This week I'll be teaching in our weeklong, intensive graduate creative writing workshops for the MA in Writing Popular Fiction program at Seton Hill U. It's always a great experience, and I particularly enjoy getting to teach and work with students and colleagues in my favorite literary genre: horror. Indeed, I'm rather fortunate to be able to do this, since the majority of creative writing programs in this country not only eschew genre labels, but also would likely eschew horror even if they didn't. Genre, most assume, is too formulaic, too emotional, too popular (and therefore too oriented to the lowest common denominator).

Obviously, such hierarchical distinctions are usually an expression of "highbrow" class politics, or a culture which reifies the individual over the collective in the creative arts -- but I won't repeat the lessons of cultural studies here right now. Instead, I've been thinking a lot lately about how genre fiction -- and particularly horror fiction, as I recently argued in a pedagogical essay on "Horror and Responsibilities of the Liberal Educator" -- may actually be more "educational" than many literary academics realize.

Often "literary" fiction and canonical literature is considered of higher educational value because it has historical lessons to teach us about culture, or because it addresses universal issues pertinent to mankind. But this is no less true of genre fiction (and many genre stories are in the canon, actually). Genre fiction is castigated because it focuses more often on emotional payoffs than intellectual ones, but this is not all that genre fiction seeks. Horror stories, for instance, are often "cautionary" in nature, and therefore teach lessons. Readers of romances and children's fiction often turn to these books for models of behavior in human relationships. Science fiction rewards knowledge of the sciences and often teaches readers about emergent research; mystery, likewise, teaches readers about criminalistics and is predicated on the notion that reader and detective alike will be engage fully in critical thinking as crimes are solved.

Thus, I'm mulling over the notion that the writers who create these stories have to be "teacherly" in their approach to the reader, to some degree. I've often heard the notion that the bestsellers of any given period not only catch the interest of the masses, but often teach readers something new -- this draw to discover and learn is a large part of popular genre fiction. It assuages curiosity about "what everyone is talking about." Yet at the same time, writers who seek to educate (usually) cannot be didactic or preachy or dogmatic about some ideological belief. As with "literary" fiction, good authors of popular fiction should raise issues of import (and often they pull these issues from the headlines, which ties them to time at the cost of being 'timeless') while keeping their own biases out of the story and lead readers to think critically about these issues on their own. The characters in a story often are models for such ways of thinking.

For the writers, however, their models are often each other. They read each others' books, or find each other at conventions, or -- for the dedicated -- encounter each other in workshops like the program we host at SHU, or the less-academic-but-more-deeply-focused-on-genre groups like Odyssey, Clarion, Borderlands Boot Camp, Alpha, and the various workshops held in meeting rooms at genre conventions. I've taught at these, and they are not nearly as "amateur" or "commercial" as one might assume. Fan and genre communities are perhaps more critical and knowledgeable about their own genre than anyone else, as the work of Henry Jenkins and others have taught us.

I have the good fortune to appear in a new instructional book for writers in the horror genre, The Writer's Workshop of Horror (ed. Michael Knost, Woodland Press, Aug 2009). Like the Horror Writer's Association guidebook, On Writing Horror, this is an example of how the creative community of genre authors "teaches" within that community. What I like about these books is that they are not just written by a single author, but a gathering together of multiple views and voices in anthology form.

For those reading this who might have the opportunity to teach horror writing, and are looking for resources, you can order The Writer's Workshop of Horror early from Woodland Press; it will be out in August, just in time for school.

I'll end with a small excerpt from my contribution, called "Stripping Away the Mask: Scene and Structure in Horror Fiction," which deals with issues regarding the pleasures of the taboo in horror, and how these are embedded into the structure (not necessarily the content) of horror narratives:

...horror is a striptease of suspense. It is an inherently exhibitionist genre, as much as it is the genre of fear. And this may very well be why horror gets a bum rap from the literati: horror can make a reader feel dirty, because it refuses to obey the inner censor that tells us that such-and-such is morally wrong, that such-and-such is ugly or grotesque, that such-and-such is perverse or unhealthy, that such-and-such is unreasonable or irrational, that such-and-such is dangerous or inhumane. Horror writers seek truth in the darkness. They remove the mask, to peer unabashedly at what it hides, horrendous warts and all....

