WR&T Reflections
There are a lot of words I can use to describe this semester in Writing, Research, & Technology. I could tell from day one that the class was going to be atypical when this unusual new professor of mine was telling us all that his name translated into Saturday Left Hand and that he was an esteemed actor, with prestigious credits in movies like Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. There were moments of creativity and vision, but even more of frustration and irritation. I learned to write solo, collaboratively, and a little in between. I was reflexive and reflective (or is it the other way around?) and at times altogether arbitrary. There were risks and small comforts, and sometimes there were things I sought to change about myself and my writing. I worked on projects that made me think, question, wonder and at the same time, perhaps most importantly, those projects taught me something, be it the importance of the written word verse the spoken one or the influence of technologies or just why it is I constantly find the need to WRITE. So bear with me, here. This has been quite the journey.
WRITING
That’s the million dollar word, isn’t it? It’s why I’m here—to write, to perfect, and to explore my writing. The genres we developed were many and they were interesting. I am a fiction writer at heart, and I think my writing really thrives when I’m given free reign and just told to go at it. Unfortunately there wasn’t much fiction writing in WR&T (pronounce it rat) but more on that later.
The Twitterive, by far, was my favorite project. I think we were given the most freedom. Though I’m not exactly what you’d call a “tweeter,” the idea of writing whatever I wanted (well, whatever would fit in 140 characters) and then creating a story out of it had my little heart almost bursting with joy. I’m an observer (aren’t all writers?) so I was able to create my future, somewhat dystopian world by watching boys and girls float to class without ever looking up from their cellphones, their ears jammed with buds to keep out the noise of the real world. Johnny’s a lot more like me than I care to admit. But by tweeting what I wanted, when I wanted, and then composing a story to my liking I think I was really able to shine (and, perhaps, take some risks.)
Poetry scares me. It's always too short, so vague. I can write short stories, novels, vignettes--but tell me to write a poem and I go running for the hills. The format has always been a mystery to me, but I've learned to "just go with it." That being said, I found the found poem (pun intended?) to be interesting. Its form doesn’t make any sense. The words are chaotic, barely laced together by a common theme. And yet... it seemed to suit me. I like poetry, I just don’t like the idea of poetry—the step by step, line by line, vignette by vignette—that’s been drilled into my head since elementary school. But the found poem was something different. The found poem was something I could understand.
I had lot of fun with microfiction. Normally it's difficult for me to write something relatively short and vague (I love details, details, DETAILS!) but the beauty of microfiction is reader interpretation. Tell a story, or part of one, in 250 words or less. Then it's up to the reader to decide what happens. It takes patience and guts to write a novel, but there’s a subtle skill in weaving an entire story in less than 300 words. Granted, if a piece of microfiction stinks there’s a lot less disappointment at the end than if one were to brave a novel for 400 pages and get left in the dust. There’s no time to worry about character development or complex relationships or a deep, involving plot line while writing microfiction—it’s all about the story, the little “slice of life” that you, the writer, want to share with your readers. I had this piece of microfiction on my blog but I wanted to put it here, too.
While most of the animals on Morning Glory Ranch were content to lounge in the pastures the farm afforded them, Claudia—a hen—found the road that bordered the ranch a source of endless fascination. It was an ancient road, pockmarked and tattooed by a stampede of vehicles, but the real mystery laid beyond it, in a battered old shack red as blood and outlined with weeds.
“I don’t know why you come here every day,” said Belle, a dairy cow, her voice slow as she chewed her cud. Claudia paced the length of the road and fluffed her feathers in frustration.
“I saw a pig go in there once,” huffed Claudia. “He never came out.”
Belle shrugged and beat at the flies with her tail.
“You’re not the least bit curious?”
"No,” said Belle. “Curiosity’s not for me. It killed the cat, you know.”
The old cow lumbered away, full utter swinging like a fleshy pendulum, and Claudia was left to ponder the allure of the shack across the road. She was alone, the world around her silent and still. The quills of her feathers trembled.
