EXPERIENCE AS LEVERAGE: CRITICAL MEMOIR IN FIRST-YEAR COMPOSITION by Cheryl Lynn Catlin A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS IN ENGLISH WEBER STATE UNIVERSITY Ogden, Utah April 15, 2020 Approved Sarah Vause, Professor of English John Sch Catlin 1 Experience as Leverage: Critical Memoir in First-Year Composition FOREWORD John Keats in “Ode on a Grecian Urn” contrasts the beautiful scenes found on the urn with actual human conditions which the artist might have portrayed. Keats charges the reader to look plainly at the truths of hardships in the world and see lessons to be found therein. He describes our world as the “vale of Soul-making,” the very place we must have to “possess a bliss peculiar to each one’s individual existence” (Keats, Letters 255 and 256); then he asks us to use knowledge of our experiences to become who we want to be. As a youth I watched my close friend abused until he suffered a heart attack and died. His health may have been failing and he might have died anyway; what happened to me as a result of watching his abuse and resultant death, however, caused me to suffer many years. That experience immediately blocked from my memory, I began to wonder why others around me smiled and laughed, and I couldn’t. The stories and experiences of others told me how I should feel and react. These became damaging narratives that told me I was different and didn’t belong. Those narratives destroyed my self-perception, and my discomfort silenced me. Further experiences confused my already fragile state: While still young and home alone, a fatal motorcycle accident occurred in front of my house; my younger sister ran away often and stayed away for long periods of time; my family car was hit by a drunk driver and our car rolled down a steep embankment; then my parents divorced and my father took my two-year-old brother to the east coast to live far from my mom and me. My experiences felt like trains running over me. Years later writing restored memory of my friend’s abuse and my trauma. Continual reading, writing, and reflecting about this event helped me see my friend’s abuse from a critical perspective: “More than questioning whether the story is true are the questions about how the story functions and how it could be actively re-interpreted and revised Catlin 2 to represent a newly constructed, more ethical truth” (Mack 59). I understood the little girl who lost herself the day she watched her friend’s abuse, seeing for the first time that the incident itself caused my years of confusion. I saw more clearly other experiences and their effects upon me. I continued to write from this critical memoir approach while my experiences gradually changed from hurt to growth. In her article, “Critical Memoir and Identity Formation: Being, Belonging, Becoming,” Nancy Mack describes memoir as “who it happened to and how that experience represents an important theme in that person’s life” (Mack 58). Understanding and accepting the person it happened to, and seeing what happened as not only damage, but also the long-term results brings identifiable growth. My recognized gifts help me to see value within myself which I didn’t see before. I needed this deeper perspective to discover myself within my hardships, and eventually see the theme within my life. Because I struggled so many years to understand my confusion, my “school” of experiences brought increased vision to recognize symptoms of struggle in others. I know how difficult it can be for others to rise above and confront what happens to them. I use my gifts now to see more in others who may feel marginalized and can’t see the good within themselves. My concern for others brings power and authority to my motives, intention, and my writing. In his 1817 letter to Benjamin Robert Haydon, John Keats wrote, “I must think that difficulties nerve the Spirit of a Man – they make our Prime Objects a Refuge as well as a Passion.” Keats’ short life filled with hardships he may have wished not to have impassioned him to become the writer he was. My experiences help me now to see value in looking deeper; I recognize that today’s students who come to the university armed with their own battle scars may also benefit from seeing more in their experiences in order that they may eventually become the best of themselves. Catlin 3 INTRODUCTION When I first learned to teach, I earnestly sought for the pedagogy with which I could identify. Seeing myself within Critical Expressivism as well as my experience teaching instilled my passion for helping my first-year composition students find voice and authority in their writing. My experiences taught me where voice and authority are found. My students’ journals told that there was much more to these students than I realized. I researched to understand how I could make a difference with each student in my classes. In her article, “Depression among Gen Z is Skyrocketing — A Troubling Mental-Health Trend that Could Affect the Rest of Their Lives,” Hilary Brueck investigated the suicide death of twenty-three-old Kelly Catlin and found a disturbing trend of depression among today’s young adults (1). This generation, which is sometimes labeled as lazy and entitled, is the very generation plagued with depression. Studies show that these Millennials and Generation-Z students want to excel but struggle with “distraction and disaffection” (Cardon 35). The journals of many of my students confirm extreme hardships which might cause this