If you wish to write horror stories, it is imperative that you understand this aesthetic. There are no "rules," really, because readers only expect the unexpected when they pick up a work of horror. In place of rules, we just have a worldview that says: "Readers peek between their fingers. I refuse to look away." We remove the mask.

I got the idea for this essay from the late author Robert Bloch, who defined horror in passing during an interview once as "the removal of masks."

Is this not also the mission of liberal education?

He joins a list of other interesting academic weblogs in honor of late blogger John Lovas worth following:

2008: Alex Reid: "Digital Digs"

2007: Elizabeth Losh: "VirtualPolitik"

2006: Clancy Ratliff: "CultureCat: Rhetoric and Feminism"

2005: Collin Brooke: "Collin vs. Blog"

2004: Jenny Edbauer: "Stupid Undergrounds: I Found It on the Street"

....Luckily, the teacher fully knows what the students want to ignore: that horror is inherently an educational genre. The very notion of a ‘cautionary’ tale is predicated on the notion of teaching someone a lesson. And while not all horror stories and films are cautionary in nature, they are always stimuli that aim at generating a dark emotional reaction which - when all the screaming stops - one inevitably attempts to manage with enlightened intellectual reasoning: whether it's in the mode of investigation (‘what's really lurking in the shadows?’) or metaphysical inquiry (‘do alternatives to God exist?’) or logic judgement (‘why did her baby have to die?’). Our rational minds are still at work when we contend with the most irrational of fictions. Indeed, even when a horror narrative - such as the work of Lovecraft - attempts to obliterate logical reasoning and symbolic systems altogether, it needs to construct them first.

What all this means is that, despite the naysayers, horror provides an excellent context for learning. It raises the serious questions that allow critical inquiry to transpire.

Go visit Dissections to read on, or to see other essays on issues related to integrating the horror genre into the classroom by Ford, Auld, Brock-Servais, Schnopp-Wyatt, Wisker, and more!

[That twitter account is for my Jekyll. My Hyde side has a twitter account all its own.]

I also finally updated my bio page here on Pedablogue. Aside from a neat photo (courtesy of Jim Judkis, who did that fantastic photo shoot for the article on me in Pittsburgh Professional magazine), the major change is: I'm being promoted to Full Professor and will be Division Chair of the Humanities this coming August!

Then I myself learn more about this trend via Twitter itself (thanks Matt Cardin). There's a good article in the May 17 2008 issue of New York magazine by Sam Anderson, called "In Defense of Distraction: The Benefits of Distraction and Overstimulation" which I think teachers who share my growing concern about student multitasking, ADD, and lack of focus ought to read.

Are we experiencing a "cognitive plague" -- or are we simply wasting our cognitive surplus? Is "multi-tasking" a myth? Is paying attention "a kind of sexy, visceral activity"? (Sure it is!) Is meditation the solution? These are the kinds of questions raised by the article.

My question is: how can we teach focus and concentration...or at least, teach it better than our curriculum already presumes we do. I think the answer lies somewhere in how well we teach reading -- whether book-length prose or complex arguments or even, perhaps, well-crafted poetry -- and listening. There's a degree to which we already expect students to be able to concentrate well; perhaps this is not an assumption we can rely on any longer in the same old ways.

It is paradoxically difficult to teach concentration and focus because it may take concentration and focus to learn it.

But there may be ways of fomenting the sort of positive distractions that Anderson writes about, which lead to greater awareness. This is why, I think Improv activities and Drama Games in the classroom work so well.

The following search on our campus -- for a published mystery author qualified to teach creative writing -- has been extended, and will continue until filled. Candidates interested in this position should apply immediately, as we will be considering applicants over the summer. Please pass along or post this information as you see fit:

Assistant Professor of English

Application Due: Open Until Filled
Type: Full Time
Tenure-track, starting January 2010.