It’ll only take a minute, she decided. I’ll cross the road, see what’s in the shack, and be back in a minute’s time. No big deal. And Claudia, who was naïve even for a hen, fluttered across the road.
From the porch of Morning Glory Ranch, Shadow, the farm's Labrador, watched poor clueless Claudia disappear into the slaughterhouse. He covered his muzzle with his paws, barely able to watch.
“Oh, chicken,” he howled, attracting the stares of the barnyard animals. “Why did you cross the road?”
How fun! At the mention of my blog, I think this would be a good time to Segway into blogging. I’ll be honest, I’ve never been a blogger. I’ve kept blogs for other writing classes, but by the time the class is over I often forget they even exist. I love to write, but it’s hard when someone tells me what to write, when to write, and how to write it, which is often the purpose of class blogs. “Post this,” “respond to this,” “what were your feelings on this?” It’s all so blasé. If I had to keep a blog of microfiction pieces, my feelings might be different, but for now my thoughts remain comfortably inside my head. I’m self-conscious about every word I write and the idea of sharing them with the world (especially when I feel that nonfiction doesn’t capture me as well as fiction) leaves me squirming. Honestly, I didn’t keep up with the blog as much as I probably should have.
Collaborative writing is a nightmare, regardless of group mates. The members of my group for the Oral History Project and for the Collaborative Research Project were all angels, don’t get me wrong, but I’m a bit greedy when it comes to writing, and I don’t like when other people interfere. The workload was less intense with four people writing instead of one, but the frustrations were great and many. I had to check my email and my phone constantly for updates from my group members, and organizing who would write or research what and who would post this or that was a nightmare. There were times when my email inbox had nearly exploded by the end of the day, and yet sometimes I’d go whole weekends without hearing a single thing from any of the three girls in my group. I also like to claim credit for what I’ve done and a part of me wishes I could label “written by Casey Otto” beneath the sections that were mine. I understand that this is not the point of writing collaboratively, but sometimes it's difficult to ease into something new.
RESEARCH
This comes naturally to all writers. We’ve been doing it since we learned to pick up the pen. It started with book reports and science papers and rapidly accelerated into research projects (although I do admit I miss the days of reporting on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland).
Before this class I didn’t think of interviews as research, but as I collected questions and readied my camera I realized that no, I wasn’t collecting data from a book or a website, but I was collecting information from a person—and that made it much more valuable. I thought of my interview questions as keywords I’d search in a book’s glossary or what I’d type in Google’s search bar. Mr. Butt’s answers to those questions were my research, though it was a bit odd to hear my voice on playback. I had to listen to the interview several times before collected the information I needed.
As with any research paper, my group first had to think of research questions... that is, after we finally thought of an approved topic (third time’s the charm, right?) Some of the questions we asked were:
What is the slow food movement?
When and how did it start?
Where are some of the locations in Philadelphia/South Jersey area?
What's the difference in price between buying food from a Farmer's Market vs. a company owned business (Shop Rite, Acme, Whole Foods etc)?
What are major differences between slow food and fast food?
Asking questions first made it easier to put our topic into perspective. We realized that we had no idea what the Slow Food movement was, but that’s part of what intrigued us to write about it. What better than to dive headlong into the unknown? It was interesting to learn as we worked, and I think by the end we all became well versed in the history of Slow Food. I’m trying my best to follow the movement myself and, though challenging, I kind of like it. I haven’t eaten red meat since watching Food, Inc. and I eat a fraction of the fast food I did before.
