{"id":9022,"date":"2016-02-22T10:24:23","date_gmt":"2016-02-22T10:24:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/?p=9022"},"modified":"2016-02-23T08:45:09","modified_gmt":"2016-02-23T08:45:09","slug":"creative-writing-for-academics-workshop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/?p=9022","title":{"rendered":"Creative Writing for Academics workshop"},"content":{"rendered":"

Volha and I have just returned from\u00a0a workshop led by Kip Jones<\/a> of Bournemouth University entitled\u00a0‘Creative writing for academics’. It was a two day workshop, and to be honest, I was not really sure what to expect. We had been asked to take an article we had written that included interview data, and to note down any dreams we had. I think on reflection the overarching idea of the workshop was to get us thinking and writing in different and perhaps unexpected ways.<\/p>\n

The first task was to write our life story on a postcard in 15 minutes. We then had to read these out to the group and they served as a form of introduction. It was certainly different from the usual tell everyone your name, what you do and where you’re from sort of thing, although admittedly it took a couple of hours to introduce ourselves. I think what struck me most about this exercise was the honesty and vulnerability (considering we were a group of complete strangers) with which people wrote their life stories. A couple of people were in tears while reading theirs. It was certainly the most unusual introductory session I have ever been involved in.<\/p>\n

We then moved on to writing tag lines (a bit like a slogan e.g. ‘Nike – just do it’ sort of thing) and log lines (25 word max. publicity synopsis) of our articles. This was followed by a 500 word summary in an online magazine style. Personally, I found these the most useful exercises of the weekend.The second day was spent (about equally) between writing stories based on a photo\u00a0we were given, and socialising and eating at the local Italian!<\/p>\n

Our homework for the second day was to write a poem based on one of our dreams.\u00a0Volha shared hers with the\u00a0group and she’s given me permission to reproduce it here as it is a very PhD-centred dream. She even has a photo of the robot that inspired the dream, a robot she had to share a room with one night.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"FullSizeRender\"<\/a><\/p>\n

“Who are you?” I asked the thing<\/p>\n

Made of plastic and some tin<\/div>\n
Standing straight with arms and legs<\/div>\n
Cables running at his chest<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
“I am you,” he said to me.<\/div>\n
“You are doing PhD<\/div>\n
Uni knows that is a hell<\/div>\n
Driving crazy lots of pals<\/div>\n
Friends are gone<\/div>\n
And money’s gone<\/div>\n
No one wants another run<\/div>\n
On the thing that only you<\/div>\n
Find eighty thousands words too few<\/div>\n
To discuss in full detail<\/div>\n
So to keep you entertained<\/div>\n
You’ve been scanned<\/div>\n
And I’ve been made<\/div>\n
To become your greatest mate<\/div>\n
I can see you’ve had enough<\/div>\n
Working on the ninth draft<\/div>\n
Of your literature review<\/div>\n
So I think it’s time for you<\/div>\n
To allow yourself some rest<\/div>\n
So why don’t we play some chess”<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Volha and I have just returned from\u00a0a workshop led by Kip Jones of Bournemouth University entitled\u00a0‘Creative writing for academics’. It was a two day workshop, and to be honest, I was not really sure what to expect. We had been asked to take an article we had written that included interview data, and to note down any dreams we had. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":9030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/P1020094.jpg?fit=1200%2C471&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p865eh-2lw","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9022"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9022"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9032,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9022\/revisions\/9032"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}