Seton Hill University seeks published novelist of popular fiction (preferably mystery/suspense), to teach and to mentor novel-length theses in the graduate low-residency Writing Popular Fiction program (half-load), and to teach undergraduate courses in creative writing and first-year composition. Background in journalism, publishing, and/or editing a plus. Teaching experience at graduate level desirable. MFA required (Ph.D preferred). 4/4 course load.

Seton Hill University is a Catholic, liberal arts University, serving undergraduate, adult and graduate students. Seton Hill is located 35 miles east of Pittsburgh. Visit setonhill.edu for more information.

Send a letter, C.V., official transcripts, statement of teaching philosophy, sample publications, and three letters of reference to Michael Arnzen, Ph.D., Seton Hill University, Greensburg, PA 15601. The review process will begin immediately and will continue until the position is filled. Seton Hill is committed to a diverse faculty; women and persons of color are encouraged to apply. AA/EOF.

***
Feel free to e-mail me with questions.

This semester, my "Introduction to Literary Studies" course read Lemire's book as a way for students to start thinking realistically about their future careers. There was a great interest in teaching as a potential profession, which is common among English majors. In fact, it's sort of a "default" for many of them. Even if they don't know what they're getting into, it is still our job to provide them with models they might draw on in the future, when they scramble to understand what it really means to be responsible to both the field and their students' future.

I do always try to model good teaching practice, even when I'm only playing the goofball in the front of the room. But now that the term is almost over, I'm wondering: do I employ my own teaching in a way that not only models what it is that teachers actually do in a classroom, but also how they navigate this "confluence of opposites" that Lemire describes? Do they learn to intellectually and performatively cope with and manage the oppositions? Do they know how to synthesize the oppositions or how to separate them when required? Are they learning instincts as much as acquired skills. Improv as well routine? Poetry as much prose? Application and experiment? Flexibility to learn continually?

This quote above really spoke to me as a poetic truism about the impulses of the profession -- which often moves in opposite directions simultaneously. Even here in this blog, the two primary categories -- theory and praxis -- are at once separate in their purpose and yet brought together in any act of writing. But is such a "bringing together" going on in my classroom when I host a discussion or mark up a paper? How 'dialectical' is my teaching, really? I'll keep musing over it, but for now, I just liked that quotation so much that I wanted to share it... and encourage other English professionals to consider using Lemire's book in their classroom or in their advising. It is quite a practical and thoughtful guide to the various options our major affords.

The results were almost entirely comedic, but some were very impressive given that I did not facilitate the productions at all with any instructional advice, cameras, microphones, or editing software! I believe we are at a point in college culture now where most students are already facile with such things as converting files to YouTube ready format and editing on a Mac, or finding a camera that will function well enough for the purpose.

Here are the videos that they managed to post to YouTube:

• Goblin Shoe Market (inspired by Christina Rosetti's "Goblin Market" and Nosferatu)
• The Goblin Market (A Lesson in Shopping) (inspired by Christina Rosetti's "Goblin Market")
• Alice B. Toklas Cooking Show (inspired by "Murder in the Kitchen" from The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook)
• The Goblin Market Puppet Pals (inspired by Christina Rosetti's "Goblin Market")
• Annabel Lee Puppet Theater (inspired by Poe's "Annabel Lee")
• Nightmare at Tinker Creek (inspired by Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Rosetti's Goblin Market, Stoker's Dracula, Kafka's Hunger Artist, Arnzen's Domestic Fowl, Gresh's Snip My Suckers)

Students could opt out of video and do an audio recording instead. Here are the two that came in:

• Friends of Dracula radio play (inspired by Stoker's Dracula)

• "Unmasking of the Red Death" radio play (inspired by Poe's "Masque of the Red Death")

We're screening and listening to these one-a-day in my class, and the walls have been echoing with laughter.

Pretty impressive work, class!

I never would have had the courage to try such an ambitious assignment if I hadn't once visited a high school class run by Lawrence C. Connolly at Sewickely Prep Academy, who assigned student groups to all adapt a specific passage from Dante's Inferno in their own ways. They screened their videos and I was so impressed by the outcome that I left wanting to try something similar myself some day. The lesson? Trust student bonds outside of the classroom, and leave lots of wiggle room in your guidelines when giving a creativity assignment. When students have free license they usually will not disappoint.