The readings were more my speed, by my were they long! It wasn’t so much the length that bothered me, but some of the readings (I’m looking at you, Situating Narrative Inquiry) were so dry I often had to pause to drink. No wonder non-writers think that scholars are just a bunch of dried up old farts—I’d think so too if I was subject to write like that all day long. However, there were pieces who were much more colorful and full of life. I love any piece that tells a story, and A Native Hilland Narrative Life did just that—with some flair, too! The latter two pieces made me think, made me muse, made me ask questions. I couldn’t help but wonder what kind of events shaped me into the person—the writer—I am today. Berry mentions that he would have been transformed into a different man had he been born five years later and, in a way, isn’t that true of all of us? It’s weird to think that we’re all born at a pivotal moment. That every crucial detail of our lives shapes the person we are, and who we’ll become. That if I was born October 21st 1994 instead of October 21st 1989 I would be reaching the end of my high school years right now, perhaps not knowing what I wanted out of life. Narrative Life had me thinking about the events that shape us as writers. An avid reader of both stories and comics, Pagnucci ended up pursuing his love for words and becoming a writer. While I doubt that all avid readers become writers, it seems to me that all writers share the same passion for the published word. My own “narrative life” started the moment I could comprehend pictures. My mother would read to me every single night for as long as I could stay awake. Eventually, it was me doing the reading, and when those books lost my interest I’d write my own. There are moments in our lives that shape us mold us, transform us; if Pagnucci never got hit by a car he never would have met his friend in the hospital, nor would his interest in comics been so strong. Narrative Life and A Native Hill both had me pondering the path we walk. And, perhaps, I am thinking too deeply—maybe our destinies are set for us. Maybe I’d of become a writer regardless of what year I was born.
TECHNOLOGY
I think it’s obvious by now that I’m not exactly the most technologically inclined person, but I will admit that it is helpful.
Without Twitter, there would be no Twitterive, and Johnny’s story would remain untold. I’m not the biggest fan of the website, and I think the 140 character limit is obnoxious, but it is a useful tool for getting in touch with others and for just generally sharing your thoughts and feelings with the world... regardless of whether your followers care or not. Unfortunately, for WR&T I was coerced into following all of my classmates and (nothing against them) but I honestly could care less about their personal lives. There were exceptions (I thought Markirah and Froy always had some thought provoking tweets) but for the most part my relationship with Twitter was strictly school related, and now that the Twitterive is complete I am content to let my account fade into the deepest recesses of cyberspace.
Now Weebly is neat. The last time I had to make a website for a class was as far back ago as eight grade, when we had to suffer through html coding and other computer lingo that might as well be written in a foreign language. My favorite aspect of Weebly was its simplicity and the ability to customize it exactly the way I wanted. My Weebly properly reflects who I am (right down to dinosaurs and Stephen King) and the OCD part of me kept it clean and organized. I don’t know if I will continue to use my WR&T site once the class is over, but I think in the future when I’m in need of an online portfolio it will definitely come in handy. Although I still can’t figure out how to get my title to show up...
Though there were moments when I wanted to plunge my fists through my monitor to strangle the life out of Youtube, eventually the website and I reached a common understanding. “No, Casey,” states Youtube, plaintively. “You can’t upload videos that are more than 15 minutes long.” “But I are human and you must listen to me!” I counter, but to no avail. Youtube perplexed me at first, though I think most of it was the fault of Windows Movie Maker. I worked with Lauren and Breanne to edit my interview with Mr. Butt, and we successfully trimmed the video to three, ten minute segments. After a half hour of waiting for the first video to upload we discovered that the format was all wrong, and yet the library computers would not save it as anything but an MPEG (which Youtube will not accept.) We then tried Dropbox. The videos uploaded successfully, but Breanne had no luck opening them. So, heartbroken and frustrated after wasting of an hour’s time, we returned to our respective homes. I discovered that my computer had its own version of Windows Movie Maker (and because I have the shiny and new Windows 7, not that downtrodden sorry excuse for XP that infects the library computers) and proceeded the divide the interview into two, fifteen minute clips. And, to my great discovery, there was an UPLOAD TO YOUTUBE button right on the software! “This is too good to be true,” I thought to myself, and after waiting only five minutes the first of the two clips was successfully up on Youtube. So now if, for whatever reason, I need to upload anything else to the website, I finally know how to do it.