epidemic: Female Student: “I deal with it [mental health] every day.” Male Student: “When I was fifteen years old, my mother passed away in my own arms.” Female Student: “I was diagnosed with depression at the age of sixteen and it caused a lot of hardships for me. I was struggling with wanting to live.” Female Student: “I found out some really dark family secrets that spun my life out of control and it shook the core of my identity for a long time. I lost a lot of trust within people and myself. It was a scary, dark time for me. Knowing that the reason I’ve been told my mom left had been a lie for almost ten years, was terrifying. Especially knowing she consciously left me with someone she knew was mentally and physically abusive.” Catlin 4 Female Student: “I had to masquerade for years to avoid suspicion and terror if anyone found out I was being abused. I know what it feels like to seem perfect on the outside but inside, you’re struggling.” Female Student: “I have battled depression for as long as I can remember but I never had a name for it until a couple of years ago. I thought that this is how everyone felt; sad all the time with no motivation to do anything worthwhile. I was a ghost growing up. I pushed people away and hid inside a shell. I pretended to find sports fun and jokes funny because I thought that was what everyone did.” Female Student: “I have a baby girl because I was raped by a man that didn’t know how to control himself or listen to the word ‘no.’” Female Student: “When l was nine years of age [in Ghana] with four siblings, we lost both of our parent[s]. … We thought all hope was lost. It was hard for my siblings and I to have something to eat because we had nobody to support us. … I started engaging myself into relationship[s] with guys to get money to feed myself.” One A-student defensively challenged every assignment and concept within my class until we spoke privately about her actions. I asked if she feared that I would fail her, to which she responded that she recently escaped from her abusive ex-husband. As a single mother, she feared further mistreatment which might prevent her being able to care for her children. Other students struggled with suicide of loved ones, fearing others they loved would follow. Some have parents addicted to opioids. Others from poverty-stricken families may be first-generation students and many must work full-time to pay their own way through school, with demands of work affecting their time in class. Catlin 5 I read these journals and many like them and reflected on my own experiences, realizing my unexpected connection to each one. Because I once felt as many do, I saw more in their faces and read more in their journals. If students can use critical memoir as I did to see into their experiences in the ways that Nancy Mack describes, they may increase identity awareness and see gifts given them because of their experiences. Realizing agency to see more brings power – power to see their privileged knowledge within their experiences, authority to speak from that privileged place, and voice and authority in writing. I saw the value of experience not for the breaking that it does but for its building. My experiences broke me, and for many years I couldn’t see a way through. Eventually, however, my experiences constructed a person whose sensitivity to violence and conflict which might be perceived as a weakness, helps me see suffering others might not see. I can show my students that experience can be leverage instead of weight because I have been there. My literature classes brought further vision to see struggling in authors and their characters. Through their examples of writing, I reflected on my own hardships, and learned to write in new ways about my experiences. Literature taught me how to write what I personally knew that others didn’t know – my privileged knowledge about what happened to me. Each time I found an author or character I related to, I learned better to write what I couldn’t say without it. In some I saw metaphors for my journey and the journeys my students face. One such novel, Frankenstein, became the impetus to incorporate what I experienced and learned into my own writing classrooms. Through the lens of Mary Shelley’s creature in Frankenstein, I will define students’ roles within their individual journeys. Classic literature has the powerful ability to encourage students to connect and reflect. The practice of writing critical memoir guided by specific prompts can bring opportunity to reflect on students’ individual Catlin 6 identities. Writing and workshopping will bring opportunities for new insight and real-world application. Additionally, teaching students to value the research process brings other voices and perspectives empowering students to facilitate their own personal growth. Even though many students feel they have no power in their lives, each has agency to look critically into his own experiences. Giving students tools to see the “schooling” within their individual lives will help them realize growth and potential in their privileged position. These same tools will help students make informed choices as they continue forward within the university. Though student success clearly proves valuable for the university, it is the individual student who can benefit most. It may be tempting to try to convince students that every circumstance can be overcome, every wound healed, or that every problem will disappear as they seek