New Article and Other Updates

So despite my great hopes of posting more in the blogosphere post-dissertation, this full-time faculty thing tends to keep me pretty busy.

However, I managed to find time to write and publish a non-academic feature article for catapult magazine recently, so I thought I'd mention it.

In other news, I've been having a ton of fun talking with my students in bits and pieces about writing and writing processes, language, and other related things in the midst of my teaching this semester of speech communication, communication theory, and interpersonal communication. I love having opportunities to have these discussions with my lovely students.

In all I don't mind so much that it's a season of teaching and grading and grading and grading and busyness. Other seasons will come again for more heavy writing activity. In the meantime I get to read a lot of what my students have to say, and I enjoy that much of the time.

The Inauguration Poem (2)

There's a great post on the Inauguration poem over at the Good Letters Blog. Here's my favorite excerpt, which is just applicable to the task of writing anything, I think:

"It’s very, very hard to write in language that transcends the moment and also serves the moment, and that has a sense of grandeur without overreaching for that grandeur....what I always learn when I read great poetry and when I embark upon each new poem [is] that you have to be very, very humble."

Most definitely.

Finding good language to both transcend and suit the moment is always difficult. And humility is always a fitting response to that task.

Wise words.

Memoir and the Art of Remembering Oneself

Okay, so I've been feeling this more and more over the last six months or so, and I think I'm going to put a concerted effort toward it in my spare time: life writing. As in, writing in which I remember different parts of my life. I think I'm going to try it out as one of my writing goals for the year.

Why am I feeling this just now? Several reasons, really:

• The historical/archival classes I took last fall got me in the mood to remember things for future generations.
• My life has been filled with interesting stories and experiences, and I need to remember that. Hard to remember somedays that I'm an interesting person when I sit in front of the computer and/or deep theoretical tome for most of the day.
• Because of the nature of said deep theoretical reading, I find myself a dull conversational companion sometimes. Remembering those various facets of myself discovered through aforesaid interesting stories and experiences will keep me more interesting.
• Thanks to Facebook, people from various stages of my past are reviving memories of my life then and making me aware of what has happened in-between. Might as well take advantage of the memory-jogging to jot some of it down.
• I did come up with a memoir idea, title and all, last fall. Might as well lay some groundwork for it from time to time.
• It's something I can easily shift to from academic tasks (and back).
• I don't have much time or money to observe many real-world activities in a vacation-esque "see interesting things in other parts of the world" sense just now. This would give me regular vacations to parts of my past for no charge.
  
• It would likely help me dig through some of the questions of identity I deal with on a daily basis, making me a more integrated person.
• It would serve as a good introduction for my significant other to some of the portions of my life I don't always think to talk about on a daily basis.
  

Anyway, I think I'm going to take a stab at it sometimes this semester betwixt and between the homework and lesson plans. Not necessarily trying to do it by chapters, as such (though I might). I'm thinking about starting with more sketching out some scenes and themes and writing some material that might be useful to drop into whatever chapters I'm thinking through later on. More experimentation than anything at this point. Play, really. I think it will be fun.

Stanley Fish on the Humanities...and a Response

One of my classmates posted this doomsday article about the humanities by literary critic Stanley Fish on Facebook earlier this week. Later, Fish wrote this one to follow it up.

As someone with a couple of English degrees, which I have found eminently useful on a variety of levels, I found both articles pretty appalling, perspective-wise.

So I was glad to read this response from Alex Reid over at digital digs.

I'm not sure whether I agree with him point by point (haven't thought it out that thoroughly), but I agree with Reid that there are indeed strong uses for the humanities, even if many people (including, it seems, Fish) don't see it that way.

I also agree with Reid that it's good for people in the humanities to intervene in society. For instance, I think it's a shame that general audience books and publications by professors are looked down upon, tenure-wise. I think they should be encouraged.

However, I also think there's use in academics doing their research--however "elite" it may seem--and speaking in specialized language. The research of the humanities often helps us to learn about, well, humanity. Reading and studying literature, theology, or philosophy, for instance, helps us think about the big questions of why we're alive, which is as important as anything else. And car mechanics don't get remonstrated for having a specialized language.

