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Writer's Evolution
Writer's Evolution: Services
It’s official. I only have two more papers to write in my college career. After four years of
writing something every day, it’s almost over. Just two more papers that stand between me
and graduation.
Writer's Evolution: About
Over the last four years, writing has become more of a habit than an assignment. I first learned how to write and format the standard 5 paragraph essay in 7th grade, but I’ve been writing much more than that. It feels like I’ve been writing essays almost every week of college, and it is a fact that I write in some medium every day, whether it’s taking notes in class, sending emails, or filling out applications.
But with every paper I wrote I had to make a decision. A decision I now only have to make two more times. Will I write what I knew my teacher or professor wanted to read or will I write what I believe? Like a lot of students, when a grade is on the line I often write what the professor wants. I write for their eyes rather than mine.
But those essays and assignments are always more of a challenge than the times I write what I believe. The papers I write from my perspective and for my eyes are more natural and more me. Although they were still submitted for a grade, writing those papers was a more enjoyable process. And the final products were stronger pieces of writing. My voice was clear and true to myself. Reading them now, I can tell that I wrote them. The arguments make sense and I have the evidence to support them. However, in the papers written strictly for my professors my writing is weak. The argument is often unconvincing and my voice isn’t there. While having an audience in mind when writing is not a bad thing, I’ve found that writing only what a professor wants to hear is a bad thing.
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Writer's Evolution: About
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I know my writing is better when I’m not writing what I think the professor wants from me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t fall into that trap. In the fall of 2016, I was taking a class about African art and the exhibition of African art. I was excited to learn about a culture completely different than mine and see different ways of artistic expression. In my initial reading of the syllabus, checking if the class was at a good time and the assignments list, I saw that the class required a few papers and a final project. It sounded like every other class I have taken, so I wasn’t worried about any of the assignments.
A few weeks into the semester, my professor distributed more detailed instructions for the first essay. What I thought was just a gallery critique where I would give my honest feedback turned out to be one of the most challenging essays I have ever written. It was not just a gallery critique that would get me to think critically about how art is exhibited and how certain exhibition techniques are problematic. It was not just being graded by my professor. The curator of the gallery I had to criticize would be reading the paper, too.
Now I faced two different but powerful readers. The essay was a big part of my grade for the class, so I needed to do well. I went over every lecture in my head remembering what my professor had said about the problems with displays in other museums so I could find something to write about. But as a person who someday hopes to work in the art world and probably a museum, I didn’t want to offend anyone or burn any potential bridges. I may never work at UMMA but it wouldn’t be wise to cut off any possible connections by writing an extremely harsh critique of someone’s curatorial work.
I found myself writing for my professor and the curator. I was not as critical about the gallery and the objects on display in the essay as I really was. There are legitimate problems with the gallery, but I didn’t write that. My “gallery critique” was mostly positive. Instead of pointing out the issues, I spent a lot of the paper exaggerating the strengths of the gallery. I wrote things like,
“The range of objects varies from a set of eleven headrests from eastern and southern Africa to a
near life-size figure shrine from originating in Nigeria. The collection is able to feature works by
many different peoples, which gives visitors a better idea of the diversity of African cultures,”
instead of how the pieces offered a very limiting view of African art and African cultures. The rest of the essay sounds cold and forced, because it was.
In this paper I wrote for two different people, based on their opinions rather than mine. I wrote what my professor had hinted at in lectures and I wrote what wouldn’t offend the curator. I fulfilled the assignment requirements, but the end result was weak.
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Writer's Evolution: About
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In another class I took the fall of 2015, I had a similar experience. It was an art history seminar about the Italian Renaissance as shown through art and philosophy. It was my first upper level writing course, so I was nervous and didn’t know what to expect. In my initial reading of the syllabus, I saw a heavy amount of writing, but that was to be expected. I just didn’t know exactly what would be expected of me. I had never been asked to write on that level before; I didn’t even know what that level looked like. I knew it would be challenging but I knew it was nothing I couldn’t handle.