education, but this would be to close our eyes to truth. However, if those who teach first-year composition, the one class which reaches more students than any other in the university, don’t accept that students entering college today come armed with their own distinct experiences, we may miss the ideal opportunity to aid in opening the eyes of and restoring voices to emerging adults. SURVIVORS’ VOICES The Bildungsroman narrative presented largely in the nineteenth century allows the author to reveal his own history through his protagonist in an attempt to understand how these experiences “formed them [him] as social subjects” (Smith and Watson 10). Mary Shelley attempted to understand her chaotic childhood through the use of this narrative form when she authored Frankenstein, three characters portraying the dichotomous effects of parenting. Victor’s parents provided idyllic childhoods for Victor and Elizabeth. As Victor’s determination to animate life grew, his ability to understand how to love his own creation withered. Victor is the Catlin 7 classic example of “even if we can, should we?” Victor chose to ignore the example of his parents and abandon his own creation, even denying his creature’s basic needs. This creature reflects Mary’s childhood, her father “engrossed in himself and unable to express deep affection for his anxious insecure daughter” (Carter 1196). Mary called her protagonist “monster.” Kenneth Burke discusses “identification” in “A Rhetoric of Motives,” stating that a rhetorical motive is often present where it is not usually recognized or thought to belong. By identifying her protagonist as “monster,” Shelley suggests finished. Burke states that depicting “a thing’s end may be a dramatic way of identifying its essence,” or all it can become (Burke 17). In other words, by using the term monster, Shelley suggests that her protagonist cannot become – he is finished as is. In Feminists Theorize the Political Joan Scott tells that “[i]t is not individuals who have experience, … but subjects who are constituted through experience” (Scott 27). As abnormal hardships form individuals, they may envision themselves as abnormally formed and not belonging; these individuals may feel as monsters, finished as is. For the purposes of my thesis, I will use “creature.” Identifying a similar name with different connotation suggests identification “with a new motivating principle” (Burke 11). As individuals surviving extreme hardships which abnormally formed them, identifying themselves instead as “creations” implies a “made or fashioned thing but with the sense of continued or potential process” (Lupton 1). My use of “creature” allows for my individuals, more particularly my students, to relate to the creature in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. This creature’s story then becomes everyone’s story; even as students look critically at their own story, they may identify with the creature. Thus, the use of Frankenstein, as literature within the classroom is “for its rhetorical effect upon an audience” – “literature for use” (Burke 17 and 5). Catlin 8 The creature found himself alone and set out to find food but found instead social disgust and beatings by villagers which pushed him to seek safety as an animal in a “kennel” (Shelley 71 and 74). His early lessons of unadulterated hate and fear brought confusion when, through a small crevice in his hovel, he saw kindness displayed by the cottagers. Witnessing the cottagers’ sadness and seeing no cause for their unhappiness, the creature was affected. He learned that he contributed to their sadness when he discovered their hunger as they placed food for their father without reserving for themselves. The creature voiced the change in his nature because “this trait of kindness moved me sensibly” (Shelley 78). The conflicted creature couldn’t make sense of his feelings but chose to abstain from taking further from their storage, instead satisfying himself with fruit, nuts, and roots. Endeared to the cottagers, he also sacrificed to bring firewood to relieve their suffering. He expressed that “… when they were unhappy, I felt depressed, when they rejoiced, I sympathized in their joys” (Shelley 79). After reading his wife’s story, Percy Shelley called the creature “an abortion and an anomaly,” but affirms that “his mind was such as its first impressions framed it, affectionate and full of moral sensibility” (Percy Shelley 311-12). Confused by his contrasting experiences, yet deeply touched and endeared by kindness, the creature’s innate goodness surfaced as he longed to know the cottagers. When the creature saw his hideous physical form in the pool of water, however, he knew he must master their language before approaching them. He hoped that if he could speak in kindness, he might be able to win the Delacy’s compassion and friendship. He learned their language by day and aided his cottagers by night through the winter, delaying his entrance into the cottage until the moment when he felt he could approach safely. However, the cottagers rejected him and he again retreated to his hovel “in a state of utter and stupid despair” (Shelley Catlin 9 99). For his kindness, the creature received abuse; his shattered world transforming his unrecognized sacrifices into emptiness. Controlled by inaccurate cultural beliefs that outside ugliness runs deep, the creature’s narrative labeled and trapped him into believing that he held no value or choices. In his fragmented