x-posted to 8040

So much of what Boler says in Feeling Power speaks to me that I am having trouble responding. So, as a blogger is wont to do, I decided to see what other people are saying. I googled Boler and affect and found this lovely collection of essays on philosophy and pedagogy, which if you scan the collection over the years, also includes essays on emotions, feelings, and affect.

Then, still not sure what to write, I scanned my bookshelves and came across two books by Patricia T. O’Connor: Woe is I and Words Fail Me and it occurs to me that both of these books teach grammar and writing from an affective perspective. Also worth mentioning is, The Pen Commandments, a delightfully humorous take on writing, written by a high school English teacher, Steven Frank. Glancing at these titles, makes me realize (again) that these people have tried to make learning to write more fun and less stressful by taking the emotions of the writer into account when they authored these texts.

Ok, I open Boler again and I land at the bottom of page 4 where Boler says, “An interdisciplinary approach to emotions and education serves a particular purpose. It helps to illuminate how emotions are visibly and invisibly addressed within education, and how emotions reflect particular historical, cultural, and social arrangements…(she) is interested in how different views of emotion and education reflect distinct social and political agendas…” (4). When I read “interdisciplinary approach” it made me think of writing across the curriculum programs and networked writing. Writing across the curriculum courses are at once inter- and intra-disciplinary. At Mizzou, many different disciplines offer writing-intensive courses and within any particular discipline, especially English or Education, you will find many writing-intensive courses. But, it strikes me that the connection points between all writing-intensive courses is not “illuminated” between or among teachers and students. What if it was? Would it change the educational culture? What if a University gave every student a blog and the entire education experience became more “illuminated” and writing-intensive? Would this be a way to create a more affective and effective educational experience by making writing and learning public? Or, would it have the opposite effect?

Sharing writing can be stressful for many of us. But, what if we broke through that barrier time and time again? Sharing our writing, I think, gets less stressful over time, but I think in the classroom, it means creating an atmosphere of trust and mutual respect–so it’s a safe space. Oh, this reminds me of something Carolyn Heilbrun wrote in Writing a Woman’s Life:

What matters is that lives do not serve as models; only stories do that. And it is a hard thing to make up stories to live by. We can only retell and live by the stories we have read or heard. We live our lives through texts. They may be read, or chanted, or experienced electronically, or come to us, like the murmurings of our mothers, telling us what conventions demand. Whatever their form or medium, these stories have formed us all; they are what we must use to make new fictions, new narratives (37).

I think combining these ideas I realize that making writing and learning more public can be less safe because our education happens in pubic. However, by making it public we reveal more of ourselves–we make ourselves more vulnerable–and we realize that everyone has similar issues and emotions to deal with. For example, Keri posted about how she realized in her reading of Boler that she realized it’s not just her who feels the need to occasionally apologize for her work. (Keri–girlfriend, you’re not alone (speaking from personal experience–just check the comments on this post.)) If we, students and professors, realize and make public that we all have some doubts at times, would we generate a more compassionate, affectious, educational experience? And, I realize that some stress is good, but where is the line?
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