Aimee
I love the content of the NPR piece. I always find it interesting when people hold writing workshops for veterans. To hear about such a great turn out at Fort Bragg is really inspiring. Mr. Bob Joust, a war veteran, mentioned how it took him over twenty years to finally seek out help to heal the pain that he had suppressed for so long. Mr. Joe, another veteran, confirmed that writing was an important part of his healing process. The writing process helped Mr. Joe by allowing him to open up to others and inspire other veterans to share their experiences as well. The acts of writing, sharing and healing is really interesting when I think about it in the war veteran context compared to academic context. the article "Writing Memoir and Writing for Therapy" hits some really controversial points. Tara DaPra wrote this article with the intention of highlighting the benefits of integrating psychological wellness in the writing classroom. DaPra's article brought up some points regarding the nature of classroom etiquette and the writing process. There's no doubt that writing about experiences (traumatic or not) can help a person gain a different perspective and understanding. However, the article also asks at what point does this new perspective become crafted to mean something greater than just the experience? How can a writer develop their emotions and initial perspective into something that can be widely understood but also artistic? Looking at memoirs as a mode of writing to reconstruct experiences, DaPra asks her readers to think about whether writing about experience is a creative act or if the experience creates the writer.
Sunday, December 13, 2015
Thursday, December 3, 2015
Response to Lauren and Charlotte
Lauren
I'm not sure how I feel about the anonymous Blunt Instrument letter. Part of me feels sorry for this white-male-poet. The fact that he's is so aware and analytical of his presence as a white-male-writer is good, but it's also really sad. He seems to not know how to be a writer anymore, and as we see in the response letter, all he really needs to do is write well. We're always told "write what you know", but he addresses the complications writers arrive at when they're inspired to write from a different perspective or about something they don't know much about. I think the response letter couldn't have put it any more plainly. Write what you know. When you write what you don't know much about then do your research. The hyper-aware thoughts this male writer was experiencing is both good and bad. It's good that he realizes it, but it's bad in the sense that it probably makes his writing much weaker than if he wrote it for his own enjoyment rather than trying not to step on any toes. You can write about something you know nothing about, and as long as you write it well and do your research you shouldn't be stepping over any boundaries.
As for the journal, there was one article in particular which really got my attention. Rebecca Cadenhead wrote a piece called "Growing Up Mixed Race in America" where she discussed the various obstacles and difficulties she has faced while trying to explain her racial background. Personally, I have run into this problem multiple times. The SAT example she discussed is something I can relate to and have heard issues about before. It's strange to me that the only option for "white" people is "Caucasian", whereas for people of color there are usually "African-American", "Hispanic", "Native American", and "Asian". Categorizing race is one of the most mysterious things to me. As Cadenhead suggests, there are so many blurred lines for many people of multiple races.
Charlotte
The Forbes article asks a lot of questions regarding emotional intelligence and its relationship to being successful. I found this article very useful in that it kind of looks at emotional intelligence through a different lens. It never really occurred to me that the most successful business owners or CEOs would also have a high emotional intelligence. The article asks why there is not a Harvard for emotional intelligence, because after all in order to be a great leader you must have emotional intelligence--otherwise you're just a leader. To understand ones own impact on others is a difficult task for most people considering how selfish a lot of us have become. The stresses of school and always coming first before anyone else has made it more difficult for our generation to see ourselves in relation to others. Not only does this effect our relationships, but it also means that we are not able to comprehend the relationship we have with ourselves.
Psychology today brought up some more interesting points as well. The lack of emotional intelligence being based off of fear hasn't really been discussed much. We've mentioned it when comparing men and women, but to gain a full understanding that it can happen on many levels is pretty innovative. The inability to judge how we may hurt one another is a component I've always been interested in. As someone who has a difficult time gauging how my actions/words may effect someone who is more sensitive than I am, I have always looked for ways to help gain that awareness.
I'm not sure how I feel about the anonymous Blunt Instrument letter. Part of me feels sorry for this white-male-poet. The fact that he's is so aware and analytical of his presence as a white-male-writer is good, but it's also really sad. He seems to not know how to be a writer anymore, and as we see in the response letter, all he really needs to do is write well. We're always told "write what you know", but he addresses the complications writers arrive at when they're inspired to write from a different perspective or about something they don't know much about. I think the response letter couldn't have put it any more plainly. Write what you know. When you write what you don't know much about then do your research. The hyper-aware thoughts this male writer was experiencing is both good and bad. It's good that he realizes it, but it's bad in the sense that it probably makes his writing much weaker than if he wrote it for his own enjoyment rather than trying not to step on any toes. You can write about something you know nothing about, and as long as you write it well and do your research you shouldn't be stepping over any boundaries.
As for the journal, there was one article in particular which really got my attention. Rebecca Cadenhead wrote a piece called "Growing Up Mixed Race in America" where she discussed the various obstacles and difficulties she has faced while trying to explain her racial background. Personally, I have run into this problem multiple times. The SAT example she discussed is something I can relate to and have heard issues about before. It's strange to me that the only option for "white" people is "Caucasian", whereas for people of color there are usually "African-American", "Hispanic", "Native American", and "Asian". Categorizing race is one of the most mysterious things to me. As Cadenhead suggests, there are so many blurred lines for many people of multiple races.
Charlotte
The Forbes article asks a lot of questions regarding emotional intelligence and its relationship to being successful. I found this article very useful in that it kind of looks at emotional intelligence through a different lens. It never really occurred to me that the most successful business owners or CEOs would also have a high emotional intelligence. The article asks why there is not a Harvard for emotional intelligence, because after all in order to be a great leader you must have emotional intelligence--otherwise you're just a leader. To understand ones own impact on others is a difficult task for most people considering how selfish a lot of us have become. The stresses of school and always coming first before anyone else has made it more difficult for our generation to see ourselves in relation to others. Not only does this effect our relationships, but it also means that we are not able to comprehend the relationship we have with ourselves.
Psychology today brought up some more interesting points as well. The lack of emotional intelligence being based off of fear hasn't really been discussed much. We've mentioned it when comparing men and women, but to gain a full understanding that it can happen on many levels is pretty innovative. The inability to judge how we may hurt one another is a component I've always been interested in. As someone who has a difficult time gauging how my actions/words may effect someone who is more sensitive than I am, I have always looked for ways to help gain that awareness.
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