New Dance Steps to a Jamaican Beat: A Conversation with Olive Senior (original) (raw)
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World Dance Alliance 2008 Conference Proceedings
This paper begins with the question; ‘How might language crease and fold from dance practice?’ Writing is conceptualised as a form of translation that rises up and into the mobile weight of movement, offering creative and documentation strategies that directly interweave with choreographic, collaborative and improvisatory processes. Examples of and methodologies for writing that emerges out of dance will be drawn from the development and performance of the duet, The Little peeling Cottage (Longley and Smith 2007). Research draws on the dancing/ writing practices of Simone Forti (Forti 1974; 2003; 2006); Brian Massumi’s parables on transition and sensation as modalities of philosophy (Massumi 2002); and Gayatri Spivak’s writing around the politics of translation (Spivak 2000).
Teaching/Writing -- Winter/Spring 2013 (Full Issue)
2013
Call for Submissions 100 2 These authors are represented in two of the required texts for the course, The Norton Book of Composition Studies, and A Guide to Composition Pedagogies. sional writing majors to each group of middle school writers (an initial set, a set after switching groups, and a final set tallied by clickers); we also draw on anecdotal evidence from class discussions of these scores (and the similarities and differences among them). Third, we analyze the actual feedback the groups posted to the wiki for each student writer. Throughout our analysis, we include excerpts from the reflections composed by the college students at the end of the process. In addition, one middle school student's writing, in particular, serves as a provocative point of intersection across the stages of this process. Reframing Responses to Student Writing Paper Jellyfish and Raisin-y Babies: Initial Perceptions of Student Submissions Ted was surprised by the remarkable quality of the writing from the Pennsylvania students. Students submitted detective fiction, dream sequences, fantasy and futuristic fiction, as well as sophisticated memoirs. For example, one student, Grace, from whose text we have permission to quote, submitted a memoir about adjusting to moving and to changes in her family. Her text demonstrates originality and humor as well as trust in her readers. Everyone loved [baby brother]. When we brought him home from the hospital a bunch of people came to see the bright blue eyed baby boy with a crop of pale blond hair and my exhausted mother. Ignoring me in the process, naturally. Just like people always had since they had brought [younger sister] home from the hospital when she was a baby. I didn't care for hospitals. That's where all the babies came from. Some babies were cute and very pretty to look at and adore, like dolls. Others had red, raisin-y, faces and cried too much. They smelled especially undesirable when they needed changing. I never quite understood why my mother loved babies so much. Still don't. She also demonstrated excellent control of syntax in constructing a sophisticated authorial voice: "Later, when I got to Pennsylvania it was still hot but there it was very humid. Sticky hot. Hard-to-breathe-in my-chest hot. Help me, the sun is beating down on me to kill me hot." Most of the texts from this group revealed students who seemed to enjoy writing and who were writing to engage and entertain their readers, not just to earn the approval of a teacher. One student created adult characters of all of the other students in the group and wrote a fictional story of a class reunion gone awry. Another piece ended with a sophisticated reprisal of a beautifully described image from an arts festival of handcrafted jellyfish with candles inside floating up into an evening sky. As one college student would later write in a reflection on the experience, Some of [the students' stories]...I could never think of even if I tried. [One] boy wrote a science fiction short story in which he made up words and mentioned hilarious details that made me chuckle. One writer played well with dialogue and demonstrated its importance in storytelling in general. Another writer used absolutely stunning imagery and captured a scene that I can picture looking at through a photograph from a polaroid camera. In all, Pennsylvania demonstrated some excellent storytelling. The overall quality of the student writing would, we hoped, reframe teacher candidates' idea of what eighth grade writers are capable of, and encourage them to respond to these students as "real writers." NCTE PROMISING YOUNG WRITERS PROGRAM HOLISTIC WRITING EVALUATION SCALE Submissions that receive a 3, 2, or 1 should meet a certain level of effectiveness with regard to organization, content, style, usage, and writing process. Submissions that do not meet this level should receive a 0. 3 Submissions scored as a 3 tend to employ an organizational framework that is especially effective for the topic/genre. The content is particularly effective throughout the piece because of its substance, specificity, or illustrative quality. The work is vivid and precise, with distinguishing characteristics that give the writing an identity of its own within the conventions of the genre/medium, though it may contain an occasional flaw. The work is polished and impressive for the eighth grade. 2 Submissions scored as a 2 are organized effectively for the topic/genre. The content is effective throughout the piece, though the paper may lack the substance, specificity, or illustrative quality of a 3. The stylistic/surface features of the genre/medium are consistently under control, despite occasional lapses. The potential in the writing is realized, though not to the degree that further revision would allow. 1 Submissions scored as a 1 show evidence of the writer's attempt at organization. Content, though effective, tends to be less consistent or less substantive, specific, and illustrative than that found in papers scored as a 3 or 2. The writer generally observes the stylistic conventions of genre/medium but unevenness suggests that the writer is not yet in full command of his/her voice. Some errors are usually present, but they aren't severe enough to interfere significantly with the reader's experience. The potential in the writing is evident, but the work would clearly benefit from further revision.