Though I agree that universities are becoming more corporatized and that there's a danger that the humanities' role will be lessened, I think this would be a big mistake. It's not that we can't learn critical thinking about the big questions--or about how to read and write well--outside of these disciplines. But having them in our universities serves as a concrete, visible reminder that these things are important to us as a society. And that's a darn good thing in and of itself, even if those professors were not--both directly and indirectly--helping to teach valuable skills to others (which they are).

Cage Match (Part 5): The Finale

Announcer (whispering): Aaaaaaand we're back in Cage Match Arena, at the fight between the married Depth and Accessibility. Their son Harry Potter has just raised his wand, so let's see what happens next. This is exciting, folks!

Harry Potter: Silencio. [the arena quiets instantly] Yeah, yeah, I know some of you were looking for me to stride in here and take part in some of those action-packed scenes we've all read me perform, but quite frankly, after all that work in the seven books, I'm tired. And I'm worried about you folks, as well as about my parents.

I know, I see you folks over there with Accessibility painted on your chests in successive letters--it's spelled wrong, by the way. I see you rolling your eyes. Don't think I won't use my wand if I don't have to. I also see you group of Depth-ites over there who obviously think I'm a lightweight. Same goes for both sides. My wand is ready, so no funny business.

The thing is, what we need isn't a cage match. What we need is to work together here, understanding the way the world is evolving. Depth and Accessibility have produced some fabulous kids, and we heap scorn on them from both sides. How could a married couple keep a healthy marriage when both them and their children are ostracized from so many different sectors of society?

Accessibility supporters, yes, you could use a bit better attention span and learning a bit more nuance. Try reading some of Literary Mystery's work from time to time, or Book Club Fiction. Or at least the History Channel.

And Depth supporters, please don't roll your eyes quite so much at such activity. It's rude, and it just makes you look bad. Your work could use a bit of narrative spice to it. The fact that something has drawn popular attention doesn't necessarily mean it's bad.

And you, Mom and Dad, stop turning each other into pounded-up tomatoes. You love each other, and it's time to show it. Marriage is all about compromise, remember? How can you love your children properly when you can't appreciate each other's quirks?

[Depth flings open the cage door and rappels down to where he is. Accessibility reluctantly follows.]

Depth: Well, son, you know how much I hate to be maudlin or sentimental in any way, much less as conforming to anything ryanstates or others may have predicted as the outcome for this event days ago, but you're so right. I'm not going to fling my arms around your father and beg his pardon or anything, particularly with these bruises, but if he's contrite, I may go home and let him sleep on the couch instead of the roof for the next few days.

Accessibility: Same goes for me, son. I'd really like to sucker-punch your mom right now to get ratings, but I'm going to hold back and go home with her. I do love her.

Announcer: Well, that's it, folks. Perhaps a bit pat, the Depth folks might say, and with not enough fireworks for the Accessibility folks' tastes, but that's the life of the Hybrid production, which this, it turns out, happened to be. This is Chuck for Cage Matches 'R' Us, bidding you farewell and returning you to your regularly scheduled blog, which is sure to be just as stirring. Thanks for sticking around for these dramatic events, and feel free to throw tomatoes or other fruits at each other or at Deborah in the comments...

Cage Match (Part 4): The Commentary and Commercials

Announcer: As I promised, Harry Potter is about to speak to the crowd here in Cage Match Arena, in this epic showdown between the married couple Depth and Accessibility. But first, I want to cut to a discussion I just had with our match commentators.

Commentator 1: Thank you, Chuck. Well, clearly this is an epic battle here between Depth and Accessibility. They're breaking all the rules.

Commentator 2: Ah, but in many ways they're also following all the rules, Chuck. And that's a problem for supporters of Depth--they'd like to see her fight Accessibility in a less violent venue. Less punches, more discussion.

Commentator 1: Well, at least this doesn't bore us to tears. Look at all that interest! Harry Potter could do anything, though, what with his magic powers and his willingness to act. I'm eager to see what happens next.

Announcer: As you can see, our commentators have sympathies. Thanks, Commentators, for your input. And now, for a word from our sponsors.