When the first essay assignment was distributed, I was relieved. We were supposed to write four pages based on Cennino Cennini’s The Craftsman’s Handbook. There were detailed guidelines for the structure of the essay, basically giving us all of the information we needed to write this paper. Each paragraph was already laid out with a topic and all I had to do was fill in each claim with evidence from the book. I thought it would be easy to write because I was told exactly what to write. However, when I sat down to write it, I found myself staring at a blank word document and struggling to focus on the book.
I knew what the professor wanted me to write, but it was difficult to find the right words. It was also difficult given that is was my first upper level writing assignment, so I knew expectations were high. I understood the assignment and felt like I had a strong grasp on the content I was writing about, but all four pages sound monotonous and strained. My voice is academic to a fault. From sentence to sentence and paragraph to paragraph, my transitions were not smooth:
"To develop the techniques necessary to master painting, a painter must be obedient
to his master as he is obedient to God. Cennini suggested that a painter should study
with his carefully chosen master for no less than thirteen years. Obedience is necessary
to dedicate this length of time to one master and one craft."
I thought that having such specific instructions would make the paper easier to write. Having structure in other areas of my academic life has been extremely beneficial so I thought this would be no different. But what I thought would be helpful and guiding ended up being limiting and quieting. I wrote what my professor wanted and how he wanted it written. Again, the end result was weak. The essay doesn’t sound like me; it just sounds forced. There is a good deal of evidence, but it isn’t naturally incorporated into the discussion.
The same thing happened in my second upper level writing class. This class was outside my major and unlike any class I had taken before. It was a history course about social protests in the United States since the 1960s. Throughout the course, we read several books related to social protest movements, including The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin.
After we finished the book, we were assigned to write a five-page book review. I’ve written many book reviews in my academic career as well as countless papers where books have been the primary source. I finished my first draft and knew I wanted feedback from my professor having learned from my experience in my first upper level writing class. I walked into our appointment feeling one way and walked out of our appointment feeling the opposite. My professor told me to change almost every part of my paper. I had written what I thought was expected, but I had not written what the professor wanted. He gave me an entirely new argument; one that he wanted to read.
To put it simply, the content of The Fire Next Time is jarring. Baldwin discusses racism in America from his personal experiences as part of a hopeful address to his nephew. I interpreted the book one way, influenced by own background and upbringing, which is very different than Baldwin’s. I listened to my professor’s new direction for my paper and abandoned almost all the original thoughts I had about the book. Originally, I ended my paper echoing what I thought was Baldwin’s hopeful conclusion:
“The only way the division based on color can be erased is for society to also be
erased and created again without the political reality of color. Baldwin places
these hopes on his nephew, encouraging him to continue to work for that society.
With these instructions Baldwin hopes that ‘we may be able, handful that we are, to
end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country.’ And although it may seem impossible,
the truest American tradition of black history has been achieving the impossible.”
After meeting with my professor, the end of my paper turned out very differently. listened to what he told me rather than what I thought. The conclusion of my paper was what he wanted to read, what he told me to read. The conclusion matched the rest of the paper, which was a shallow look at a complex book. It was cold and impersonal and entirely too academic. Almost every paragraph is the same length, down to the word count. My hopeful conclusion became a dark inflammatory statement:
“This tendency explains why the status of black individuals living in America only
temporarily improves but the same issues have remained constant. No progress
has truly been made because the real American tradition has been to hide behind
inauthentic excuses and proclamations of innocence. Baldwin identifies these
claims as sins because it is a lie.”
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Writer's Evolution: About
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But in the fall semester before, I took a creative writing class where I had the opportunity to write more freely. In that class, we read and wrote poetry and fiction. The syllabus listed many poetry assignments and a few fiction assignments, but the length of each one was pretty short. I thought I was going to a fun opportunity to try new styles of writing in a supportive environment.
As the class progressed, some assignments were more challenging than others. We began with structured poems, like sonnets in iambic pentameter. So when I had to write sonnets in iambic pentameter, I felt the same constraints as the essay with specific structure, but this time I enjoyed it more. I enjoyed it because I felt accomplished when I found the write word to fit the rhyme scheme whereas in the essay I felt like I was being told what to do. Although it was difficult at times and definitely frustrating, the poems sounded like me. I’m no poet, but each one I wrote was true to myself and because of that they are stronger pieces of writing.
After sonnets we moved into the less structured styles of poetry and into free verse. For these assignments, I had more freedom than ever. I was able to write about whatever I wanted and however I wanted. Conventions could be thrown out the window and I had the freedom to capitalize random words and use no punctuation or too much punctuation. I had more freedom than I had in the rest of my academic life.
For one of my assignments, I wrote a free verse poem about my Grampa’s house, which was a very special place for me and my family. I didn’t live there, but I feel like I grew up in that house along with my sister and cousins and aunts and uncles and of course my Grampa. It was always filled with happiness and love and it will always be one of my favorite places. My Grampa died two years before I was in the class and sold his house about a yea before that. So I had been struggling with losing him and the place where I have so many memories. I decided to write my poem about everything I was feeling and what the house and my family means to me. Because it was such an important topic to me and I wanted to poem to do justice to my memories and the house, I went to my professor for feedback and edits.
I wanted to do the best that I could so I could maybe share the poem with my family, the audience who would best understand the inside jokes and memories that are included in the poem. Going into my meeting with the professor I knew that I was going to get advice about what to change or remove. But given the free nature of the class, I felt more comfortable not listening to every suggestion my professor made than I had in my other classes. I genuinely wanted her feedback, but I knew I probably wouldn’t listen to every edit.
One of her suggestions was to remove a phrase that I repeat often. The address of my Grampa’s house was 307 Oakwood, so in the poem I repeat, “to go to 307 Oakwood.” My professor thought that the phrase got too heavy in the reader’s mouth and slowed down the poem too much. She suggested I change the phrase or drastically limit the amount of times I repeat it. But I didn’t listen. I repeated the phrase so often because the address was a big part of my memory of the house. When I was making plans with family, we would use 307 and Grampa's almost interchangeably. I wanted to keep the phrase as is and use it as many times as I used it, so that is what I did.
I was writing the poem for me, not my professor. Because of that, it is a stronger piece of writing. My voice is strong and consistent. It is a personal subject, but the memories I talk about feel authentic. I went through with the edits that I agreed with, but I didn’t write exactly what my professor wanted. I wrote a meaningful and strong poem because I wrote what I believe.
In the capstone project for my minor in writing, I have found the same freedom as I had writing about the house that raised me, my Grampa’s house. With this project, I have the opportunity to write what I believe. I am writing about somewhat silly beliefs I have about sea lions as satire on current racist and islamophobic sentiments in the United States. I decided write a children’s book for adults with that central theme.
My project has been influenced by my other writing experiences where I have struggled when writing specifically for a professor. Looking back on pieces of my writing, I found that my most meaningful experience has been in the process of writing the poem. Paying attention to the audience paid off because the audience was primarily me. I also had my family in mind because they are so involved in the memories shared in the poem. But it was still an assignment for a class, so my professor was also in my mind. Unlike other papers and assignments, this time I was able to write for myself, my family and my professor in the same piece.
In my capstone project, I have the same freedom to write what I want, how I want, and all for myself. I also have the same audiences in mind. Primarily, I am writing for me. But my family is well-aware of my almost heinous views on sea lions, so part of this project is also for them. And as one of the final assignments of my minor in writing, it is for my professor as well. Like I was with my poem, I am always open to advice and edits. But in the end I have the chance to write for me. Because of that, my capstone project will be a strong piece of writing.
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Writer's Evolution: About
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