small examples of the transgenre...

try this: http://astartesdweese.wordpress.com/2013/09/25/twenty-little-poetry-projects-feautiring-twenty-little-monkeys/

Blogs and Whatnot

Blog responses to the readings are due every week. Look to the list at the right and see what others are writing, and thinking, about... There's some brilliant and thoughtful ideas and insights in some of those pages. Remember, writing in any form can help one think through and process ideas, which is only beneficial to more and future writing and thinking...

Also, make sure you are following the syllabus for assignments (see assignment sheets on EMU Online) and come prepared (presentation proposal paragraph due Wed). Wed we are doing in-class workshopping of creative project 1, bring your draft, see workshop groups listed below.

Project 1 Groups

You can exchange your drafts ahead of time if you like, or bring them to class to share on Wed. For this first project, exchanging ahead of time isn’t required, though it will be on the future projects. 

Emily Ba.

Dianah

Tiffany

Christopher

Emily Ber.

Sami

Ryan

Nick

Ben

Jason

Tyler

Joe

Justin

Lauren

Ashley

Anzaldua: Some Things

See "Introduction" to Second Edition at back of book

Begin with p63 “Coatlicue State” and discuss rest of book (though you can skip through poems in second half/section, focus on a few to see what she is doing etc); also focus on:  Structure and organization of book as whole, “progression”?

Think about construction from a writing perspective, how is the book constructed, written, what is creative, transgenre, transformative about it?

Form (How)   --  Content (What)

Form  --  structure, dis/organization, language, vocabulary, visual, sound, process, narrative, fragmentation, revolt, de/construction, rebel, transgress (ie vs regress, progress, etc), transgender, transgenre, transculture…

Content -- queer, culture, language, history/myth/story, gender, identity/identification

Anzaldua: lists of identifying characteristics including language(s) and different types of Spanish (8 kinds p.77) + Indian language and history + English that circle and repeat in different ways to reiterate that there is no one language, no one cultural identity, no one narrative about culture and identity to claim that articulates this identity

Chicano pachuco: create own language, (like Lorde, Brossard, Cixous suggestion to create own language) if the dominant language doesn’t make sense, doesn’t express, as a means of rebellion; language is about ways/means of expression; dominant language oppresses non-English speakers but also in structure as a reiteration of hegemonic, (patriarchal), hierarchal, linear (white mainstream) logic and form (that inhibits “other” forms of expression, voice, recognition…)

Critique as/toward alternative, positive, claim Other as (new, visible, spoken) model

Updates and Announcements

Follow the syllabus for dates, assignments, to keep on track.

The assignment sheets for the Presentation of an outside text and Project 1 (creative writing project of your own design) are available on EMU Online (and Project 1 is posted in the previous post). See syllabus for dates and deadlines and come talk to me if you have questions, ideas, want to go over anything in either assignment.

Wed. we will begin talking about Anzaldua's Borderlands. Come prepared to discuss and possibly to relate previous (theoretical) readings to this (creative) text.

Also make sure to post a blog response that deals with the readings for this week. Make sure to do this once a week. See syllabus for more details/instruction.

Project 1 Assignment

CRTW422 Transgenre / Fall 13 / Darling

Project 1 Assignment

"I have always said that writing is energy taking shape in language. Sexual, libidinal,mental, and spiritual energies give to us the irresistible need to declare things, tomake new positions, to look for solutions which can unknot social patterns of violenceand death, to explore unknown territories of the mind to search for each of ouridentities, to fill the gap between real and unreal."

--Nicole Brossard, "Poetic Politics"

The topic/theme/content and the style of presentation of the project is up to you. Think though about how to enact some of the philosophical or theoretical ideas of the texts we have read in the creative manifestation of your own project. Maybe there is a line or passage or reference, association, or idea that resonates and becomes the starting point or center of your project. Consider the intersections between philosophical, theoretical, creative and your own experiences, interpretations, and impulses as a writer and artist; how do these affect the creative process and the realization of the work?

Also, you should consider the relationship between form and content in both the process and product. What do you want the work to "be about" or to address? How do you want to present, structure, organize, show this content through formal strategies and choices? How can you use visual, linguistic, sonic and sensory, or other elements in the process of creating form in relation to content? Consider what kinds of language and structure choices you are making and why these contribute to the holistic process + product of the work at hand.

Finally you should turn in 4-6 pages of text plus any other elements you would like to include. If the work is entirely on the web or in visual form, include a transcript of the text or a write-up that explains where the work is, how to access it, and any other relevant information. Please talk to me about how to go about creating, formalizing, and turning in your project if you have questions.

See syllabus for due dates.

Bathhouse Events this Semester

Writers Tisa Bryant (author of Unexplained Presence) and Douglas Kearney (author of The Black Automaton) will be visiting us for two events (see below for details and book plugs). On Tuesday (11/5), our guests will read from their creative work, and this will be followed on Wednesday (11/6) with each writer presenting a talk/presentation on some aspect of their creative practice. 

 

 

Unexplained Presence

Tisa Bryant. 

Fiction. Essays. African-American Studies. By remixing stories from novels and films to zoom in on the black presences within them, Tisa Bryant's UNEXPLAINED PRESENCE ruminates on the sublime power of history to shape culture in the subconscious of both the artist and the reader/viewer. Moving from interrogations of Francois Ozon's "8 Femmes" and Virginia Woolf's "Orlando" to the machinations of the "Regency House Party" reality TV show, UNEXPLAINED PRESENCE weaves threads of myth, fact and fiction into previously unexplored narratives lurking in our collective imagination. "This is truly a bold book, one that combines scenes of rich technicolor with the light of truth, at once invoking and dissolving cultural myths and faux histories" -Brenda Coultas.

The Black Automaton

Douglas Kearney

Poetry. African American Studies. Winner of the National Poetry Series, selected by Catherine Wagner. From ambivalent animals thriving after Katrina to party chants echoing in a burning city, THE BLACK AUTOMATON troubles rubble, cobbling a kind of life. In this collection bodies at risk seek renewal through violence and fertility, history and myth, flesh and radios. "First, you have to see Douglas Kearney's visual poems, which cheekily diagram cultural memes as if they were parts of speech (as they are). THE BLACK AUTOMATON has its share of sharp, tender lyrics, too...these exploit the political possibilities of puns and the way meanings hinge on inexact resemblance. Kearney's poems tweak and skewer pop culture and literary sources from Paul Laurence Dunbar to T. S. Eliot to traditional ballads and blues...Kearney's work turns poetic and cultural conventions disquietingly inside out."—Catherine Wagner

Welcome to CW422 Transgenre

Follow this blog for class announcements, to see others' blogs, and just for fun!

Also, remember to set up your own blog and make sure you can find the documents posted on EMU Online (emuonline.edu).

Follow the syllabus for Monday and come prepared to discuss the readings.