I’ve never been very good at writing conclusions, so I will keep this short and to the point. Overall, I enjoyed my time in Writing, Research, and Technology. It was fun to explore unusual topics and it was hard not to be enthusiastic when you have a professor who, even on his bad days, makes it seem like Disney World and kittens and all things wonderful are right around the corner and within our grasp. I was disappointed that there wasn’t much creative writing beyond the Twitterive, but I understand that it is not a creative writing class. I hope that everything I’ve learned from January to May will help carry me through the rest of my time at Rowan University.
WRITING
That’s the million dollar word, isn’t it? It’s why I’m here—to write, to perfect, and to explore my writing. The genres we developed were many and they were interesting. I am a fiction writer at heart, and I think my writing really thrives when I’m given free reign and just told to go at it. Unfortunately there wasn’t much fiction writing in WR&T (pronounce it rat) but more on that later.
The Twitterive, by far, was my favorite project. I think we were given the most freedom. Though I’m not exactly what you’d call a “tweeter,” the idea of writing whatever I wanted (well, whatever would fit in 140 characters) and then creating a story out of it had my little heart almost bursting with joy. I’m an observer (aren’t all writers?) so I was able to create my future, somewhat dystopian world by watching boys and girls float to class without ever looking up from their cellphones, their ears jammed with buds to keep out the noise of the real world. Johnny’s a lot more like me than I care to admit. But by tweeting what I wanted, when I wanted, and then composing a story to my liking I think I was really able to shine (and, perhaps, take some risks.)
Poetry scares me. It's always too short, so vague. I can write short stories, novels, vignettes--but tell me to write a poem and I go running for the hills. The format has always been a mystery to me, but I've learned to "just go with it." That being said, I found the found poem (pun intended?) to be interesting. Its form doesn’t make any sense. The words are chaotic, barely laced together by a common theme. And yet... it seemed to suit me. I like poetry, I just don’t like the idea of poetry—the step by step, line by line, vignette by vignette—that’s been drilled into my head since elementary school. But the found poem was something different. The found poem was something I could understand.
I had lot of fun with microfiction. Normally it's difficult for me to write something relatively short and vague (I love details, details, DETAILS!) but the beauty of microfiction is reader interpretation. Tell a story, or part of one, in 250 words or less. Then it's up to the reader to decide what happens. It takes patience and guts to write a novel, but there’s a subtle skill in weaving an entire story in less than 300 words. Granted, if a piece of microfiction stinks there’s a lot less disappointment at the end than if one were to brave a novel for 400 pages and get left in the dust. There’s no time to worry about character development or complex relationships or a deep, involving plot line while writing microfiction—it’s all about the story, the little “slice of life” that you, the writer, want to share with your readers. I had this piece of microfiction on my blog but I wanted to put it here, too.
While most of the animals on Morning Glory Ranch were content to lounge in the pastures the farm afforded them, Claudia—a hen—found the road that bordered the ranch a source of endless fascination. It was an ancient road, pockmarked and tattooed by a stampede of vehicles, but the real mystery laid beyond it, in a battered old shack red as blood and outlined with weeds.
“I don’t know why you come here every day,” said Belle, a dairy cow, her voice slow as she chewed her cud. Claudia paced the length of the road and fluffed her feathers in frustration.
“I saw a pig go in there once,” huffed Claudia. “He never came out.”
Belle shrugged and beat at the flies with her tail.
“You’re not the least bit curious?”
"No,” said Belle. “Curiosity’s not for me. It killed the cat, you know.”
The old cow lumbered away, full utter swinging like a fleshy pendulum, and Claudia was left to ponder the allure of the shack across the road. She was alone, the world around her silent and still. The quills of her feathers trembled.
It’ll only take a minute, she decided. I’ll cross the road, see what’s in the shack, and be back in a minute’s time. No big deal. And Claudia, who was naïve even for a hen, fluttered across the road.
From the porch of Morning Glory Ranch, Shadow, the farm's Labrador, watched poor clueless Claudia disappear into the slaughterhouse. He covered his muzzle with his paws, barely able to watch.
