independence to a formula. I see it as if students are walking a path that has already been paved for them when they should be instead, exploring discovery and creativity.
“To develop as writers, students must develop a repertoire of strategies for dealing effectively with various writing tasks presented to them in different situations. They must also learn to make choices about genre, content, structure, organization, and style; and they must learn to hone their judgments about the effects of the choices they make as writers. Consider that in Schaffer’s approach the goal of writing is to produce an essay of requisite length that contains the correct ratio of detail to commentary. In contrast, real writers must decide what they will compose based on their intentions, who will read their texts, and what effects they want their texts to have on these real and projected readers.”
Now, I want to discuss Antero Garcia’s How Remix Culture Informs Student Writing & Creativity and how I believe it connects to Wiley’s argument against formulaic writing. Wiley suggests resisting formulaic writing because it assumes the same structure can be applied regardless of context, which is unrealistic because writing situations vary drastically. While Wiley critiques Schaffer’s rigid writing model, Garcia encourages the practice of remixing.
Garcia argues that remix culture has become an essential part of how young people learn, create, and communicate. I really enjoyed this article because it made me realize that remix culture is not just in music or digital media. Remixing is something we do every day, whether through writing, communication, or any form of expression. People are constantly transforming existing texts, music, images/videos, and ideas into something new.
From my perspective, remixing is not copying. It is reinventing. It’s reinventing something with the purpose of cultivating creativity and identity. There has to be more than just traditional texts such as formulaic writing. There has to be remixing in our culture in order for students to express their identities. One of my biggest takeaways from Remixing culture is that it’s a liberatory act because it allows students to challenge dominant narratives and reshape perspectives.
I am so excited yipee yay Adamari is presenting! (no hate to the rest of you at all, I just had soooo many classes with her that is why I am excited and why I get to call her a rat. She is not a rat, she is amazing, I am so happy to see another one of her presentations, they are always so well done)
Imma do “The Popularity of Formulaic Writing (and Why We Need to Resist) first cause I opened the other link and got an ad for Cowgirl by Isa Beniston and it reminded of me mummy joe, so I will save the fun for later.
“I am busier than ever visiting high schools and talking to teachers about teaching”. I know it is the whole point of the readings we are doing, but man oh man do so many people not know how to teach writing. Obviously, we are getting all the papers about that, so it isn’t a great statement to say no one knows how to teach writing, but it surely seems to be a big issue. I never thought about how poor some teach writing before this class. The whole red pen scare didn’t usually sacre me as I love getting feedback. Unless, like those in the Rat Summer know, it says “See me after class”. That is scary. But yeah, lots of people not knowing how to teach writing it seems, which is crazy cause people do indeed be teaching writing without really knowing how.
“But don’t worry, I am not about to rehash diatribes against the five-paragraph essay. In fact, I do not believe formulaic writing is the actual villain in this classroom drama”. Interesting take. I would say teaching writing like a formula is a problem, especially when everyone has different expectations of the formula. I think writing is too subjective to be standardized and put into a formula, so I am interested in seeing where the drama is. Espeically when we mentioned hating the five paragraph essay and how it was just made for easier grading.
“A CD is any kind of specific detail such as facts, evidence, examples, proofs, quotations or paraphrase, or plot references. The commentary is the writer’s analysis, interpretation, insight, explication, personal reaction, and so forth. The ratio of 1 CD to 2 CMs must always be maintained in the writing students produce so that they internalize this basic pattern. Body paragraphs must have at least two chunks and be a minimum of 100 words. Introductions and conclusions must be 40+ words, with the introduction containing at least three sentences and a thesis somewhere in the first paragraph, while conclusions must contain all commentary and provide a finished feeling to the essay”. Okay so this is a very interesting set up. I think this is fine for high school, getting them used to writing. This is a similar structure to some English 1030 classes I see at Kean. I still feel like having such a formula will set them up for failure later on. If they go into academic writing that is. Good set up for now, writing does usually follow this sort of set up. Topic sentence, quote, explain quote, and then concluding sentence. I think someone later on will need to tell them to break this formula though, as college professors do now by telling students to break the five paragrah format. I am pretty sure this is just a standard thing to teach, I don’t think anyone teaches a different way to do a paragraph for high schoolers. Later on, there would need to be the idea of a synthesis introduced. Your topic sentence is the theme of the paragrah, quote one from author one on the idea, explain, quote two from a different author on that topic, say how they connect, quote three from author three, say how it connects, maybe a “and so on” but usaully it is a conversation between three authors. College/academic writing usually wants a conversation between multiple authors in a single paragraph WHILE you also say your ideas. It gets way more complicated than this, which is why teaching writing is so hard. There are way too many unique settings at play. I also feel like those intro and conclusion ideas are mid. Intros are always thought of to be so short but I would argue they should be a decent size. You gotta introduce your paper along with the ideas presented in the paper, if we are to do the writer thing and assume that the reader ahs no idea what we are talking about. This sets things up later for context/backgrounds of research papers where the intro is the abstract that is a summary of the entire paper. Conclusions, first of all I hate that word. Nothing is ever really concluded. But they should be some sort of takeaway or to do. They shouldn’t conclude, shouldn’t be a finish. I would argue they should leave the reader with a task to do or thoughts to have, it isn’t a story that wraps up with a finished feeling. There should be more. I am yapping far too much, sorry Adamari, especially with this probably being for high schoolers. But I fear that the set ups are fine, the issue is no one telling them later on how things have to advance. Everyone has to start somewhere, no need to do reading synthesis at high school unless required and no need to do a research paper at the college level, but I would argue the set up isn’t the issue. It is that we hold the high school set up as if it sets us up for life, but this set up would not pass for a college/academic paper (depending on the professor).
“Prewriting activities, for instance bubble and spider diagrams, serve as graphic organizers for getting students started in setting up a main idea and finding topic sentences and concrete details”. Okay I might just be hating today, but not the spider (monster) outline. When people say prewriting activity I do have a certain idea in mind, I know we discussed that basically everything you do before writing could count as prewriting. But I feel like brainstorming/organization should be in its own category. I feel like prewriting should be some sort of prompt or thinking activity that gets students to be able to do the brainstorming/organization task. Perhaps I am wrong. But I would classify this stuff as something else.
“Rubrics reinforce the basic format by having students check for proper ratios between CDs and CMs; having them count the requisite number of words, sentences, and paragraphs; and making sure all parts fit the pattern”. Ain’t no way. Sure, I will check that you explain the quote in some way. Don’t just put in a random quote with no set up or explanation. But checking the word, sentence, and paragraph count is a bit much. Let them write what they feel. What, am I gonna be throwing a fit if there is one word less. Too much nonsense. I am a big hater of this it seems.