Here's "Goblin Shoe Market" by Jessica Pilewski, Mike Poiarkoff, Theresa Conley, and Dianna Griffin -- notable for its emulation of a silent film:

ABSTRACT: This compilation, an expansion of the earlier "Over Sixty Education Blogs," lists over two-hundred education and science blogs, providing for each blog: the author's name and background; the blog title, focus, and URL; and (where available) the Technorati Authority [TA] and the Blogged Rating [BR]. Appendix A discusses the Academic Discussion List Sphere (ADLsphere) and the Blog Sphere (Blogosphere), indicating the strengths and weaknesses of each. Appendix B considers the ADLsphere and the Blogosphere as harbingers of a collective short-term working memory. Appendix C discusses the International Edubloggers Directory, Technorati, Blogged, ScienceBlogs; other blog directories and lists; and other social networking sites. The REFERENCES contain over 100 general citations to open access, internet usage, the ADLsphere and the Blogosphere.

Visit HakesEdStuff to download the file.

Unlike YouTube proper, which will accept content from any subscriber, from what I gather, educational sites from MIT to the Culinary Institute of America are providing the content in an "open source" way that gives them a "channel" in the collective, allowing them to not only share information but to some degree expose viewers to their identity as a sort of advertisement. When you click the "apply now" link at the bottom of the page, you get an application for institutional membership, with a stipulation that reads:

We request only one channel per institution that encompasses the entire campus, and you must have authority to open a channel on the institution's behalf. If you are a school, department, or educator within the institution, please coordinate with the proper department on campus - typically Public Affairs or Academic Technology.

Thus, while it is still "open source," there is still the brand identity of the academic institution at work which -- ostensibly -- will filter the content on the user side of the equation. This has pros and cons, and one has to wonder how much production value and censorship comes into play. I think this benefits larger, well-funded colleges who have a procedural apparatus in place for providing such content... ergo, the preponderance of lectures on YouTube EDU currently seem to be Ivy League colleges of high reputation (seeking pertinence in the digital age) and trade colleges the likes of which you might see advertised often on television.

Indeed, with the increasing boundary-loss between streaming online video and the television set -- aided by the rise of devices like the AppleTV, Roku Player, and XBox -- it seems sensible for academia to take seriously the potential of investing in video sharing.

Readers at the Open Culture Blog are recommending academicearth.org -- which LifeHacker compares to Hulu -- as a stronger alternative. I can see why, at first blush: it organizes material by subject right from the front page, seeming to be curriculum-centered rather than institution-centered. The videos seem to be high quality, and often offer transcripts and other material that make the vids seem much more "course" like. Moreover, the rating system is organized by instructor so that you can quickly jump to those who browsers feel are the best at delivering the content, rather than just (as in youtube edu) those videos that are given a generic "star" rating on who know's what criterion.

Another issue on YouTube EDU's format is the "comments" feature, which like any good weblog allows users to provide feedback. As I give a glancing look at various videos, I see comments that are littered with obscenities and smart aleck jokes, as if they were notes passed between virtual slackers and class clowns sitting in the back row. AcademicEarth, on the other hand, allows embedding of videos which would encourage users to post comments on their own sites, instead. (Of course YouTube EDU allows embeds as well).

The value of YouTube EDU, of course, would be greater visibility in google search and youtube search results. This, sadly, is the monolithic aim of far too much online content, but this is the way the cookie crumbles in the attention economy. Since most students would probably tend to search google long before they ever stumbled upon AcademicEarth, the site bears serious consideration for academic institutions.

There are uses I'd like to see sites like these put to: more academic debates, more streams of events that feature students as much as star lecturers, more faculty/research profiles or interviews.... perhaps we will see growth in this kind of material soon.

The new survey found that college professors generally want incoming students to have a deeper understanding of a selected number of topics and skills, while high school teachers in all content areas tend to rate a far broader array of content and skills as “important” or “very important.”