[camera cuts to commercial 1, with a scene of a young man sitting on a sofa.]

Commercial 1: Tired of feeling run down? Watching too many Cage Matches? Buy your own cage and spice up your workout life! Fight your enemies or your closest friends and family! Either way, you'll watch the pounds melt away. Buy now for only 12 installments of $59.99.*

[fine print:*Does not include a surcharge of $5000. Cage is not a toy. Manufacturer intends this as an exercise tool, and takes no responsibility for any deaths or injuries that occur during its use.]

[camera cuts to commercial 2, with a couple arguing over the cage match on a sofa]

Commercial 2: Tired of taking sides in these sorts of battles? Like something in-between? Jump over to Hybrid TV, where we have somewhat-nuanced, never dull, discussions of all the children of the combatants.

[camera cuts back to Cage Match Arena, and zooms in on Harry Potter's raised wand...]

[To be continued...]

Come back tomorrow for the startling conclusion to our cage match adventure... (Oh, and feel free to let me know in the comments if you're interested in the product mentioned in Commercial 1.)

Cage Match (Part 3): The Crisis

Announcer: And welcome back, once again, to Cage Match Arena, where we're hosting a cage match between a couple married for a hundred years--champion Accessibility and challenger Depth. Their children standing on the sidelines have gotten into the fight a bit as well--Journalism is right now down there, it looks like, fighting to defend the honor of his sister Book Club Fiction, who was just slammed with a tomato by an Accessibility supporter.

Up in the cage, things have taken a bit of a turn. Depth was ahead early, then Accessibility, but right now it looks like both of them are exhausted, leaning back on the opposite sides of the cage and glaring at each other.

In order to understand this glare, let's bring you to the crisis that led this couple from wedded bliss to this point. It seems that it happened when one of their youngest children, Reality TV, was five years old. There was a note home from his kindergarten from his teacher saying that he had tried to have one of his classmates voted out of school.

When Accessibility came home from work, he and Depth got into it. Accessibility thought that the behavior was delightfully amusing, and praised his son for his creativity. Depth, however, thought the child needed a stern punishment. She's reported to have yelled, "He's just like his father! Shallow and ignorant!"

Tragic, folks, when marriages go bad, but then, I wouldn't have missed this fight for the world.

Look, the challengers are going at it again! Accessibility just got in the first blow, a particularly good one...

Cameraman: But look! Down in the audience! It looks like one of their younger but widely respected children, Harry Potter, is breaking through the crowd, ready to make a speech. Is he trying to stop the event?

Announcer: Shut up, Jake. You're not supposed to talk. Yes, it does look like Potter is getting ready to say a word. We will bring you all of it, we promise, but first, we must bring you a word from our sponsor (and break for tonight's final presidential debates)....

[To be continued...]

Cage Match (Part 2): The Progeny

Announcer: So welcome back to Cage Match Arena, where challenger Depth is taking on champion Accessibility for the title. They've been, so far, going punch for punch, which doesn't surprise us here at all. See something we didn't tell you yesterday is that these two combatants know each other extremely well, as they've been married for the last hundred years or so.

[cut to wedding shot of Accessibility and Depth stuffing cake into each other's mouths, then another of them standing on a beach, with Depth on Accessibility's back]

Yes, that's right, these two fell in love sometime during the Romantic period in England, and they've been together ever since. Sometimes, like tonight, their relationship has approximated the War of the Roses, but over the years they've also had many many children, some of which resemble their dad, some their mom, but many of which look like both. Some have migrated to other countries, but they're all here tonight.

[pans to faces on the sideline]

In case you've forgetten who they are, a sampling of names should be enough:

• Journalism
  
• Creative non-fiction
  
• Book club fiction
• Literary mysteries
• Complex hour-long TV dramas
• Biographies
• The History Channel

These children, many of whom are quite successful, are standing on the sideline, eagerly watching and wondering what the outcome will be for their much-loved parents. It's quite brave of them to stand there, as the crowd is getting near riotous with their support of either Depth or Accessibility, meaning that these hybrids are getting occasional boxes of popcorn dropped on them.