“Teachers can simply refer to this rubric in responding to student writing, making the task of evaluation much simpler and uniform and less time consuming”. No. Bad. We literally just talked about how we should hear from the students about what direction they wanted to go in and judge the writing based on that. We should, sorry teachers, but we should get away from grading quicker just to grade quicker and move on with lives. Teach the fricken kids man. I get how hard it is to check 20+ essays, especially as a yapper. Dr. Sisler called me out day one in the spring, some of yall were there for that. Trust me, I know how the English department loves/hates to see me coming. I get how much work it is. But it is work that is worth it. Students got stuff to say, let them say it. Help them say it. Teach them how to say it. Funneling things down to an easier grading system does not seem like the way to teach writing, it seems like the way to help teachers have less work to do. This quicker grading thing will only hurt them in the long run, proof from all of us.
“With teachers and students agreeing on what counts most in an essay, teachers do not have to spend a lot of time writing terminal comments to justify a grade, which is often the purpose of our teacherly remarks on student work”. I am a hater I am a hater. I am having issues with like every sentence. I think grading them on word count or if they have the right amount of CMs is so silly. I get this is a quicker rubric, to simply see if they have the right number of stuff in the right places, but it feels so icky to me. It feels like learning just to help out the teacher and not learning to help the student write better. Learning to fit this format that college professors won’t use. Icky. Nasty. Big hater of this article I miss the Cowgirl ad.
“Even though Schaffer admits her method is formulaic, she claims that teachers should not worry that students will become dependent on the formula. Yet she does not explain why this is the case. She says, ‘The formulaic nature of this unit does not bother us because students may leave it once they understand it. Some students leave the format early in the process; others choose not to leave it at all because they like the structure and say it helps them know what to do with a blank page'”. I dislike this person. Stupid to think students won’t become dependent on a formula. Do you tell them they can leave? Do you leave things open for them to explore? Do students really leave this. Be honest. Cause I have a feeling they won’t. I know sooooo many people who want to get things right and would never leave this format if they know the teachers are looking for it/expecting it. You think someone will be brave enough to step away from this? What if the teacher grades them worse because they aren’t following the format? I have been in classes with people who ask 50 questions about an assignment because they want to get it right, aka want to do what the professor wants. But the professor would go “I don’t have the answers, it is up to YOU to pick the topic. Whatever you want to write about”. And people still freak out. Ain’t no way the good students who could step away would be the ones who step away. The trouble makers or silly kids might do it to see what will happen or because they don’t care enough to “get things right”. But this is such a dumb idea. No student will willingly step away. We are all proof of that. I was doing five paragraphs till a professor told me just to write, and the yapper was released. Unfortunate for the English department. But it needed to be done. Booo formats. Boooooo
“This possible dependency is a point I will return to later; for now, I want to emphasize that the virtue of the Schaffer approach is that students acquire a rudimentary schema for what can pass as an acceptable academic expository essay, an accomplishment not to be trivialized”. The vocab in this sentence… We randomly locked in hello. Language got crazy there for a second.
“Students first need to develop ‘writing fluency,’ she argued, not simply learn how to fill out a form”. I am no longer a hater. I have been healed. I hope the rest of the paper is more good ideas. Boooo filling out a form. Booooo
“Teachers, while acknowledging that students must move beyond the Schaffer method if they are to continue improving, were nevertheless left wondering what to do next. Unfortunately, there is no next in the Schaffer approach.” Now. I hope we learned our lesson. This is why I take quotes as I go. Was I right or was I right. They would not be set for life and have issues with what is next. This is why formats suck. People get stuck. We literally said we should ask the students what their goal was and see if the paper did that. Boom. No formula there. This paper making me a big hater I am so sorry Adamari for my ratness. This paper angers me.
“They must also learn to make choices about genre, content, structure, organization, and style; and they must learn to hone their judgments about the effects of the choices they make as writers”. As “boring” as it seems, this is why I loved English 1030 and helped tutor it many times. Same essays every time, but I loved seeing students learn different essay styles. It is so important to know one type of writing works for that one time of writing. I think too many times students get into writing course and think all the writing will be the same. No, you sometimes will get asked to write personal stories or more research type papers, or maybe traditional essays. Soooo many different writing styles and eventually, if you go far enough in English, you gotta make the call on what to do. For a research paper, will you give historical context or a background on the event. It is a call you have to make based on your research. How much of your topic do you have to explain? How many methods will our research paper have? Research papers have a lot of stuff up to the research being done. Creative writing also has sooo many aspects up to the writer. Maybe with essays you have more to say than four paragraphs, there was too many things in the prompt to get all the thoughts out in that limited space. There is no real formula for writing. It is only really if you met the goal you wanted to complete. Did the reader get what you wanted them to out of your writing?
“Formulaic writing of the kind Schaffer advocates forces premature closure on complicated interpretive issues and stifles ongoing exploration”. So true, it does limit exploration. It is like that saying of giving a man a fish instead of teaching him how to fish. There is a limit on thinking for themselves with these formulas, it is just filling in the main parts to get the paper done. So, is it even real learning? It seems to just be learning the formula and nothing else.
“Structure, we are telling them, has no ‘inherent relationship to ideas, since just about any idea can be stuffed into the same form'”. Yo. Bring in more of these other people I love what they be saying. So true. They are just learning that any idea can be meshed into the same one formula. They just got to ask what their peers are doing to see that everyone is fitting their ideas into one mold. These other people be so smart.
“What is the inevitable result when students never get beyond the formula and cling to it as a life raft from which they never want to disembark?” What I said about students not wanting to leave but in a more creative way. Is this article just bashing on this one scholar, cause I think that is so funny. It could have been writing from the other perspective, using those smart people to be like “here is what we should do in high school” instead of showing how wrong this one person is. I hope Schaffer died before this article came out cause if not that is crazy. Someone just tearing your teaching idea apart in a paper. Yipes. Adamari best never do that to me. Unless I die first then she can post whatever she wants on how awful my work was. But being alive when someone disagrees with your stuff this much would be crazy. Beefing in the academic space… I hope to never have to live that. Beef with my work in silence, without me knowing, cause this is so much “this person had terrible ideas”. I would rather you somehow contact me first, give me a chance to better myself/my work, than I wake up one day to some article going over how my ideas were terrible. Truly a yipes moment. Disagree in a more chill way than blasting me in an article man.
“These are the practices where teachers make all of the important decisions, and students simply find material to satisfy what they eventually realize is “what the teacher wants'”. Guys. I am so smart. I said this too. Earlier, but with “what the professor wants” cause I think about college more than high school. Sorry Zach to discount you in a way, but I don’t teach high school. Haven’t been there in a minute. But look at me go, thinking where the article is going. Lovely.
“A familiar argument in support of formulaic writing is that many struggling writers really need a simple format to follow so that they can achieve some immediate success in their academic writing. There is some merit to this argument”. I laugh every time an article is like this. “Insert idea here”… “This idea is wrong” or “This idea isn’t fully correct”. It is so funny. It is the way it is said too. Every time I see it in such a fun way. “some merit”. When you hate something but there is some truth to it, so you gotta agree.
“the same material that has bored them semester after semester and which they perceive has no relevance to their lives”. Yipes. Getting a little depressing there dang. I mean I guess doing the same formula would seem like no relevance to someone’s life, but like that is still a bit far no. Maybe I just love writing too much and can always find some joy. Every new writing prompt gives me new ideas. But yeah doing the same thing is indeed boring. Love changing things up.