existence the creature felt only rage and revenge: “CURSED, CURSED, creator! Why did I live? Why, in that instant, did I not extinguish the spark of existence which you had so wantonly bestowed?” (Shelley 97). Reflecting on the outcome of his first attempt, however, the creature felt he may have been hasty. His decision to return to the cottagers, however, found them in the midst of departing, their rigid boundaries of belonging breaking the “only link that held me to the world,” (Shelley 99). His feelings of revenge turned his thoughts toward malevolence; however, even in his state of rage, he was “unable to injure anything human, I turned my fury towards inanimate objects” (Shelley 99). Not knowing where to go and what to do, the creature wondered “now, with the world before me, whither should I bend my steps?” (Shelley 99). He recognized that he might only find compassion through his creator and set off to plead his case. Though his travels were long with intense sufferings, the creature found himself cheered by sunshine with emotions of “gentleness and pleasure, that had long appeared dead. … Soft tears again bedewed my cheeks, and I even raised my humid eyes with thankfulness towards the blessed sun, which bestowed such joy upon me” (Shelley 100-101). When a young girl ran his direction and her foot slipped so that she fell into a stream, the creature reminds his readers of his goodness as he runs from where he hid, and “with extreme labour from the force of the current, saved her, and dragged her to shore.” He endeavored to bring the girl to life when suddenly he Catlin 10 was approached by a “rustic,” who on seeing the creature, tore the girl from his arms, aimed his gun, and fired (Shelley 101). For his kindness again, the creature received abuse reaffirming that his monster exterior was his finished self: “This was then the reward of my benevolence! … The feelings of kindness and gentleness, which I had entertained but a few moments before, gave place to hellish rage and gnashing of teeth. Inflamed by pain, I vowed eternal hatred and vengeance to all mankind” (Shelley 101). The creature once again fell victim, labeled and trapped, with no apparent choice but revenge. When the consequences of all the creature endured culminated, his goodness was turned into “misanthropy and revenge” (Percy Shelley 435). His arrival in Geneva brought occasion for such revenge, but even with this opportunity, his desperation to remain benevolent sought to teach an innocent child to be his “companion and friend” (Shelley 102). However, when the creature seized him, the child screamed calling him “monster! ugly wretch!” (Shelley 102); – this last beating by humanity sealed the creature’s fate. He would kill the boy, this relative of his enemy and have his vengeance, resigning himself to the inaccurate narratives which society placed upon him: “I gazed on my victim, and my heart swelled with exultation and hellish triumph; clapping my hands, I exclaimed, ‘I too can create desolation; my enemy is not invulnerable this death will carry despair to him, and a thousand other miseries shall torment and destroy him’” (Shelley 102). In his desperate narrative to Victor of his transformation from benevolent being to monster, the creature said, “I am malicious because I am miserable,” thus admitting his desire to live a virtuous life if only there were another way. The monster proclaimed, “If any being felt emotions of benevolence towards me, I should return them an hundred and an hundredfold; for Catlin 11 that one creature’s sake, I would make peace with the whole kind! But I now indulge in dreams of bliss that cannot be realized” (Shelley 104-105). As a severe victim of the evil in mankind, and even after killing a human in vengeance, the creature pled for the chance to step from narratives which controlled him, to act with benevolence toward that humanity which hurt him; a chance which he felt belonged to Victor. He reasoned that the creation of a female companion would allow him to leave humanity forever. However, his marginalized voice was again silenced when Victor denied his request. This denial led the creature to mistakenly suppose that he had no choice but to accept his ill-fate. After relaying his story to Walton, he still did not see clearly until the moment after Victor’s death the results of his choices. Seeing his essence as Victor’s created monster instead of a being “perpetually becoming created” he cried to Walton, “Evil thenceforth became my good” (164). Even then as he relayed his miserable life in detail, he missed the most important message of which earlier understanding would have changed his life – summing up his thoughts in these words: “but I was the slave, not the master” (Shelley 164). The creature used words gained through much education to see more in his story and portray it as memoir. Though the creature’s vision was inaccurate with regards to his ability to see his own agency, he saw clearly what happened to him as a result of his mistreatment, knowing all the while his desire to be benevolent. The results of his mistreatment brought false beliefs that his essence was “monster.” Had he identified himself as creature – perpetually being created, the result would be empowerment to transform. AGENCY TO BECOME MASTER Regrettably, within the creature’s destructive experiences which many today also suffer is “a process … by which subjectivity is constructed” (Scott 27). The creature believed his Catlin 12 