“Oh, chicken,” he howled, attracting the stares of the barnyard animals. “Why did you cross the road?”
How fun! At the mention of my blog, I think this would be a good time to Segway into blogging. I’ll be honest, I’ve never been a blogger. I’ve kept blogs for other writing classes, but by the time the class is over I often forget they even exist. I love to write, but it’s hard when someone tells me what to write, when to write, and how to write it, which is often the purpose of class blogs. “Post this,” “respond to this,” “what were your feelings on this?” It’s all so blasé. If I had to keep a blog of microfiction pieces, my feelings might be different, but for now my thoughts remain comfortably inside my head. I’m self-conscious about every word I write and the idea of sharing them with the world (especially when I feel that nonfiction doesn’t capture me as well as fiction) leaves me squirming. Honestly, I didn’t keep up with the blog as much as I probably should have.
Collaborative writing is a nightmare, regardless of group mates. The members of my group for the Oral History Project and for the Collaborative Research Project were all angels, don’t get me wrong, but I’m a bit greedy when it comes to writing, and I don’t like when other people interfere. The workload was less intense with four people writing instead of one, but the frustrations were great and many. I had to check my email and my phone constantly for updates from my group members, and organizing who would write or research what and who would post this or that was a nightmare. There were times when my email inbox had nearly exploded by the end of the day, and yet sometimes I’d go whole weekends without hearing a single thing from any of the three girls in my group. I also like to claim credit for what I’ve done and a part of me wishes I could label “written by Casey Otto” beneath the sections that were mine. I understand that this is not the point of writing collaboratively, but sometimes it's difficult to ease into something new.
RESEARCH
This comes naturally to all writers. We’ve been doing it since we learned to pick up the pen. It started with book reports and science papers and rapidly accelerated into research projects (although I do admit I miss the days of reporting on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland).
Before this class I didn’t think of interviews as research, but as I collected questions and readied my camera I realized that no, I wasn’t collecting data from a book or a website, but I was collecting information from a person—and that made it much more valuable. I thought of my interview questions as keywords I’d search in a book’s glossary or what I’d type in Google’s search bar. Mr. Butt’s answers to those questions were my research, though it was a bit odd to hear my voice on playback. I had to listen to the interview several times before collected the information I needed.
As with any research paper, my group first had to think of research questions... that is, after we finally thought of an approved topic (third time’s the charm, right?) Some of the questions we asked were:
What is the slow food movement?
When and how did it start?
Where are some of the locations in Philadelphia/South Jersey area?
What's the difference in price between buying food from a Farmer's Market vs. a company owned business (Shop Rite, Acme, Whole Foods etc)?
What are major differences between slow food and fast food?
Asking questions first made it easier to put our topic into perspective. We realized that we had no idea what the Slow Food movement was, but that’s part of what intrigued us to write about it. What better than to dive headlong into the unknown? It was interesting to learn as we worked, and I think by the end we all became well versed in the history of Slow Food. I’m trying my best to follow the movement myself and, though challenging, I kind of like it. I haven’t eaten red meat since watching Food, Inc. and I eat a fraction of the fast food I did before.
The readings were more my speed, by my were they long! It wasn’t so much the length that bothered me, but some of the readings (I’m looking at you, Situating Narrative Inquiry) were so dry I often had to pause to drink. No wonder non-writers think that scholars are just a bunch of dried up old farts—I’d think so too if I was subject to write like that all day long. However, there were pieces who were much more colorful and full of life. I love any piece that tells a story, and A Native Hilland Narrative Life did just that—with some flair, too! The latter two pieces made me think, made me muse, made me ask questions. I couldn’t help but wonder what kind of events shaped me into the person—the writer—I am today. Berry mentions that he would have been transformed into a different man had he been born five years later and, in a way, isn’t that true of all of us? It’s weird to think that we’re all born at a pivotal moment. That every crucial detail of our lives shapes the person we are, and who we’ll become. That if I was born October 21st 1994 instead of October 21st 1989 I would be reaching the end of my high school years right now, perhaps not knowing what I wanted out of life. Narrative Life had me thinking about the events that shape us as writers. An avid reader of both stories and comics, Pagnucci ended up pursuing his love for words and becoming a writer. While I doubt that all avid readers become writers, it seems to me that all writers share the same passion for the published word. My own “narrative life” started the moment I could comprehend pictures. My mother would read to me every single night for as long as I could stay awake. Eventually, it was me doing the reading, and when those books lost my interest I’d write my own. There are moments in our lives that shape us mold us, transform us; if Pagnucci never got hit by a car he never would have met his friend in the hospital, nor would his interest in comics been so strong. Narrative Life and A Native Hill both had me pondering the path we walk. And, perhaps, I am thinking too deeply—maybe our destinies are set for us. Maybe I’d of become a writer regardless of what year I was born.