“By solely using the formulaic approach to writing, the real winners will be the students who always win anyway.” Now what student is winning. What does that even mean. What kind of student “wins”? Is this like, getting a good grade? Is that a win? Is learning the idea a win? What does this mean. I never once considered myself a winning student, I never even heard of it said this way. I guess this is a better way of saying a good student, as we don’t wanna really say students are bad (even though there are some “bad” kids out there). But winning students is crazy, what is a win.
“teachers are under increasing pressure to produce students who can write essays that pass proficiency exams and who can score sufficiently high enough on standardized tests to save schools, and entire school districts, public embarrassment and possible censure and, in some cases, to garner monetary reward.” HELLO? Public embarrasment!? What is going on. I remember my fourth grade teacher was crying over our journals and some other rando teacher had to come in and explain that our teacher can’t teach us for the rest of the day as she was so upset we ALL failed the standardized test. It was a really crazy wild day. She was one of my favorite teachers too, one that my martial arts students had like ten years later and went “Petersen! We saw your Netflix work in class today!” First of all, ain’t no way I ever did a Netflix assignment. I had a Netflix account in high school, I remember cause I watched Stranger Things and Voltron. So. I most definetly did some sort of favorite show assignment not Netflix. But, point is, that teacher loved my work so much she held on to it for like ten years. So, at some point, the work WAS good, but standardized testing is stupid. I guess it is important to know if we are in some sort of education crisis, but clearly it is dumb. Some kids just are bad test takers. Or the tests aren’t as standardized as they might think. You do good work in one way but it won’t hold up in the stupid tests if they do some other random form, which is why formula writing isn’t the best form. But standardized testing being this much pressure on students on teachers is crazy when everyone hates it and sees the harm they do. Dumb, get rid of it.
“The formulaic approach would make their writing sound mechanical and simpleminded”. Look at that, having a voice would be important there. Having a unique style would help with not being so mechanical. Everything is connected guys.
Okay no more comments on that, I think I said all that needed to be said at the moment (this is already long and we got Cowgirl to get to).
Idk if yall saw the same ad for “How Remix Culture Informs Student Writing & Creativity” so I will show you so I don’t seem crazy and you can enjoy.
This is what I was talking about, finally, after all that yapping you find out what I was talking about. It brings me much joy. I hope the article is the same.
Here is mummy joe, what the art style remined me of. Check out mummy joe, great stuff.
ANYWAY, back to real content.
“Let’s get something out of the way: pretty much anything you or your students are making is a remix.” We are off to a great start. I agree. Even this blog is a remix. I am taking the quotes and yapping on them. I added in mummy joe. My memories. Other things I don’t know it cause it ain’t finished. I think we have done remix projects before, I know Dr. Friend and Professor Ali love them. Taking past work and reviving it. It is such a fun idea I love it. Lets get INTO IT
“Writing is also an important, accessible way that young people are remixing today: from fan fiction based on their favorite author’s worlds to retelling of a popular story from a new perspective—on a vlog, podcast, or on paper—remixing is, intentionally or not, part of the process.” I am invested. Yes. Fan fiction is so remix. It is a made world with the authors spin on it. Oh how I loved I picked this article second. Adamari you genius. I can’t think of one work that is truly orignial. We all take bits and pieces from stuff in our writing. We are social creatures after all. We “copy” what we love without realizing and put it into our work. How many times has Adamari seen/heard the rat behavior presentation. Oh I turned that thing into everything I could, to the point a friend joked I should just make a rat bible. We remix everything all the time. Yall see those Tik Toks on people having quotes from media in their daily conversations? Like trendy sayings or stuff they can’t get out of their head, they bring it up? We remixing all the time of the things we experience and love, I truly love this idea and stand by it all the way. I am unoriginal and I know it. So sad, I know. If I am not original, the Siege, who can be. But it is true. You basically all took a photo of my all time famous quote “I do whatever I want”. No clue how that will be remixed, but it will be now. The Spider-man meme from Alyssa is always in the remix somehow. We love to see it.
Not the history lesson on what a remix is. I wanna skip but I probably shouldn’t, I never know what will be my next best quote.
“In the halcyon days of social networking—the late 1990s and early 2000s—remix was something of a fringe culture: individuals with the savvy and time to utilize digital technologies could share in UseNet groups”. I am far too young bro what. What is a UseNet.
“To be clear, remixing was popular in music and film production long before the Internet, and musicians often release unofficial “mixtapes” today, even if they are never offered on physical media (let alone a cassette).” I know what a cassette tape is, okay not that young. I am cultured in that way. I also think it is funny to say that remixes happened before the internet. I just now realized with this that I listen to remixes all the time. I like mixes of songs, I think sometimes they are better than the original. Sometimes it sucks cause then I do hear the orignial but want the remixed version. I listen to a lot of girl pop remixes so if you hate the pop genre do not ask for my remixes. I actually found some nice Kpop mixes but haven’t found a decent Sabrina Carpenter mix yet. I know I know so sad. But I love her songs too much that the remix gotta be godly for me to listen to it. Otherwise I get too bothered by the slight imperfections of the random YouTuber.
Poor Adamari reading this for content and getting a random CJ yap. Anyways back to content. Sorry back to not content. “A hip-hop mixtape often finds a rapper sharing rhymes over popular beats already on commercial airwaves.” Anxiety song, you all know that or no. That song pissed me off so much. I wanted the orignial every single time. “Somebody That I Used to Know”. Anxiety, bad remix. You disagree begone. I can’t with you. Original or nothing for this and I stand by it hardcore. I just said I usually like remixes but I take it back for that one song.
“The soul classics I grew up with, the furry-footed denizens of Middle Earth that I read about as an adolescent,” the what now. The what. What in the world begining sentence… Another Tik Tok thing of going “we are running out of original sentences” when hearing something crazy. How did we get to Middle Earth, what just happened. Where did I get transported to. What does “furry-footed denizens” mean.
DO NOT LOOK THAT UP OMG. Do. Not. Look. That. Up. Save yourselves. Furry foot porn showed up for me. So, I am still clueless on what that sentence means but for all of us I am MOVING ON. I pray yall read this TED Talk first and got the warning to not look it up.
But also there was one photo in the mist of furry content of the Star Wars Ewoks, so. Maybe it meant that…
Anyways now that I am terrified for the rest of this article. “While one refrain of remix culture is that it is allows underdog success stories (anybody can attract an audience), large media conglomerates, from Sony to DreamWorks to Random House, are also extraordinarily savvy at remixing media”. This reminds me of that terrible Wish movie. Disney loves including their characters in other projects of theirs, like the seven dwarves being remixed into this movie.
“Remixing is a two-way street. As part of the business-as-usual approach to marketing, it can reinforce traditional, problematic portrayals of women, people of color, and LGBTQI individuals.” Oh, are we about to lock in? Randomly getting into deep lore.