monstrous label, saw himself a slave to it, and saw no agency to change his condition. His agency, however, was not taken from him, he gave it away through his own misperception. Instead of owning his experiences, he blamed those around him and swore vengeance on all humans as a result. The unfortunate incidences of the creature’s life are a metaphor for those in society whose experiences, instead of constructing an identity of value, teach the affected to believe that they aren’t valued, that humans can’t be trusted, and that their voices aren’t heard. Renowned with these experiences, history portrays many victims which tell their stories silently – few having the courage or strength to stand firm in their resolve to stop abuse for others. Like the creature, many people are unable to help themselves, feeling hopeless to make needed changes. Elizabeth who like Victor knew what it meant to be raised in a loving environment experienced similar hopelessness when she told Victor of the death of Justine: I no longer see the world and its works as they before appeared to me. Before I looked upon the accounts of vice and injustice, that I read in books or heard from others as tales of ancient days or imaginary evils; and at least they were remote, and more familiar to reason than to the imagination; but now misery has come home, and men appear to me as monsters thirsting for each other’s blood. … Alas! Victor, when falsehood can look so like the truth, who can assure themselves of certain happiness? (Shelley 63) The evil which plagued Elizabeth’s family taught that even she had no agency for change. Today’s students may also feel like the creature and Elizabeth – shattered worlds amidst chaotic messages tell some that they are different and don’t belong with little ability to affect change. When students bring their individually constituted identities to college, these may feel more like extra weight to them than identities they cherish. Not recognizing agency to affect Catlin 13 change, many may accept less as the creature accepted the role of “monster” thrust on him. Constructed from experiences which colored their perceptions, students may also feel that they don’t belong in the university having little of value to contribute. Students who feel this may compare their progress with others further on the university path and see only failure. These messages which often tell of eventual failure may keep them from giving required effort toward their own success. IDENTITY THROUGH PRIVILEGED EXPERIENCE For students to feel a sense of belonging within the university, David Bartholomae states that they must speak the language of discourse. However, in his article, “Inventing the University” he describes this as “assembling and mimicking the language” as if they were already members of the academy (Bartholomae 4 and 5). He notices that students who are not yet ready to take on the voice of the discipline slip from writing with authority to their commonplace language. Bartholomae identifies commonplaces as those which orient students to provide reference points and “‘pre-articulated’ explanations readily available to organize and interpret experience” (7-8). When students say they have nothing to say or contribute, Bartholomae says they are saying that they are unable to take on the specialized discourse as members of the academy – not able to speak in the commonplace of the discourse. This inability to speak the language of the discourse only enhances the feeling of not belonging which students feel. Bartholomae’s solution is for students to practice seeing themselves in a privileged position within their discourse. He says they must “appropriate … a specialized discourse … as though they were easily or comfortably one with their audience” and “write from a place of privilege” (Bartholomae 9). Bartholomae says “all writers, in order to write, must imagine for themselves the privilege of being ‘insiders’ – that is, of both being inside an established and Catlin 14 powerful discourse, and of being granted a special right to speak” (Bartholomae 10-11). In other words, first-year compositions students must be able to assume privilege where they see none. This creates a problem for first-year composition students in that students must speak from a place of privilege but are not able to as they lack commonplaces of their discourse. Many left high school within the year and are unable to speak as though their new discourse is already common to them. These students are at the threshold of the university experience – none of which is privileged to them. One way to help students find their commonplace from which to speak, is to place the student within an area he is most acquainted, such as a sport or talent. This student who holds specialized knowledge will speak with the commonplace language of his specified knowledge in a manner that is more privileged than the composition teacher who does not hold that privileged knowledge. As students know themselves, each can define what is commonplace to him. Because he carries this privileged knowledge, the student can express and feel that he has something to say. This writing will be unique and allow the student to feel authorship in their writing as it has come from the student’s own place of privilege. However, this writing will lack in its ability for the student to feel that he has anything to contribute to his discourse. A more effective place of privilege and commonplace language for each