Writing Life

I actively study and work to build writing communities that focus on the writing life beyond “tips and tricks” that help a writer through one project. That means, I research, teach, and practice strategies that cultivate writing experiences that make writing a regular–and perhaps even enjoyable–part of student and faculty lives.

Experimentation is a key feature in cultivating a sane and productive writing life. Here’s one example of an experiment I tried along with other faculty writers: writing every single day for a month.

Scholarly Writing Hacks: 5 Lessons I Learned Writing Every Day in June. Chronicle of Higher Education/ Profhacker.

“On May 31st panic set in. I had agreed to commit to writing every day in the month of June as part of a faculty writing group experiment. Inspired both by National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), recent conversations about mini-monographs, and a visionary classics colleague who cooked up this idea, seven of us agreed to set a big scholarly writing project goal for the month (such as writing 30,000 words) and write every day to reach it.

We agreed to post our daily word count and to report our progress (and musings) on a private WordPress site: “(Wee) Little Monograph in a Month.” Despite my enthusiasm for the challenge, I feared I’d fail: Could I keep my writing momentum going for a full 30 days? Could I really write just a little every day and get a rough, raggedy draft by the end of the month? Here’s what I learned from trying . . .” [Read More]