Lorraine's story was an interesting intersection of racial analyses and comparison of creative writing and academic writing. I wasn't quite sure why there was such a focus on Lorraine's background to the extend that it went, though some passages that provided context to her creative piece were appropriate. I wondered if it was all truly necessary or was even working against Lorraine in the story. As a Latinx student I don't know if I'd LOVE that much attention and emphasis on my ethnicity when someone is analyzing my work, because then a focus on more academic themes are overlooked, or accidentally judged/attributed to racial background when it may not be a factor in the quality of the work.
Week 12--Post on Lorraine's Story
The story's very personal focus--titled "Lorraine's Story" instead of "How I Worked With A Student on Bringing Personal Voice"--shows both the greatest strength and weakness of this case study. As other students have noted, this pulls you in--you get invested. Brian's framework prompts memories of revision and darling-killing in creative writing, and the reader can sympathize with the struggle to move between kinds of writing while acknowledging how Lorraine's lived experience as a woman of color in a majority-white institution has shaped her experience in Iowa and extended to how she moves between kinds of writing. However, this is ultimately Brian's framework and mediation of Lorraine's story; without citation, with the creative non-fiction structure, it is difficult to discern how much of this is quoted from Lorraine vs. surmised by Brian; he writes himself as a facilitator, and we do come to understand the complexities of this student...
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