“Remix can turn troubling messages to offer analysis and reinterpretation. It can also involve primary sources that may be offensive and triggering for some audiences—a fraught process in terms of the images, sounds, language, and ideas conveyed.” Not exactly the deep dive I thought we were going to get. But yes, remixes can help turn terrible messages around. It might make things easier to digest or help people analyze harmful content. But it can sometimes be harmful for minorities. I know when a Batman story has a character that has a history of being white be a different race, the internet throws a fit. However, soooo many comic book people are white. Remixing the story is helpful in getting more representation, but also puts visbility spotlight on minories and then the news can get flooded with hate on the characters being remixed.
“Looking at the Tumblr community’s remixes of Hermione from the “Harry Potter” series as a black character (long before a black actress was cast in the forthcoming Harry Potter and the Cursed Child) illustrates how individuals are allowed to see themselves in remixes.” oooh not the Harry Potter. Now, see, I did just say how remixing can be helpful, but I forgot to mention we do need to be careful when remixing. For example, if we want to add more diverse characters to a white cast, maybe consider making the main character switch things up. Far too many times the female in the group also becomes the person of color, and the white male stays that. A bit of a problem. If too many side characters get swapped, then we get the story changing in some interesting ways. Like making Snape from Harry Potter become a person of color changes how we see his childhood bullying. Instead of it just being he was an awkward kid, now it can be seen as racism, which adds a different layer to the story, as it might add the idea that Harry’s dad was a racist. (This is all stuff I have seen people saying online by the way, feel free to disagree or say I am crazy for saying these things, I didn’t come up with this Snape being a person of color is a bad idea. People pointed out how things changes the story a bit and I am just pointing out how things could get complicated the more you switch stuff up). Gotta be careful with the remixing as it changes the story in interesting ways.
“Likewise, online fan fiction and video remixes of Star Wars: The Force Awakens casting rebel pilot Poe and reformed storm trooper Finn in a romantic relationship offer a counter-narrative to the heteronormative assumptions most viewers make of the film. Remixing can be a liberatory act.” Oh how I love remixing things to be queer. One of my favorite things, queer ships that totally should exist but don’t. I got a whole list but not now. Yap for another time.
“Written by Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton and its nearly all-black and Latino cast illustrates contemporary messages that ours is a nation built by (and for) immigrants. Meanwhile, the music makes numerous nods to hip-hop history and its own founding fathers.” For this I would say it is still very important to teach how history was, as I saw some people on social media forgetting/finding out the founding fathers were white. Lets not forget how racist history was now guys. Lock in.
Anyway, yippe yay you reached the end of my yap! Hope you didn’t accidentally traumatize yourself during the second article like I did! My search history is messed up now. But yay so excited to talk about these ideas in class!!
If nothing else, the paradigm demonstrates that when individuals are given the opportunity to disclose deeply personal aspects of their lives, they readily do so. (p.6)
I don’t know if this line sparked some curiosity or just made me emotional. People have a strong desire to be heard whether it’s by themselves or by others, it doesn’t matter. What matters is getting it out of our system. To process hardships or triumphs through writing in a reflective and deeply personal way.
That’s an emotional thing to think about.
I remember journaling as a safe space for me growing up. It’s where I’d go to write on and on about the day I had, the drama happening at school, my crushes, my internal conflicts, etc. And when I’d finish writing, I’d reread my entries with a certain curiosity, wanting to see what I had managed to get out. It was my way of processing.
I don’t know how I would have handled any situation in my life then, if I had not written it all down.
One of my best friends, Geo, is your typical guy (& that’s not to be offensive). I’ve talked to him about therapy before, but he’s always shrugged and been critical of the whole process. When I shared my experiences, he’d say something along the lines of well I’m happy that works for you, I just don’t know if it could for me. I’d say, then why not journal? And then he’d make a bunch of excuses as to why he doesn’t like journaling.
Last time I saw him, he spoke to me about life after graduation and how difficult it’s been to navigate… on top of all of life’s twists and turns. All of this to say that he’s been having a pretty hard time. As we walked he mentioned… in a very nonchalant, casual way… that he started journaling.
Why did he start?… because he needed help processing. He needed help acknowledging and, as a result, confronting these sometimes difficult emotions. I think using that as a starting point to then start journaling about happy, good things would serve well for him too.
One reason that we believe that expressive writing has been effective is that it serves as a life course correction… (p.37)
Like I said in my previous blog, I have a newfound “fear” or kind of hesitance to journaling. I now think that it’s because I know that if I pick up the pen I’ll be met with myself and be forced to confront all my wrongdoing (mainly because when I journal I usually rant).
But… occasionally, most of us benefit from standing back and examining our lives. (p.37)
What activities in your life feel like ice cream or broccoli? This was different in our beginning of class check in. Ice cream represented something good, and broccoli represented something you didn’t particularly like. We all expressed our feelings on ice cream and broccoli. It was great to hear what everyone’s differences were.
After our check in, I asked Dr. Zamora if we could go on another writer’s walk. The weather was beautiful. Dr. Zamora took a vote of hands who wanted to go, and those who didn’t want to go. To my surprise, we all went. It wasn’t as long as the first writer’s walk, but it was still great.
After our walk, we were handed an orange and purple piece of paper. Instead of shout outs, we used the pieces of paper to ask questions and compliment each other’s blogs from the week before readings. That was a different approach as well as interesting. It was interesting to hear some of the compliments and questions about our blogs.
Presentation time: CJ presented his presentation on Queer Composition(s). I think his presentation was very good. I learned a lot about the games that I have purchased for my son. The gaming experience is way over my head. I am just not into it. My son, on the other hand, loves his gaming.
In reading this article, one question caught my attention. What is it about trauma that influences health? Traumatic experiences can affect a person’s health, well-being, and mental health. People go through life experiencing unanticipated circumstances that can affect them in different ways. Psychologically, dealing with emotional changes, Socially, becoming withdrawn from others, and behaviorally, that can lead to lifestyle changes developing unhealthy habits. The article states “that they are associated with a host of biological changes including elevations in cortisol, immune disruptions, cardiovascular changes, and a cascade of neurotransmitter changes”.
Some traumatic experiences lead to PTSD, depending on how extreme the traumatic experience is and how you respond to it. People who suffer from depression are most likely to suffer from PTSD as well.
As I continued reading the article, I noticed that the case studies placed individuals into different groups. Some groups that didn’t show any signs of sickness after a traumatic experience, and other groups that showed PTSD as a result of their traumatic experience they’ve encountered.
Personally, I would place myself in the group of people who experienced trauma, but did not develop PTSD. For example, one of my closest brothers passed away from kidney failure. We were close in age, and wherever you saw me, you saw him, and vice versa. We were closer than two peas in a pod. Losing him was a painful experience. I suffered with pain for a while, but I didn’t let that pain consume me. I had to move on. I had children who depended on me.
This brings me to four questions in this article: Why is it that some people seem to deal with major or upheavals better than others? What is the profile of healthy coping? If such coping strategies exist, can they be trained? If such techniques are available, how do they work?