It looks like Journalism is particularly taking a beating down there, though he's throwing that piece of fruit right back at them... Oh! Up above, it looks like Accessibility just took quite the blow from Depth. She knows just where to hit him, it seems!

Ah, tensions are high here: no telling what's going to happen next. Unfortunately, we need to break now for a word from our sponsors. Don't go away--we'll be back soon to continue this saga.

[To be continued...]

Readers, please inscribe chants you think are going on in the audience, from either or both sides, within the comment area.

A Cage Match: Depth vs. Accessibility

As the lights go up on the arena, the audience roars...

Announcer: Yes, folks, today, on this beautiful Columbus Day (Canadian Thanksgiving for you Canucks), we have for you a rare event. Previously this would have been handled by way of a Socratic dialogue, but we must roll with the times, so here it is, the showdown between our reigning champion, Accessibility, and his challenger, Depth. Now, if you've been around, you know that this format favors Accessibility over Depth, but it looks like Depth has been training up by lifting heavy tomes of French philosophers. She looks remarkably buff. I'm anxious to see what happens.

Depth and Accessibility face each other in the cage.

Depth: You ready to throw down, punk? Those long nuanced sentences may not be concise, but they've built up my strength.

Accessibility: Your long sentences are worth crap. A short punch is the most powerful.

Depth: We'll see about that: you err in thinking that my deep thinking has stopped me from Karate Kid-esque training while teaching deeper substance at the same time (and using many colons and semicolons). Furthermore, I have an attention span that can grind yours into the ground.

Accessibility: You going to stand there and argue, or fight? That's what people came here to see. Let's rumble!

Depth: Don't think I can't be passionate, nuanced, and right at the same time. Bring it on, dude. Bring it on.

They pitch into each other.

[To be continued...]

Any takers for the chances of either side?

Wist; or, Giving One's Inner Nerd a Hug

So as I look around at blogs written by people in the world of general-audience writers (such as here, here, here, and here) at this time of year, I sometimes feel wistful. I see people preparing for NaNoWriMo and so forth. I see encouragement to finish creative projects and get one's stuff out there for publication.

I stare outside at the colorful leaves doused in golden sun, and I think of all the writing projects stacking up in my brain behind the (mostly academic) ones I'm working on, and I feel wist. Great wist. I look outside, and it seems that far away, just beyond what I can see, there's this shimmering vista of greener-than-green grass with springtime crocuses popping out of it. My stack of academic tomes on historiography, archival theory, and even the fascinating rhetoric of conspiracy look pale and anemic beside this green vista, as does the stack of term papers and conference papers that is my October's goal.

These papers are important for me to do. They're intellectually stimulating. They are helping me prepare for other future writing tasks I must do, both inside and outside of the academy. But it's hard to remember that some days when the just-out-of reach crocuses seem to pulse with their purple brilliance.

I think there are good reasons for me to feel that these current tasks are marginalized ones from the perspective of the general-audience writing world--after all, they will not be concise, beautifully sounding writings for public consumption, which is the most acceptable thing in the world of writers that write to sell. Nor are they going to be the kind of aesthetic production that's seen to be acceptable to those in the writing world that aren't so concerned about sales.

(If one were to represent the whole writing world as a social landscape not unlike high school, then, I'm clearly a nerd on that landscape, even if within the academic world, I'm the artsy one in the corner. No wonder I feel a bit fractured in my identity.)

But I think my sense of wist is also, at least in part, a crocus-is-prettier focus on what I want to do that isn't so possible right now, rather than being content with what I have, and recognizing that the journey takes time. This stage, my doctoral work, is a process of learning--a time in which I don't have to focus on broad audiences all the time, and a time to collect material for all sorts of writing projects of all genres. A time for germination. And while I may occasionally chafe at having to perform certain writing tasks when there are others that look prettier in my head, this stack of books beside me has some fascinating stuff in it.

And the leaves are pretty.

Audience and Online Interaction Spaces

Lately I've been realizing how much participating as an author in online interaction spaces (like Facebook and this blog) is helping to deepen my thoughts about audience from the writer's perspective.

Take Facebook for instance. On my profile, friends and acquaintances from various stages of my life collide. I'm used to thinking about them differently, and now they're here, in one space. This gives new perspective to what "writing for a wide audience" means.

Or take the fact that I import this blog into Facebook as well as posting the items here. It makes me aware that others may also be reading this in a different context--e.g., feed readers--and that makes me try to keep those contexts in mind when I write things, knowing that, for instance, people might be seeing two different sets of comments on my posts, or none at all, depending on where they might be reading it.

These sorts of things make me aware of how much I modulate my communication on a daily basis depending on who I'm speaking to and how they're receiving that communication. And as a writer, these thoughts further sensitize me to the nuances of the idea about audience, which is such an important aspect of what we consider as authors.

Walter Ong* says that writers always imagine a particular kind of audience for their writing, and then give their readers roles to step into. It's fascinating to me how these online venues challenge, stretch, and concretize those imaginary audiences, potentially making both author and audience aware how much those roles are a shifting landscape, and how much the audience also creates roles for communicators to step into.

Anyone else have any noticings about audience, whether from online or offline venues?

*In his excellent essay "The Writer's Audience Is Always a Fiction"

How Much Detail?

The 3 day novelists from TextFIGHT brought up a question in Monday's post comments that I wanted to poke at further, because it seems to be one of the key questions for writing today: how much detail do you dispense and when?

They were talking about this in the context of their characters, but the same problem presents itself in other kinds of writing too. It's a question anytime you're an expert on something and want to write for people who don't know as much about the subject as you do.

How do you figure out how to include just the right number of details, and which ones your audience will be interested in? I realized awhile back that this is why I was so intrigued in the writing of the TV series West Wing--at the time I started watching, I was profoundly ignorant of and disinterested in the very detailed subject matter it portrayed, and yet it kept me interested and taught me just enough about the subject matter to get me by in the narrative. If I could find that balance myself...

This seems to be to be an even harder question to answer today than it used to be, when, as they point out over at Good Letters in the commentary on the excellent post "Maybe Google Isn't Making Us Stupid", the taste of readership seems to be undergoing a sea change, though it's unclear to me exactly what kind of sea change. On one hand, people don't read long pieces anymore so much, we're told. But on the other hand, they'll spend hours reading all the info they can find on a subject they're interested in, wanting more and more detail. By the same token, many are addicted to watching or reading the same stories over and over again, or looking for more installments to a series to get more info.

It's hard, in this climate, to know where to stop. How to write so that people want to get to that "wanting more" point, and then how to keep them happy while you're trying to engage those who also want less and are easily distracted? Finding that balance sometimes gets harder now that I'm an academic that spends a lot of time writing for academics, who are also similarly intrigued by questions that don't so much interest the general populace. But what is the general populace with so many people interested in different niche topics?

I don't know. I only know that I find test readers to be invaluable in giving me feedback on what's interesting and adequately-explained and what's not.

Anyone have thoughts on any of this?

Why I Like Hanging Around Academics

I like nuance. I like detail. I need to swim around it for awhile before I'm able to narrow it down to the best stuff, in order to simplify. And sometimes I think things are too complicated to simplify, even then.

I was reminded this weekend of these things as I hung around with other grad students, who were quite happy to spend hours discussing things connected to the grad student life. I'm glad there are people whose jobs it is to get their minds around all the details of certain topics, and are able to spend hours picking through them.

However, this natural tendency in me is something to keep an eye on when I'm trying to produce writings for general consumption. Some things deserve to be short and elegantly streamlined.

Peter Morville included some apt quotes at his findability blog (these are from the book Made to Stick):

Becoming an expert in something means that we become more and more fascinated by nuance and complexity. That's when the Curse of Knowledge kicks in, and we start to forget what it's like not to know what we know. (p.46)

Proverbs are the Holy Grail of simplicity. Coming up with a short, compact phrase is easy. Anybody can do it. On the other hand, coming up with a profound compact phrase is incredibly difficult..."finding the core," and expressing it in the form of a compact idea, can be enduringly powerful. (p.62)