2003
This paper grew out of the collaborative relationship that emerged from in-class modeling of student-centered writing approaches as participating teachers and a consultant/researcher began to explore ways to increase the length of fourth -grade writing. The paper reports on a small study in fourth-grade writing aimed at increasing the length of student writing. According to the paper, one goal was to find a way to encourage student writers to compose longer and more meaningful pieces, and additionally, to develop personal experience narratives and the writing process. The limited focus of the paper is to tentatively explore one approach to increasing the quantity of writing produced in one session. The paper reports that students (n=17) in two classrooms were assigned the same writing topic and given similar instructions for prewriting activities. The paper states that in both classrooms the researcher modeled the idea that an elevator to assist people with disabilities to reach the...
What I write about writing/dancing/writing
INMATERIAL. Diseño, Arte y Sociedad
Artistic writing as research is in itself a method of making for artists in the academy. As creative practitioners in performative research paradigms (Haseman, 2010) we require a critical dialogue with/in the practice of writing through our artistic approaches. The process of writing I propose, parallels the process of making critically contextualising writing, critiquing and reflecting on the making, and analyzing the process in tandem with making-as-writing. To write as praxis, a tool for the artist as academic; I practice an approach to play and experimentation through improvisation around the writing. I practice what I propose that the artist adapts to an approach paralleled in their discipline(s). For me, this is in dance/theatre scholarship and praxis. Ideally, the writing may occur in-tandem with disciplinary choices, provocations, prompts, and interrogations. In this Project essay, I reflect on the current durational performance research project I’m making, as research proje...
Revising Moves: Writing Stories of (Re)Making
Utah State University Press eBooks, 2024
Is this really about revision? Early in our work on this volume, we had accepted abstracts that looked to be exactly what we asked for: reflections on revision. However, as the chapters began rolling in, they seemed also-in some cases quite prominently-to be reflections on collaboration, or composition, or identity configuration, or professional maneuvering. We loved the stories contributing authors were telling. They took us off the page, showing us children interrupting the scene of revising a grant to ask questions about God's gender (Wallis-Thomas), a faculty of color detailing injurious mistreatment to recast a whitewashed narrative of their resignation (Martinez), a student-teacher collaborative approach to a traditionally top-down practice, drafting a letter of recommendation (Becker, Blewett, and Sohan). But, were these stories really about revision? We began to question the assumptions we had brought into this project about how the moves of revision can be made visible. When we wrote the CFP, we thought "bits of or clips from actual text(s) in progress" would capture observable data, trace action in a scene, record activity in and around writing. Yet we began to recognize that the experiences of revising relayed by contributors often didn't "stay put" or cohere around demonstrable examples. Revision wasn't limited to textual change; it became a life activity, immersed in conversation, family life, collaboration, identity formation, years of thinking and rethinking, moments of conflict and resolution, problem-solving, political and social upheaval. Like air, revision seemed to fill all available space. As the five of us talked on Zoom about the chapter submissions and emerging book (originally subtitled "Showing and Narrating Revision in Action"), we began to accept that seeing revision in action isn't as simple and transparent a task as showing "bits or clips" would suggest. Just as revision moves, so too did our expectations as we took direction from our contributors, whose work urged us to honor revision's vitality Copyrighted material, not for distribution
Literary Characteristics Which Constitute" Quality" in the Junior Novel: An Empirical Approach
1976
To investigate the attributes associated with "quality," ten junior novels were rated by eleven raters for theme, characterization, plot, structure, style, setting, literary devices, readability, within-sentence modification, between-sentence modification, and overall quality. Results of factor and regression analyses indicated that quality in a junio:s: novel is basically a function of the author's style, plot, structure, setting, and theme. Characterization, literary devices, and within-and between-sentence modification were not so strongly associated with differences in overall quality. (AA)
Composing Techniques: Choreographing a Postqualitative Writing Practice
Qualitative Inquiry, 2018
Writing can be a (playful) practice that develops through techniques. To illustrate, I draw from the works of Erin Manning to describe how I take up techniques in both writing and dance. I then suggest several potential techniques for fostering a postqualitative writing practice: following creative impulses, situating writing within concepts, and finding time to not write. Discussions of these techniques are augmented by a series of play spaces in which readers might choose to experiment by folding, cutting together-apart, slowing, and more. The play spaces are designed to encourage readers to consider how they might invent techniques for their own practices. Significantly, writing techniques shape practices that emphasize how and why writing becomes. Without examining writing habits and how they might develop further through techniques, we risk holding scholarly writing in stasis and limiting its future only to what already has been done.