{"id":213,"date":"2023-08-22T05:38:13","date_gmt":"2023-08-22T09:38:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/?post_type=chapter&p=213"},"modified":"2023-08-22T05:38:14","modified_gmt":"2023-08-22T09:38:14","slug":"conduct-in-the-creative-writing-classroom","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/chapter\/conduct-in-the-creative-writing-classroom\/","title":{"raw":"Conduct in the (Creative Writing) Classroom","rendered":"Conduct in the (Creative Writing) Classroom"},"content":{"raw":"What I\u2019ve been trying to underscore is that being ethical as creative writers is vital to our practice and that, for us, academic integrity involves more than citing our sources. The work that we produce must demonstrate sensitivity and respect toward our audiences. This is not only true of writing that we wind up publishing but also of works-in-progress that we share in classroom settings. Exercising sensitivity and respect toward our peers\u2019 writing is equally important.\r\n\r\nEvery post-secondary course is structured around particular modes of learning (lecture, lecture\/discussion, group work, lab work) and each classroom is a community governed by explicit and implicit rules of conduct. In all courses, regardless of discipline, \u201ccommunity members\u201d (i.e. the instructor and students) are expected to be respectful of others\u2019 ideas and opinions, not to mention their gender, social class, religious views, \u201crace,\u201d ethnicity, and sexual orientation. Creative writing courses, however, are unique in that they are largely workshop-driven and, therefore, what is intensely personal (i.e. my writing) becomes somewhat public (in the sense that my classmates read and comment on it). In some other disciplines, students are asked to \u201cpeer review\u201d each other\u2019s writing but in creative disciplines the work produced, and subject to public scrutiny by peers, tends to be intensely personal. Students can experience equally intense vulnerability in workshop settings.\r\n\r\nIt is imperative, then, that, in addition to being cautious about such matters as intertextuality, appropriation, and truth claims in our own<\/em> work, we must be mindful of how we enter into conversations about our peers\u2019 work, which isn\u2019t as easy as a person might think. Simply heaping praise on a classmate\u2019s writing can be less-than-productive, particularly when the praise is disingenuous. Effective workshopping demands that participants provide comments which are supportive but also geared toward improvement. (Are crucial details missing? Do some confusing moments require clarification? Can some words, or line breaks, or images, or motifs be finessed? Is the plot believable, the characters plausible, the dialogue authentic, the context accurate?) Neither ambiguous admiration nor acerbic articulations of concerns \u201cwork\u201d in the workshop environment. We all take substantial risks when we share our writing. Following a version of the \u201cgolden rule\u201d is essential: \u201cSpeak about others\u2019 work as you would have them speak about yours.\u201d","rendered":"

What I\u2019ve been trying to underscore is that being ethical as creative writers is vital to our practice and that, for us, academic integrity involves more than citing our sources. The work that we produce must demonstrate sensitivity and respect toward our audiences. This is not only true of writing that we wind up publishing but also of works-in-progress that we share in classroom settings. Exercising sensitivity and respect toward our peers\u2019 writing is equally important.<\/p>\n

Every post-secondary course is structured around particular modes of learning (lecture, lecture\/discussion, group work, lab work) and each classroom is a community governed by explicit and implicit rules of conduct. In all courses, regardless of discipline, \u201ccommunity members\u201d (i.e. the instructor and students) are expected to be respectful of others\u2019 ideas and opinions, not to mention their gender, social class, religious views, \u201crace,\u201d ethnicity, and sexual orientation. Creative writing courses, however, are unique in that they are largely workshop-driven and, therefore, what is intensely personal (i.e. my writing) becomes somewhat public (in the sense that my classmates read and comment on it). In some other disciplines, students are asked to \u201cpeer review\u201d each other\u2019s writing but in creative disciplines the work produced, and subject to public scrutiny by peers, tends to be intensely personal. Students can experience equally intense vulnerability in workshop settings.<\/p>\n

It is imperative, then, that, in addition to being cautious about such matters as intertextuality, appropriation, and truth claims in our own<\/em> work, we must be mindful of how we enter into conversations about our peers\u2019 work, which isn\u2019t as easy as a person might think. Simply heaping praise on a classmate\u2019s writing can be less-than-productive, particularly when the praise is disingenuous. Effective workshopping demands that participants provide comments which are supportive but also geared toward improvement. (Are crucial details missing? Do some confusing moments require clarification? Can some words, or line breaks, or images, or motifs be finessed? Is the plot believable, the characters plausible, the dialogue authentic, the context accurate?) Neither ambiguous admiration nor acerbic articulations of concerns \u201cwork\u201d in the workshop environment. We all take substantial risks when we share our writing. Following a version of the \u201cgolden rule\u201d is essential: \u201cSpeak about others\u2019 work as you would have them speak about yours.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1782,"menu_order":3,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-213","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":200,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1782"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":214,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/213\/revisions\/214"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/200"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/213\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=213"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=213"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/ubcacademicintegrity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}