TECHNOLOGY
I think it’s obvious by now that I’m not exactly the most technologically inclined person, but I will admit that it is helpful.
Without Twitter, there would be no Twitterive, and Johnny’s story would remain untold. I’m not the biggest fan of the website, and I think the 140 character limit is obnoxious, but it is a useful tool for getting in touch with others and for just generally sharing your thoughts and feelings with the world... regardless of whether your followers care or not. Unfortunately, for WR&T I was coerced into following all of my classmates and (nothing against them) but I honestly could care less about their personal lives. There were exceptions (I thought Markirah and Froy always had some thought provoking tweets) but for the most part my relationship with Twitter was strictly school related, and now that the Twitterive is complete I am content to let my account fade into the deepest recesses of cyberspace.
Now Weebly is neat. The last time I had to make a website for a class was as far back ago as eight grade, when we had to suffer through html coding and other computer lingo that might as well be written in a foreign language. My favorite aspect of Weebly was its simplicity and the ability to customize it exactly the way I wanted. My Weebly properly reflects who I am (right down to dinosaurs and Stephen King) and the OCD part of me kept it clean and organized. I don’t know if I will continue to use my WR&T site once the class is over, but I think in the future when I’m in need of an online portfolio it will definitely come in handy. Although I still can’t figure out how to get my title to show up...
Though there were moments when I wanted to plunge my fists through my monitor to strangle the life out of Youtube, eventually the website and I reached a common understanding. “No, Casey,” states Youtube, plaintively. “You can’t upload videos that are more than 15 minutes long.” “But I are human and you must listen to me!” I counter, but to no avail. Youtube perplexed me at first, though I think most of it was the fault of Windows Movie Maker. I worked with Lauren and Breanne to edit my interview with Mr. Butt, and we successfully trimmed the video to three, ten minute segments. After a half hour of waiting for the first video to upload we discovered that the format was all wrong, and yet the library computers would not save it as anything but an MPEG (which Youtube will not accept.) We then tried Dropbox. The videos uploaded successfully, but Breanne had no luck opening them. So, heartbroken and frustrated after wasting of an hour’s time, we returned to our respective homes. I discovered that my computer had its own version of Windows Movie Maker (and because I have the shiny and new Windows 7, not that downtrodden sorry excuse for XP that infects the library computers) and proceeded the divide the interview into two, fifteen minute clips. And, to my great discovery, there was an UPLOAD TO YOUTUBE button right on the software! “This is too good to be true,” I thought to myself, and after waiting only five minutes the first of the two clips was successfully up on Youtube. So now if, for whatever reason, I need to upload anything else to the website, I finally know how to do it.
I’ve never been very good at writing conclusions, so I will keep this short and to the point. Overall, I enjoyed my time in Writing, Research, and Technology. It was fun to explore unusual topics and it was hard not to be enthusiastic when you have a professor who, even on his bad days, makes it seem like Disney World and kittens and all things wonderful are right around the corner and within our grasp. I was disappointed that there wasn’t much creative writing beyond the Twitterive, but I understand that it is not a creative writing class. I hope that everything I’ve learned from January to May will help carry me through the rest of my time at Rowan University.