In other words, the "array" of content coverage is a sign that HS emphasizes breadth, while college tends to emphasize depth of work in a single content area. I'm not sure if this happens because of the assumptions of high school teachers about what college actually expects, or if it is merely a symptom of a larger neurosis regarding testing (prompted, perhaps, by NCLBA). "Breadth" is easy to test and grade, and errs toward assessing memorized knowledge over analytical and critical thinking, which usually takes essay reading and concentrated analysis in itself to generate a response.

Thus, the report itself shows the outcome:

the survey found a general lack of reading courses in high school and a decline in the teaching of targeted reading strategies after the 9th grade. In contrast, college instructors of remedial courses rated such strategies as very important and reported devoting a large percentage of time to teaching them.

I am not damning all High School in some generic, demonizing way. One of the things colleges have to offer is a shift in this paradigm of thinking. I think breadth is perhaps JUST AS important as depth for that level of learner, and I would simply suggest that some sort of balance should be sought. Whether or not an institution can support that kind of balance, in a frenzy to establish assessable outcomes, is debatable. But until teachers begin supporting reading in every way they can -- which means being active readers of their own student's writing, in addition to simply assigning texts -- the culture will not change.

Have you ever posted a question on your quiz that you thought was important enough to test, but which you knew was likely to be one few students answered correctly? I had that sneaking suspicion myself, when I asked students to define "metonymy" in a multiple choice question. The term was not really covered very well in the book, but I did give a mini-lecture about the word and I thought it was important for them to understand...but when I was composing the quiz my back brain reminded me that I didn't see very many students taking notes at the time I lectured, and I knew it was brand new and difficult term to spell, let alone comprehend, so I suspected few would get it right on the quiz.

But I wasn't really sure. So I gave them a chance. After everyone had turned their quizzes over, I asked them to take a moment to circle the one single answer on they quiz they were least sure of. Then they passed the quiz to a neighbor (who, as in Quiz Taker/Note Maker, had to put their name under the quiz-taker's and would be held accountable for any cheating on their behalf). The neighbor then had to read the circled question and write their own answer to it down. If they felt the student got the question right already, they were told to write something supportive instead, like "way to go!" Then I collected the quizzes.

Once I had them all, I did a quick scan of the pile...and found my suspicions were correct. Most people had circled the "metonymy" question. There was another question often circled that came in "2nd place". I turned these two answers into brief discussions with the class, and since I became fully convinced by that point that "metonymy" hadn't really sunk in the first time we covered it, I announced that everyone would get the points for that answer, whether right or wrong. We discussed the second most-commonly circled answer and I felt that enough people already knew that one that it would not receive instant credit, unless the "corrector" of the quiz got it right. The same held true for the other answers that were circled which we hadn't covered in discussion: if the corrector got it correct, they "saved" the quiz-taker some points.

In the end, this didn't really skew the scale for the class or have any negative impacts. The only students it "hurt" were the ones who got the question they chose to be "saved" right to begin with but missed other questions on the quiz. But that isn't really my fault -- they had their chance.

So why do this, beyond hedging my own risk on quizzing the class on an "iffy" course topic (like "metonymy") that I wasn't confident I had taught well or that they would really know?

For the teacher, it saves time. I usually like to go over a quiz after we take it (often using them to structure a lecture/period), but in this instance drilling down to the top two answers which the majority of the students presume they got wrong helped me to know what answers were most pressing, and dispensed with the others, leaving me enough time to shift to another class matter.

The benefit for students, beyond possibly getting a few bonus points, is essentially two-fold: it fosters bonds between neighbors in the room, and, more importantly, it rewards collaboration. Not only did we get to have an open, collaborative dialogue about the most pressing material right after the quiz, but the "corrector" gets to be the quiz-taker's hero if they happen to save them some points. In this way, the student gets to see the value and significance in knowing answers beyond the scope of their own grades, and comes to understand that what they know might benefit others. They don't get punished for not knowing; they get to reward others for knowing! And many were proud of doing so in my class that day. These benevolent correctors were given a sense of power, in the form of academic philanthropy. I hope to cultivate that sort of "givingness" among those who have knowledge and skills.

