9.11 Indirect brainstorming - and definitions of CNF by induction

Indirect brainstorming. We started class with some exploration of what I think of a indirect brainstorming.  A lot of brainstorming taught in writing courses is about developing ideas for a specific purpose.  Indirect brainstorming is more about spending some time inside your thoughts and feelings and watching what comes up.  Time spent in these kinds of processes helps in two ways.  It gives you some experience noticing what you are thinking/feeling; and it allows you to recognize and accumulate writing about ideas/feelings/thoughts/stories that are "in" you.  Think of it as pro-active brainstorming.  It puts you in a position where you might be able to  "look up" (in your journal) writing your thoughts on a topic - rather than generating it specifically for an assignment.

Variation on meditation.   IOur first exercise was to sit quietly with eyes closed and simply notice what passes through our mind -without judging or trying to control our thoughts in any way.  We did this together, for 5 minutes.  After sitting, I asked you to write about your experience - what you "saw" and how it felt.

Your reflections on the experience were that it was hard to sit and be quiet, that there was some discomfort in doing this in a group, that disturbances (noises, movements) seemed magnified, that it was hard to sit still - and stay awake.  This is all pretty regular.  You also noticed that your ideas were more vivid.  Some of you had "thoughts" visually - for others it was in language.  There was curiosity and worry, and a wish not to think some of the things you were thinking.  Thoughts jumped around - followed by association, and feelings were attached to thoughts.  This list reflects what many people notice in this kind of experience.

In our discussion of why we might want to spend time sitting and watching what comes up in our minds, we said that if you watch your mind as a habit - you will get better at knowing what is in your mind, and you may even begin to notice patterns.  Becoming conscious of consciousness is, in many ways, a necessary writerly accomplishment - since writers need to be aware of how consciousness works in order to represent human behaviors, and in order to be able to write materials that evoke felt resoonses from their readers.     Specifically, you pointed out that this approach might help with writers' blog, opening up or inspiring creative work, and giving us more choices about how to go (or not) particular places in our minds.

Sensual association.  The second brainstorming activity was to associate to our sensual memories: smells, sounds, touches, sights and tastes.  In our talk, smells were particularly evocative.  As you read out your lists, sounds of the ocean, the smell of first rain, fall, our mothers, and pierogis, all of us went with you into related bodily experiences.  As set up in my introduction to this exercise - memory is deeply associated with the senses.  That makes sensory association an important technique for brainstorming - and for writing powerfully evocative prose.

Analysis of features of creative nonfiction.
 We started by listing features you noticed in all of the assigned readings.  Our list on the board included the following.
colloquialism - local language = sense of coming from a particular place

rawness, vulnerability = no holding back "out there 

sincere, open

detailed setting + stories

internally observed = reflection

writing techniques - elements of fiction

flashback, figurative language, dialog, metapho = literary

drew from memories 

reflection point <=>vivid experience/story embodied idea

-- 

essay features = reflection/point/generalizations, 1st person

fiction features = embodied, evoked experience, scenes /detailed showing rather than telling, 

not chronological

 

I then talked through your assignment sheet for the long essays (posted to the right).

 

We finished class with group work to analyze the long essays in terms of: focus, organization, directness, literariness, word choice, and point of view.  At the end of group work I asked for one brilliant statement from each group relevant to your analysis, and you came up with the following.

1. CNF makes readers FEEL the story (as opposed to just staying in the words).

2. The writing's organization makes the point: it is critical to the way the reader "gets" what the story is about.

3. Word choices create the character of the narrator (the voice of the "I" who tells the stories).

4. Both writers of these essays used their writing to explore their identities.

 

AWESOME - and truly brilliant observations about CNF!

Great class and see you next week.

For next class:
We will continue work on indirect, associative brainstorming and finish discussion of how to define creative nonfiction.

Read: Lott & Gutkind on creative nonfiction (handout in class - copies available in my mailbox)

Blog 2:  Use today's class discussion + what you are reading in Lott + Gutkind to develop your definition of creative nonfiction.  What to Lott & Gutkind leave out?  How are definitions of creative nonfiction changing in light of digital publishing?