assignments ENGL227 Introduction
to creative nonfiction workshop: Drafts For Feedback
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Need to be in touch with me?
LEE TORDA 310 Tillinghast Hall Bridgewater State University 508.531.2436 ltorda@bridgew.edu www.leetorda.com |
Fall 2016 Office Hours:
M/W 11:30-12:30 T 11:00-12:00 and by appointment. Need to make an appointment? Click here: https://goo.gl/3CqLfo |
Overview. Four times this semester, twice before midterm and twice after midterm, you will workshop and revise a draft of an essay. The finished drafts (or as close to finished as you can get to in this round), will be included in the two portfolios you will turn in this semester (more information on both the midterm and the final portfolio are available on this website).
We will read a variety of kinds of essays—essays of place, of people, of memoir, essays that are topical and many that are highly personal. We will read essays with all manner of style and tone—lofty and formal, funny, silly, crazy, totally informal. Your job as a reader-who-writes is to sift through these topics and styles and forms and decide what you want to write about.
The essays we read will be generally grouped around a theme or format—for instance essays that are about other people, for example, or essays that are about a place. You are welcome to experiment as a writer-who-reads by writing in the same theme or format that we are reading. But you are not required to, and that is why the nature of this assignment is a bit ambiguous.
At the end of the semester, you’ll have roughly four essays at around 5 pages each that will make up your portfolio. You’ll turn in the drafts for these four essays at designated times during the semester as indicated on the syllabus. Further, you’ll workshop those four essays in the class prior to turning them in.
The Writer’s Notebook is a good place to start to draft your essays and get feedback mid-process from me.
Beyond this kind of information, there are no specific topics for each of the four installments of your Drafts for Feedback. If you feel like you are floundering for a topic and your Writer’s Notebook doesn’t seem to be yielding anything, you should feel free to either email with me and/or sign up for a short conference to brainstorm. Remember you also have the Writing Studio folks—I’m sure the consultants would love the chance to talk about writing with a more advanced student.
I know that some of you would prefer more structure for each draft. I will try to give personally useful advice in the writer’s notebook feedback, and, in class, I will try to talk about the ways the readings might inspire all of you to write about a particular topic or theme. But, ultimately, the choice for each of your four drafts will be up to you.
Nuts & Bolts
We will read a variety of kinds of essays—essays of place, of people, of memoir, essays that are topical and many that are highly personal. We will read essays with all manner of style and tone—lofty and formal, funny, silly, crazy, totally informal. Your job as a reader-who-writes is to sift through these topics and styles and forms and decide what you want to write about.
The essays we read will be generally grouped around a theme or format—for instance essays that are about other people, for example, or essays that are about a place. You are welcome to experiment as a writer-who-reads by writing in the same theme or format that we are reading. But you are not required to, and that is why the nature of this assignment is a bit ambiguous.
At the end of the semester, you’ll have roughly four essays at around 5 pages each that will make up your portfolio. You’ll turn in the drafts for these four essays at designated times during the semester as indicated on the syllabus. Further, you’ll workshop those four essays in the class prior to turning them in.
The Writer’s Notebook is a good place to start to draft your essays and get feedback mid-process from me.
Beyond this kind of information, there are no specific topics for each of the four installments of your Drafts for Feedback. If you feel like you are floundering for a topic and your Writer’s Notebook doesn’t seem to be yielding anything, you should feel free to either email with me and/or sign up for a short conference to brainstorm. Remember you also have the Writing Studio folks—I’m sure the consultants would love the chance to talk about writing with a more advanced student.
I know that some of you would prefer more structure for each draft. I will try to give personally useful advice in the writer’s notebook feedback, and, in class, I will try to talk about the ways the readings might inspire all of you to write about a particular topic or theme. But, ultimately, the choice for each of your four drafts will be up to you.
Nuts & Bolts
- Papers should be about 5 pages, double-spaced, in 10 or 12 point fonts, with one inch margins all the way around.
- Do not use a cover page. Instead, put your name, date and ENGL227 in the upper left corner and call it a day.
- Always, always, always have a title. A good one.
- See syllabus for specific dates regarding the workshop for the draft of will take place and when you will turn it in to me.
- You will get feedback on the draft you turn in to me and will be expected to revise at least some if not all of your drafts.