Personally, I believe that my way of coping with difficult experiences come from the Power of Prayer, Faith, and the support of Prayer partners. I was brought up in the church. My family and I stood firmly on the Word of God. The verse: Mathew 19:26 states: “With God, All Things Are possible”. This scripture is a reminder, that no matter what challenges I face in life, I put my trust in God. My father, Edward Boyd, was a Reverend, and my mother served ‘as First Lady. We have a powerful prayer group. Prayer and Faith is a major part of our lives. We believe in putting our trust in God’s hands. Our belief is that the battle is not yours, it’s the Lords. Yolanda Adams (is an American Gospel Singer), who wrote the gospel song “The Battle Is Not Yours”, reminds me of the faith I was raised with, and the belief that we do not have to hold on to burdens on our own. We turn our burdens to God and put our faith and trust in Him, to carry us through our times of struggles. Our faith and prayer helps us cope with any traumatic experiences we face in life. As for me and my household, we believe in the “Power of Prayer”.
However, I realize that not everyone is raised in the church, share the same beliefs, or depend on faith to lean on during difficult times of struggles that life brings. My faith in God is my source of strength and comfort during all of my traumatic experiences.
I understand that other individuals may rely on different methods and resources to help them cope with traumatic experiences. This leads me to consider how researchers use case studies on individuals’s to see how language and writing can help them cope.
In my opinion, I think there are pros and cons to writing about traumatic experiences. Writing can be difficult for some people when they revisit traumas that they’ve tried to bury deep in their subconscious memory. Then there are some individuals who believe writing helps them with their emotions and begin to heal, by putting their traumatic experiences into words, and expressing those feelings. The power of writing becomes a way of coping that allows them to tell their stories in their own words.
Either way, I strongly believe that individuals should release problems one way or another. Keeping problems, stress, or traumatic feelings inside most likely lead to health problems. It begins to eat away at you, opposed to speaking or writing about them. I connect this to the three “R’s”. Relax, Relate, and Release.
The article mentions “Studies show that writing resulted in less visits to the doctor or physician, and are more beneficial to males than females”. “Case studies were determined that there were not sufficient evidence to warrant adopting the writing method as part of clinical practice (more theory-oriented)”.
I think writing is a great therapeutic tool to use to help some individuals write about their traumatic experiences. I commend the researchers for their case studies on individual traumas. Support groups are very helpful. Writing may not help everyone. I believe that if it works for you, that that is a good thing. If it doesn’t, that’s okay too. We’ve all been through some type of traumatic experience or situation in our lives. What matters is finding what helps you cope, and what healing methods work best for you.
To be a writer is to find healing in writing our sorrows. To be a writer is to know that writing releases our quietest burdens and internal pressures. Because of sorrows and burdens, we have scars that no one can see, but only we can feel. Writing loosens the weight of our burdens. And our scars are splendid because they create a story.
After reading Expressive Writing, Emotional Upheavals, and Health by James W. Pennebaker and Cindy K. Chung, these were my initial thoughts. I’ve always felt that writing was emotionally healing because of my own experience. After reading the article, I now understand more about the physical effects of expressive writing. One of the studies in the article consisted of having a group of people with elevated blood pressure write about their trauma for a few months. The authors mention, “One month after writing, those who participated in the emotional disclosure condition exhibited lower systolic and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) than before writing. Four months after writing, DBP remained lower than baseline levels.“
I have reflected upon this physical study the authors have made and I’m captivated by how expressive writing can reduce systolic blood pressure, in some way cortisol, and induce a congruent state of calmness. One key factor the authors highlight is: “It is possible that confronting a traumatic or distressing experience led to reactions aimed for in exposure-based treatments.” Pennebaker and Chung suggest one way to treat trauma is by exposure-based methods in order to channel it instead of internalizing it. As they mention, people and students who wrote about their emotional upheavals showed improvements and positive behavioral changes. Furthermore, these individuals achieved positive outcomes even after recently experiencing a negative circumstance in their lives.
The principal idea of the article is that unprocessed traumatic experiences induce decline in physical health and weaken psychological well-being. The authors’ depth in all the studies conducted shows that expressive writing is a way to channel trauma, leading to a healing process and improvement. One of the most striking ideas in this article is the importance of naming and labeling traumatic experiences. Many people are in denial and don’t know how to manage emotional trauma. They choose to silence their pain and it consumes them. As a result, many individuals have health issues because the emotional burden disrupts their physical well-being. This made me think about the relevance of therapists, mental-health mentors, and, in general mentors who find methods for people to assimilate their trauma. And if you think about it, all of these professionals use writing in some way to help individuals accept that there’s an internal trauma –and that it’s okay to name it as it is because there are hundreds of people who go through it too.
I feel I have a story for everything, but I just can’t help but see a correlation in my life with the articles I’ve read. In this article, the authors mention, “Not talking about a traumatic experience is also associated with a breakdown of one’s social network, a decrease in working memory, sleep disruptions, alcohol and drug abuse, and an increased risk for additional 38 traumatic experiences. Expressive writing or the unfettered talking about a trauma can often short circuit this process. “ This quote spoke to me because it reminded me of the anxiety crisis I had three years ago. I had insomnia, felt extremely anxious, but for the first time in my life had therapy. One of the best methods for me to overcome this anxiety episode with the help of a therapist was writing and reframing my thoughts. I actually named that process: reframing my brain sequence. The therapist recognized that I had internalized emotional issues for so long that my body and mind had a crash-out. She was right. I am a person who, instead of venting out internal upheavals, I absorb them. Especially at that time, I felt that I didn’t want to be a burden for anybody, so I didn’t ask for help, until my body and mind burnt out. I wasn’t producing melatonin because my cortisol level was too high and my nervous system was unstable. But I was able to get my body and mind back to a normal state.
I share this because through that experience, for the first time in my life, I didn’t choose to internalize trauma anymore. The authors mention, “Narrating an emotional event into the bigger picture might help to integrate the experience into one’s greater knowledge structures and personal identity.” Now I look at that negative experience as a stepping stone that helped me structure my identity, revealing strength I didn’t even know I had. Writing poems about my internal issues allowed me to find a firm version of myself.
Now I understand better why authors write memoirs. Writing their experiences developed identity formation. One of the best examples is Anne Frank’s “Diary of a young girl” which we have clear conclusions from her memoir. 1. Expressive writing as emotional processing 2. Psychological resilience and 3. Shaping identity. Anne Frank documented her traumatic experience as a way to vent out her desperation, threat, and isolation. Making her memoir a remarkable document that, to this day, has great relevance in literature. Her writing allowed her to process emotions that otherwise would have remained unspoken. Through her writing, Anne Frank maintained hope, identity, and perseverance. And that is the beauty of writing. Writing is the painting of someone’s voice. Writing can help someone endure and make meaning from trauma and emotional upheavals.
My ending thought on Pennebaker and Chung is the following quote: “Writing is medicine. It’s an appropriate antidote to injury. It is an appropriate companion to any difficult change.” – Julia Cameron. To me, this means writing is the place where our wounds learn to speak, and our souls begin to heal.
