I am feeling very stuck. A lot has happened in the world and in my personal life over the last week. Each week feels like more heavy things to deal with. Many of us are still dealing with the repercussions of the pandemic as well as new and different experiences for our work and educational spaces, supporting our families and friends, and/or reeling from traumatic government-level decisions - from war in Ukraine to the dismantling of bodily autonomy, human rights, and voting rights.
While working on researching for my next essay, I am feeling distracted and scatterbrained more than usual. In my writing accountability group, I was challenged to use this space and try to write about this example of writer's block and mental capacity. Unsurprisingly, this felt like the right move, to take some space here to consider my writing processes and at the same time work through my feelings.
I'm struggling to start each paragraph, not because I have nothing more to say, but because I have too many things and can't get them all out at once. Most of the writing I do outside of this space is fairly rigorous and academic. I take a lot of time with planning, researching, editing, and rewriting. On the other hand, this blog space is often closer to a brain dump and I enjoy both ways that I approach writing.
I'm involved with two book discussion groups right now on campus. In one, we're reading Linguistic Justice by Dr. April Baker-Bell. The other group is reading The Trees by Percival Everett. Each discussion is organized and mostly comprised of a slightly different group of people, Linguistic Justice is predominantly faculty and we're considering how we can teach better and differently and staff council organized the reading of The Trees. The Trees is confrontational, challenging, and a bit spooky. It takes place in modern America and deals with race, class, and history through the telling of a complex (and possibly supernatural) murder mystery. In each discussion, I've needed to attempt to limit the references I'm making about the other book, only because while there is some overlap, each discussion has slightly different attendees. I'm getting so much fulfillment about these conversations because it's giving me space to process the synthesis and connections I'm making between books, teaching, work, life, and more.
I've never considered myself a writer, I often mention that it's like pulling teeth for me. Except in journaling situations like this. I'm a reader, through and through. In my academic writing, I'm happy to gather information, read, annotate, and begin the necessary synthesis, but when it comes to writing, I balk. I wonder if a part of that is feeling too restricted. The voice of academic writing is comfortable and familiar for me to read (generally), but it's not how I write. When I write, I want feelings and emotions, action, and personality. Of course, as I'm wrapping this up, I want to pull some of these feelings together to tie them to BOTH of the books referenced above. In Linguistic Justice and The Trees, there is overt and subtle commentary on the supposed neutrality of academic writing. In Linguistic Justice, this is about policing language as an aspect of racism. In The Trees, it's similar, but also adds a layer of Black folks struggling for recognition and validation. My immediate reaction to these ideas was to consider how patriarchy exerts itself as the language of logic - women (women's language, feminized language, and the other) all write with emotion. In my efforts to pull down hierarchy, this dichotomy of logic over emotion is a personal battle to me.
My writing peers also pointed out some of the differences in style, tone, and subject matter for the writing projects I described to them. I'm hoping to be able to use the play of emotion, opinion, anecdotes and research and data to best make my thoughts clear. In a place with fewer hierarchies, we wouldn't need to choose between logic and emotion. We could use both together to express our ideas without needing to hold back. I am looking forward to leaning into these challenges.
