Daimys – Response to Ch. 6

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#402

My most recent experience with workshopping was my Intro to Liberal Studies class in the fall of 2013. The first mont was dedicated to readings and discussions of those readings in class. We had to write weekly responses of the assigned texts, and then read those responses out loud. Our final project was an archive project: we had to pick something we wanted to write about and go to any archive and find material. Eventually, when we were writing our final papers, we each got a day assigned to read our work and get feedback from the rest of the class.

Reading our responses to the texts assigned was an interesting experience because everyone read before anyone responded. This forced us to focus and take notes on what each person said because we knew we had to listen to 10 other pieces before we could respond to anyone. This activity was supposed to get us used to listening to each other’s work and also get a feel for how our different classmates wrote. What I found was that we were a class that had an unusually tuned ear. Everyone listened to everyone else and was able to get into interesting discussion of the readings based on the responses. People were able to pinpoint certain ideas given and connect them to other things other classmates had said. And we were all really focused on exploring new ideas, not shooting down someone’s interpretation of the reading. It also allowed us to build a close relationship quickly because we were immediately put in a vulnerable situation of readings our work to others but didn’t have the pressure of critique; we only had to listen to each other – there was no traditional feedback of the writing, just points of entry into discussion.

When the time came, then, for our final projects and the workshopping of our writing, we had become a close group. We focused on people’s strengths and where that was most evident in the writing. There were a couple of times people mentioned things like grammar or things they didn’t agree with, but other classmates were quick to point out that that wasn’t the point of this workshop. I don’t really know how to explain it, but we took care of each other and were genuinely interested in everyone’s ideas and progress.

That’s what I loved most about Chapter 6 – the idea that workshopping groups become a community. As everyone gets to know each other, they become invested in that person’s story, writing. I especially loved the anecdote about the group of men that would leave class and talk about their writing throughout their walk to the parking lot, even staying outside in the cold and still keep in touch to talk about writing even now. I think that speaks the most to what great workshopping does – it builds bonds, connection between people that make writing more enjoyable and purposful.

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