So this is like 40 pages… Yeah I am gonna limit my yap guys. I will be reading but instead of pointing out every single quote I like Imma save it for the really special ones this time. Maybe it was less of a yap this time, I don’t know yet I didn’t read/write it yet. We shall see what happens.
“As we lay out in this chapter, there is reason to believe that when people transform their feelings and thoughts about personally upsetting experiences into language, their physical and mental health often improve.” Not it taking three pages to finally get something that makes me go “oh that is why we are reading this”. The before was so much medical terms I kept checking to see if I was reading the right thing, cause nothing was mentioning writing, English, reading, or language till now. But this paper gotta do a lot of convincing cause I think this is an iffy idea. I guess maybe afterwards the event is better on the mind? But when currently writing out the trauma it never makes me feel like my mental health improved. Sometimes the writing it out actually made things get worse as the event causing stress increased because of the writing. It depends on many factors what counts as mental health improvement.
“However, an increasing number of studies indicate that having people write about traumas can result in healthy improvements in social, psychological, behavioral, and biological measures”. Biological? Hello? Do I want to know what that even means. I get how psychologically it improves your health, thus your social life or behaviors improve, but biological? How in the world does that even happen man.
“By the mid 1980s, investigators started to notice that upheavals that were kept secret were more likely to result in health problems than those that could be spoken about more openly. For example, individuals who were victims of violence and who had kept this experience silent were significantly more likely to have adverse health effects than those who openly talked with others (Pennebaker & Susman, 1988).” Now see, here we get into a whole other issue. How can people speak out about certain things when society silences them? Women don’t report abuse for many reasons. Maybe it isn’t safe to do so, maybe they know there is a chance they won’t be heard, maybe they know there is a chance nothing will get done and things will be worse for them. It is important to note that when people are silent things don’t work out as well for them, but there are sooooo many factors people are silent. Might even be as simple as they don’t have anyone to tell or don’t think about telling these stories. But that is a whole thing about society being set up in some evil ways.
“Even though a large number of participants report crying or being deeply upset by the experience, the overwhelming majority report that the writing experience was valuable and meaningful in their lives.” Me. If Alyssa makes us do some deep stuff I may cry, so even though it is her topic she better not. She makes us do some deep stuff things are gonna get real and I kinda want a chill Thursday. Love yall, but not enough to do a therapy session in the middle of class.
“He also found that longer intervals between writing sessions produced larger overall effect sizes, and that males benefited more from writing than did females.” This reminds me on how society expresses men to hold in emotions more and then that YouTube video where the woman goes “and who set that system up?”. Cause truly why do men tell other men to hold in emotions to the point where they get more out of deep writing. Let those emotions out men, let them out.
“Self reports also suggest that writing about upsetting experiences, although painful in the days of writing, produces long-term improvements in mood and indicators of well-being compared to controls. Although some studies have failed to find clear mood or self-reported distress effects, Smyth’s (1998) meta-analysis on written disclosure studies indicates that, in general, writing about emotional topics is associated with significant reductions in distress.” Real. This does seem like a painful thing to be doing. Also, not sure how I feel about all this self-report stuff. People be liars and I think about how people may think they are doing good but they lying to themselves. I want some more evidence other than all this self-report stuff.
“As researchers, we assume that, say, the diagnosis of a lifethreatening disease is the most important issue for a person to write about in a cancer-related study. However, for many, this can be secondary to a cheating husband, an abusive parent, or some other trauma that may have occurred years earlier”. HELLO?? Are people good. If I get asked to write about trauma, I will bring up the thing I am currently dealing with, if there is one. Like the diagnosis, I would bring up that, before going into the other nonsense. That is about me, my stress, my trauma, forget the other garbo. But me right now does not have some sort of cancer so I would indeed write about my mother or my father. My mother being a jerk to me or my father losing his leg in a stupid way. Those are the traumas I talk about, my go to being to hate on my mom cause the dad thing was suuuuper scary to go through. But like, ignoring your disease to vent about a cheating husband is wild to me. Forget that man. Rude rat. I was gonna note with the job loss example I was like “no duh people hate losing their job” and then it mentioned kids and stuff and I was like “…. oh right. People get married and have kids”. I do not be thinking about that. So it is wild of me to be thinking about some cheating man, but also to be thinking about kids, even though both are understandable. It would make sense to have concerns about loved ones in your life. Me causally forgetting how bad it can be for people to lose their jobs.
“provide sufficiently open instructions to allow people to deal with whatever important topics they want to write about.” I do not know how to feel about this. I do hate prompts in general. I get why people need them, to bounce off ideas to start writing. But truly sometimes I got nothing. When Dr. Z asks us to write and then asks who wants to answer, I am like 90% sure every time I didn’t answer I had nothing. I wrote down the prompt and went something like “…. I do not even have a response for this”. I feel the same with the picture check in. Every single time those photos don’t really speak to me other than being pretty or something. I am making up some random connection every time cause they do not speak to me. Do I like writing? Yes, I can always come up with my own yapping. Clearly. But for some reason prompts just lock me and I just think and think and think about the prompt with nothing coming to mind. So if it was just a “write about your traumas” I can go OFF. A generic prompt would help me for this case. However, my not knowing how to feel about this despite my hate for prompts is that I would probably say a lot of stuff but not go too deep. I think a prompt that asks for a feeling, as much as I HATE when prompts want us to get a specific feeling, would probably get more out of people. Generalizing this cause who wants to get deep right off the bat. Asking more deep questions would get more lore out of people, thus making it worth it. For if it stays at surface level, it might not be all too helpful.
“In another study, students were asked to write about traumas in the standard way”. There is a standard way to write about traumas? Since when. How does one write about a trauma standardly.
“Similarly, in an unpublished project by Lori Stone (2002), students were asked to write about their thoughts and feelings about the September 11 attacks.” Usually I do not factor in the year of things but oh my gods. Hello. We getting crazy in this article. I mean I figured when the paper said “for two decades” it was old but bringing in a 2002 year study talking about 9/11… And this is why dates are important cause jeez.
“Most studies comparing writing alone to talking either into a tape recorder (Esterling, et al., 1994) or to a therapist in a one-way interaction (Murray, Lamnin, & Carver, 1989; Donnelly & Murray, 1991) find comparable biological, mood, and cognitive effects”. I know I said I would pick important quotes but this sounds so fun. It is like all the old shows/films or shows/films set in the 80s or something where a character goes around talking into a tape recorder. That is so fun. Just yapping to yourself in a tape device. I would not yap about trauma though, that seems like a “yap about ghosts or murders in the town while you investigate things” type of activity. Though, there is also 13 Reasons Why so. What do I know about tape recordings.
“Rather, reading or discussing one’s traumas in a group format after writing may pose unexpected problems. Clearly, additional research is needed to help understand this process.” Not this 40 pages paper telling me more research needs to be done. You doing all this yapping and more research hasn’t been done yet? Also, yes. It is more stressful to yap to a group about your issues. People like to vent and keep things quiet. They need to get their thoughts out, clearly as the paper already discussed it is not good to hold things in. But telling random people your deep lore is a not fun activity.
“One possibility is that writing by hand is slower and encourages individuals to process their thoughts and feelings more deeply.” I agree. As a yapper, I hate writing by hand. I like the feel of both typing and writing, but writing takes so long. Also, while I do tend to keep my papers, hand writing stuff gets put away in folders that may not be seen for a looong time. I bookmark most if not all my writings on the computer, so they are easier to access. Better to revisit and revise if needed. I like typing more for organization and speed, but hand writing has its charm.
“In both cases, we found that people talked with one another at very high rates in the first 2-3 weeks. By the 4th week, however, talking rates were extremely low”. The timing gotta be mad low nowadays. I feel like we see so much now that we are always talking about the next bad thing and never really giving any bad moment its time to “shine?” Shine is probably a terrible word to use, but my point is we move very fast now. Does anyone take any time to process anything?
“However, if another person disagrees with their thoughts and feelings about the movie, the participants are more biologically around on a second screening – even though they are watching the movie alone.” This paper is starting to lose me so bad. What in the world are we talking about right now. I get we are now yapping about how great it is to yap to others but when in the world did movies get like this. “biologically around”. What in the world does that even mean. Do I not know what biologically means? I felt like I did but the more this paper brings it up the more I question my sanity. I truly am so lost. This movie example did not do it for me I am so confused on what this even means. What does it mean to be biologically around even if you are alone. What does that mean. Do people biologically watch movies? Clearly I am doing movies wrong cause what.
“Some people who don’t tell others about an upsetting experience may never think about the event and others do” Now how do we even know this stuff. How do you get people to talk about something they do not think about. If they don’t think about it, wouldn’t they not know to mention it, thus they wouldn’t mention they aren’t thinking about a thing they aren’t mentioning? Maybe I am getting too tired for the second half of this paper but I feel like I entered the Twilight Zone.
“The answer is no.” Brother. I can’t with this paper. All this yap to go “no” every now and then is crazy. I mean, so true. Sometimes your thoughts turn up with nothing. But it keeps happening and like are we even saying anything anymore. So much stuff to get rid of all the yapping to say “no”. So much back and forth with this paper I am losing it. I am like “oh okay yes I am following along” just for it to go “no”.
“suggested that once an individual attempts to translate a picture into words, it changes the memory of the picture. Most experiences are like pictures”. Already lost. We gotta stop with these examples man. What do you mean changes the memory of the picture. Do we not look at pictures to put them into words? Why we memorizing. And then it just moves on. We keep bringing in these exampls to think I get it, I don’t but the paper just moves on.
“The problem of capturing an experience with language is comparable to the engineering difficulty of defining an analog signal using digital technology”. Brother, now you KNOW I do not know what in the world you are talking about. Hello. What are these examples. Who is this paper for. Is this an inside joke I don’t get? I thought when giving examples, the examples are for people to better understand the topic. What engineer is reading this. What random niche inside joke did I just read? I mean maybe this is the point, I am to not understand the example. As someone who does not engineer, oh yeah it surley is hard to define an analog signal only using digital technology, hardest thing ever guys. I thought analog signals would be helpful with computers but maybe I am thinking of the wrong digital technology. Maybe other technology is better.
So. Reading the next lines. I was most definetly wrong on what I thought that line meant. I thought digital as in computer. Did digital mean finger. What is going ON in this paper bro. I for sure thought someone would be like “no CJ, you did understand the paper. Stop stressing”. But… did digital mean finger guys…. Cause … I most definitely did not get that example if it did indeed mean finger.
Okay moving on from that section cause I got that we need to label emotions better, but the examples are so confusing for no reason.
“Individuals who use very few negative emotion words or who use a very high rate of them are the ones most likely to remain sick after writing, compared with those who use a moderate number of negative emotion words.” I feel like we gotta factor in more stuff. Do these people have the vast vocab to use all these different emotions? Cause I know of the basic emotions, I wouldn’t be able to get too into it. I feel like being better equipped with terms might change results when writing out your feelings. Also, how do we know the levels of sickness? The paper keeps mentioning health, but who got doctor seeing money. Do we factor that in, the availability to see a doctor? Consider other things going on in the person’s life, other stress factors? I feel like there are too many variables with this sort of thing.
“Although most therapists would agree with the importance of shifting perspectives, the difficulty for a researcher is in devising a way to track this shift.” I feel like all of this was super hard to track, as so much of it was based on what the person said about themselves. But what do I know. I mean if you got the time you could see how the writing shifts with time, if the emotional words used get more positive or negative. That could be one way to track things.
“Specifically, the more that people oscillated in their use of 1st person singular pronouns (I, me, my) and all other personal pronouns (e.g., we, you, she, they), the more people’s health improved”. How in the world did people write in different point of views. How do you not yap in first person. Those some creative people not gonna lie. Being able to transform a lore drop to a different point of view must take mad skills.
“Be cautious in interpreting these findings”. This paper keeps saying things and then being like “jk ignore all that”. Hello. What are we doing. I am trying to learn here and every time I go “got it” it is a prank.
“We still don’t know for whom it works best, when it should be used, or when other techniques should be used in its place.” Crazy thing to say after all this. Overall this article was saying a lot of something and nothing at the same time. Kept presenting all this data or questions to go “there isn’t enough research” or that the study proved no difference between the data sets.
Alyssa try not to bring up Edi Giunta or memoir in your blog challenge: failed.
I promise this week’s blog will be shorter, if only because I have some supplemental reading I am providing you all with. I apologize in advance.
The idea of this reading—that writing can be a tool for healing for the body and the soul—is something I am intimately familiar with. Writing has always been an outlet for me. I think you can pick any writer off the street, and nine times out of ten, they would tell you that the writing process is healing for them, too. I love seeing all the way healing comes out of writing, and I love reading Pennebaker and Chung’s explanations as to why it works.
In line with last week’s theme of looking back at our old work and admiring our fluidity, inspired by this week’s theme of writing as healing, I decided to look back at my process essay that I wrote after finishing my memoir for class. Instead of reinventing the wheel, I thought I would share a revised excerpt with you all here:
I did not know where writing this memoir would lead me. I started with a vague idea of what I wanted to write, but I did not know how I would do it. I did not know why I would write it. However, after these four months, I found a common thread between my pieces: these are all moments I know happened. I could tell you what happened, give you a timeline, describe the events on their surface level. I could not tell you what effects these moments had on me, until now.
I write to process. I create, erase, and reshape words until I am once again familiar with the face of my youth. I trace the outline of myself, guided by the writers before me. Louise DeSalvo. Margaux Fragoso. Melida Rodas. Emily Bernard. They hold my hand as I look into the mirror.
If I push too hard, the glass will shatter. I cannot be my younger self again; I cannot fix her problems. I cannot tell her it will be okay. All I can do is look at her through the mirror of memoir, and answer her questions for myself. Who are you? I hope she is fine.