One might contend that all I did was sanction an act akin to "cheating off" a fellow student, by turning it into a system for extra credit. I don't see quizzes as instruments of torture and panoptical surveillance. I see them as opportunities to make students accountable, yes, but if they are not integrated into the class period of the day, they feel like tools intended to police rather than instruments of learning.

I love reading tips and tactics like these; one little change can make a whopping difference in not simply productivity but keeping one's sanity!

*** A Public Service Announcement! ***

FACULTY WANTED TO TEACH WRITING OF POPULAR FICTION

Assistant Professor of English
Location: Greensburg, PA
Category: Faculty - Liberal Arts - English and Literature
Posted: 11/10/2008
Application Due: Open Until Filled
Type: Full Time

Seton Hill University seeks published novelist of popular fiction (preferably mystery/suspense), to teach and to mentor novel-length theses in the graduate low-residency Writing Popular Fiction program (half-load), and to teach undergraduate courses in creative writing and first-year composition.

Candidates should hold a Ph.D. in English, MFA considered. Background in journalism, publishing, and/or editing a plus. Teaching experience/potential at undergraduate level desirable.

Send a letter of application, curriculum vitae, official transcripts, a statement of philosophy of teaching, a writing sample, a teaching portfolio, and three letters of reference. The review process will begin February 15, 2009 and will continue until the position is filled.

Seton Hill University is a Catholic, liberal arts University, educating traditional and non-traditional undergraduate and graduate students. Classes are offered in a variety of formats - day, evening, and weekends. Seton Hill has a student-centered campus culture based on Catholic values, acceptance, community and service. The campus is located 35 miles east of Pittsburgh.

Postal Address: Dr. John Spurlock, Chair
Humanities Division
Seton Hill University
Seton Hill Drive
PO Box 507F
Greensburg, PA 15601
Email Address: spurlock@setonhill.edu
http://fiction.setonhill.edu
http://www.setonhill.edu

***
[NOTICE: The deadline for applications has ended and we have begun vetting a parcel of strong contenders. Should a viable candidate not be chosen, I will repost.]

I was thoroughly impressed by what the students came up with for this homework assignment. Many of the students went far beyond my expectations, and I asked a few if I could share their work here.

I liked Melissa Kaufold's collage entitled "How Do You See Me?" (above), because it interestingly represented the identity of an English student, with competing voices (mostly negative) surrounding the figure -- who herself is a multifaceted construct (the four-fold face) ostensibly holding an armload of books that obscure the rest of her body. A very colorful thought balloon reveals the value in her thoughts about literature, impervious to the onslaught of negativity espoused in the "external" world; the strength of these thoughts is reinforced by the thick black boundaries lines that protect these "thoughts" from interference and keep them relatively cohesive.

The collages of the class as a whole seemed to inherently lean toward conflicts like these. In her collage, "Transcendence" (below), Julia Leksell took an artful approach to semiotics, employing negative/white space in an intriguing way that differed from many of the other collages the students created. Here, she took control over the bricolage of symbols to add her own imagery to the piece, where she portrays a dove-like ascent or emergence from what seems like a pile of abandoned and contradictory signs and symbols:

The diagonal lines in Leksell's postmodernist piece make me imagine that the pictured bird is hefting a weighty net of language, struggling but succeeding to rise. I like the positive message here.

Attempts like these to come to some cogent "perspective" on literary studies opened up the floodgates of discussion in class, and allowed everyone -- whether creative writer, journalist, or literary scholar-in-training, to participate on a fairly equal plane.

I followed up the assignment by having students swap collages and write up analyses of them. We discussed this process as one inherent to both artistic production (crafting sense out of found language and fragments) and criticism (analyzing the whole by breaking down the structure into its parts). This two-pronged approach to the assignment created a dialogue between creativity and criticism in a really successful way, I think. It both raised the question, "What is literature?" and unveiled that it is, if anything, a conversation that meaning-making demands.

[POSTSCRIPT: After posting this entry, Dr. Davis from Teaching College English asked if I'd share the guidelines. They're relatively specific to the context of my class syllabus, but I'll gladly share it here, if it helps in any way: