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I cannot adequately express how refreshing it felt to read "Lorraine's Story." Especially after reading the unbearably dry Fei Study, it was like a breath of fresh air to read something creative. I found myself wanting to underline everything the author says about the process of writing and the merits of creative over academic writing. Much as I like charts and appreciate numbers, the text of the Fei Study was difficult to get through because I could not engage with it in the same way as I can the Goedde piece.
That said, I certainly see the difficulties in evaluating creative writing and in tutoring students working on creative pieces I think his pressing Lorraine to tell her story is a good way to do it, but I also think there are times when he comes across (in the article at least, though I can't say how he came across to Lorraine) as a bit patronizing. Stories, especially stories we are perhaps not proud of, can be extremely difficult to tell, even when they're worth telling, and it almost felt like he wanted her to tell the story for his sake, under the guise of helping her. On the other hand, however, he was probably right, and she probably would not have told the story without his pressing her. So I don't necessarily think he crossed that line, but the article certainly does highlight that that line is there to be potentially crossed.
I also, of course, see the value in the Fei Study's approach. Statistics, numbers, quantitative analysis: all of these are useful and important in figuring out how writing tutoring functions on a micro level, and in a world where evaluation is everything (as it is in academia), numbers and pointable change over time serve an important role in figuring out what works and what doesn't within the evaluative parameters. However, I think what we can learn from Goedde's article is that the evaluative parameters are not all that matters in writing tutoring. The writer is not merely the words they put on a page, but rather is, first and foremost, a person. Not to belabor the point that several of seem to make every week, but engaging with our students on an individual level can, in my view, allow them to find themselves as a writer, and writing as oneself will always be more interesting, and more compelling, than writing within the cookie cutter standards set by the ivory tower.
I cannot adequately express how refreshing it felt to read "Lorraine's Story." Especially after reading the unbearably dry Fei Study, it was like a breath of fresh air to read something creative. I found myself wanting to underline everything the author says about the process of writing and the merits of creative over academic writing. Much as I like charts and appreciate numbers, the text of the Fei Study was difficult to get through because I could not engage with it in the same way as I can the Goedde piece.
That said, I certainly see the difficulties in evaluating creative writing and in tutoring students working on creative pieces I think his pressing Lorraine to tell her story is a good way to do it, but I also think there are times when he comes across (in the article at least, though I can't say how he came across to Lorraine) as a bit patronizing. Stories, especially stories we are perhaps not proud of, can be extremely difficult to tell, even when they're worth telling, and it almost felt like he wanted her to tell the story for his sake, under the guise of helping her. On the other hand, however, he was probably right, and she probably would not have told the story without his pressing her. So I don't necessarily think he crossed that line, but the article certainly does highlight that that line is there to be potentially crossed.
I also, of course, see the value in the Fei Study's approach. Statistics, numbers, quantitative analysis: all of these are useful and important in figuring out how writing tutoring functions on a micro level, and in a world where evaluation is everything (as it is in academia), numbers and pointable change over time serve an important role in figuring out what works and what doesn't within the evaluative parameters. However, I think what we can learn from Goedde's article is that the evaluative parameters are not all that matters in writing tutoring. The writer is not merely the words they put on a page, but rather is, first and foremost, a person. Not to belabor the point that several of seem to make every week, but engaging with our students on an individual level can, in my view, allow them to find themselves as a writer, and writing as oneself will always be more interesting, and more compelling, than writing within the cookie cutter standards set by the ivory tower.
That's an interesting point about Goedde 'patronizing' Lorraine. It would easier to judge that if we could read or hear or see the exact dialogue about how he encouraged her to share that story. That process is definitely glossed over in this article. It seems like Brian uses plenty of qualifiers-- "I like that," or "If it were me," and he seems to be willing to relinquish control back to the author quite readily. That's an interesting balancing act in the Writing Center; at a certain point, students are kind of showing up for our opinion (experience, knowledge, what-have-you).
ReplyDeleteI don't think he recorded their sessions, which would have required IRB approval, but he did have access to her drafts. He approached his semester working with Lorraine as he would any experience a non-fiction writer would write about--by relying on memory and possibly embellishing here and there for dramatic and thematic effect.
DeleteI also was interested in your point about Geodde's "patronizing" tone. I think it touches a bit on something I brought up in an earlier class about wanting an international student to talk about their experience in their country with language despite them not being very interested in interrogating that idea. I realized it was my own personal interest and curiosity driving this, and so abandoned it. It is definitely tricky when students sometimes seem to want to write out your thoughts word-for-word to keep your own voice/interests out of things.
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