In writing “A Rosary Held So Tight It Leaves Marks”, I see myself through the hundreds of eyes in the mirror. I see myself from the Ikea bookshelf in my childhood room. I see myself from the St. Clare’s bathroom mirror. I see myself in glass, in mugs and phone screens. Memoir surrounds me; I have become comfortable with it.
I would also like to leave you all with another piece of writing that has stuck with me for a long time—the book Writing as a Way of Healing by Louise DeSalvo. DeSalvo, mentioned in my process essay, was a fellow writer of memoir, and recognized the power of writing. I’ve thought a lot about her recently during our class discussions, but I haven’t figured out how to bring her up until now. Quite literally the perfect book for this week! I find that the part of her work that is most relevant to our class discussions so far is her section on the writing process, where she argues that writing must be done in different stages to be effective for healing. She writes, “I’ve come to understand that the most healing way of approaching the writing process is to focus upon the potential and possibilities for growth rather than upon its problems and pitfalls. Knowing what each stage of the process affords us and making explicit our intention for using the process as a healing experience assure us that we will pass through each stage in the most enriching way possible” (DeSalvo, 1999). I am attaching to this blog post a PDF of this chapter for your enjoyment.
Very short blog post this week, but I just thought that sharing is caring—so, enjoy! (Also, no annotations because I was not printing out 40 pages. Sorry!)
This week’s readings (mainly Sonya Huber) had me thinking a lot about my writing process, my voice, and how it’s developed (and continuously developing) over time.
My voice has had many transformations. And they’ve all felt a little awkward and “false” until, over time, they finally felt like me. And honestly, I still feel like my writing voice is transforming.
I like the idea that our souls can encompass various voices. Some are more personal and others find themselves serving the public mask a little more. It’s important to remember the essence of self is carried within each “voice” as you use said voice as a tool in your writing.
Acknowledging all your different voices in all these different contexts helps you garner a deeper understanding of the self in turn makes you a better, more “embodied” writer.
But it’s all annoying isn’t it. To have to navigate these spaces all at once and all these voices at once and use your very-specific-to-you style to compile a satisfying writing project.
I’ve struggled too. And after reading this, I started reflecting on why I use parenthesis at all. I realized I use it to kind of say or explain things without feeling or carrying the added pressure that comes with presenting my thoughts in an academic setting. When engaging in creative writing, I’ve noticed that I use parentheses to let my audience in on a little secret or to tell them what I really mean.
But why can’t I write or reveal as I use my surface-level voice, without the hedges? I guess that would be two different voices coming together in one piece of my writing. Heteroglossia! I liked learning the word for the phenomenon for a piece of writing inhabiting a writer’s many voices. It makes me feel more comfortable with exercising my voice the way I have and continue to do.
But that doesn’t necessarily remove that uncomfortableness from seeing yourself (the person you are) creeping there on the page. Which is a whole psychological endeavor to think about. What’s the difference between a person’s approach to writing who was heard when exercising the tool that is their voice and those who weren’t? Those who aren’t able to (particularly those who don’t have access to speech, vision, or body)?
I’ve been thinking about voice and its power a lot recently. Especially in writing. For some it flows out like water, and for others it takes more of a negotiation with oneself to finally “get the mess on the page.”
And wherever you land on that spectrum of struggle has a lot to do with where you’ve been and where you’ve landed. There is no Ideal Text to compare and work ourselves toward. & that’s important to remember.
Secondary education isn’t necessarily to blame for where I’ve landed (which is the side with struggle involved). Sure, it plays a role because of the how strict the structure of writing was, but I had a couple great english teachers that encouraged stepping (slightly) out of those lines. For me, I think it has more to do with identity.
Thinking of voice as a flame is a beautiful sentiment. To be caring, compassionate, mindful of our voices and nurture them into liveliness. To do that all again for the sake of knowing and trusting ourselves enough to write at all. And exercising that cycle to then present it to whoever your audience may be.
꩜
Journaling has not been an easy feat for me recently. I genuinely can’t do it because every time I approach the page, it feels like my mind struggles to put the words together. Mainly for fear. But whenever a deep feeling arises that I can’t ignore (somehow) a poem exits itself out of my mind and (somehow!) onto paper.
“Real-life troubles affected my voice, to the point where I couldn’t be honest on the page or feel some of my emotions.” Like Huber, I’ve felt this way many, many times. But as an act of resistance, I can try labeling the voice that writes poems… Nonsensical Women or something.
A quote I also liked: “We become thought; we feel voice; we act out ideas on the small stage of our being.”
“When I first heard, as a young person who liked to write, that writing was about “finding your voice,” I got nervous. That seemed very risky: what if I picked the wrong one?”- Susan Huber
Susan Huber starts off this article with a very relatable question. What if I picked the wrong one? The wrong voice that would lead my writing. That’s a very real fear I had when learning about writing with voice for the first time in Professor Lisa Sislers’ Advanced Composition course during my undergrad. It was the first time I heard about voice being your own distinct personality in your writing.
I felt behind as a writer, even though I wasn’t even calling myself one at the time. I thought I had to pick one voice and stick with it forever. Famous authors I recognize, like poets Sylvia Plath or Margaret Atwood, and novelists Stephen King and Ocean Vuong, have distinct voices that I look up to. All of which seems to be unmoving or unchanging. Huber offers a new, refreshing perspective:
“I believe that we often hold this sense of voice as “self” or “essence” a little too tightly. The idea of one “authentic” voice is a holdover from a time when we saw each self as singular, isolated, and separate. These days, we’re moving beyond ideas of simple subjectivity and objectivity, and we’re more likely to see the self as constituted in relation to others, in community.”
Voice is not subject to stagnancy because we are not subject to stagnancy. We are ever-changing beings; therefore, our writing, and in turn, voice (or voice(s), may I challenge) can go through change too. This is how we embody our writing, by letting it embody our natural human nature, exploration, and creativity. This is how writing becomes a living, breathing body of work, even long after the words become stuck letters on a page.
Our writing can hold many voices and names.
“Language intersects with life.” -Mikhail Bakhtin
Mikhail Bakhtin, another notable literary theorist Huber mentions, also believed, like myself, that we have many voices. Even if a text were written by a single person, he argued that it can still hold many voices. Those of resonance and dissonance; of relevancy and hypocrisy.
Huber expands on this theory and calls for freedom of expression when writing and teaching it. She goes as radical as naming the many voices that take shape in her writing:
“And now I can’t stop naming voices: Hayseed Punk-Rock Girl, I’ve Lost My Shoes, Fierce German Peasant. In letting myself loose a bit, in looking for the weird voices in my own life and head and letting them out, I found new ways to say things and new perspectives on my life.”
I like the notion of naming your voices and reflecting on the different perspectives they bring into your life. If I were to name a few, I think some of mine would be: Slow Panda, Adhd Zoomies, Worry Man, Spirit Divine, Teacher Rivers, Stagnant Steed, and Inspired Butterfly. All are me, yet offer various ways in which I view the world and describe my processes.
Which voice(s) are you using? (Pinterest//bababoyee)
When I become a professor, I’d love to incorporate voices, their importance, and how to find them, into the classroom and my writing exercises, the way Huber suggests.