student is his own experiences. As students discover their “individually constituted identities” based on their distinct experiences, students will know that they have more to contribute to their discourses and feel that they belong no matter their place on the path within their discourse. The use of critical memoir provides opportunity to discover places of privilege in addition to identity formation and a sense of belonging. Catlin 15 Nancy Mack gives specifics in her article about critical memoir and what it must include as an agent to help students be, belong, and become part of the academy. She says that memoir should be constructed from multiple positions: “the naïve self who was present at the time of the experience, the future self who imagines the person that the author wishes to become, the subjective self who interprets the experience as the culture would suggest, and the author self who negotiates among the other selves and constructs meaning … questioning the who, what, when, where, and why of the potential ways that the stories could be told” (Mack 58-59). Asking students to write from these various positions encourages self-interpretations and identity formations. Assigning meaning to memory through critical reflection, then reinterpreting experiences, will show patterns not previously understood. When a student can define a position of privilege that sets him against a “common discourse,” he moves toward a more specialized discourse, thus developing his own commonplace within the academy (Bartholomae 17). Finding and developing his own commonplace is essential for students to understand themselves and grow within their experiences and the university. Critical memoir gives students their “insider” place of residency as they are granted that special right to speak for themselves. They develop their own voice and authority in their writing as well as in the university. Bartholomae wisely noted: “The story of appropriation becomes a narrative of courage and conquest. The writer was able to write that story when he was able to imagine himself in that discourse. … There are ways, I think, that a writer can shape history in the very act of writing it” (15). As students locate themselves within the discourse of their personal narrative, they can change history, reinterpret it, and make use of it for finding their place of privilege, their voice, authenticity, and authority. Catlin 16 Robert Kegan in his book, In Over Our Heads: The Mental Demands of Modern Life defines self-authorship as: meaning-making structure characterized by an ideology, an internal identity, a self-authorship that can coordinate, integrate, act upon, or invent values, beliefs, convictions, generalizations, ideals, abstractions, interpersonal loyalties, and intrapersonal states. It is no longer authored by them, it authors them and thereby achieves a personal authority. (Kegan 185) As they learn about themselves, our students will begin to see renewed strength and original identity as well as their own fulfilling sense of belonging. As they write about themselves, they will find a place when, as Kegan suggests, they no longer author their personal narratives, their personal narratives will author them. It is at this place that students find themselves. When students find themselves, they will no longer be concerned about fitting into the discourse – they have their own. They own their privileged experiences and their place within the academy. They have reached a place of personal authority. Whether or not students find an insider’s place in the academy or discourse, they have found an insider’s seat within themselves which will propel them forward, cause them to be invested in their place within the academy, and to have a stake in their own learning that will not easily be given up. WRITER’S TOOLS IN THE CLASSROOM Individuals are largely products of their social and cultural systems, affected by their environments. Sherrie Graden argues in Romancing Rhetorics that each “student must first learn how to carry out the negotiation between self and world. … [A] first step in this negotiation must be to develop a clear sense of one’s own beliefs as well as a clear sense of how one’s own value system intersects or not with others, and how finally to communicate effectively” (Graden xv). Catlin 17 One important way teachers can help students is to accept that each student today enters college with his own distinct experiences. Seeing more in our students allows each to see more in himself. Designing assignments which help students see their distinctive roles within their individual experiences will help them find their own privileged knowledge, find that “insider place” within themselves, and recognize their own commonplace language within their discourse to ultimately give students a place to step from when they leave our first-year writing courses. My fifteen-week course is inspired by “Critical Memoir and Identity Formation: Being, Belonging, Becoming,” by Nancy Mack and “Inventing the Writer” by Anis Bawarshi. Three specific units help the student to see opportunities to recognize more within experiences. Each unit pertains to the individual student as he sees himself and how he learns to write about himself. In my example, students compare and contrast the creature in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein with excerpts from Frederick Douglass’ Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington’s Up from Slavery. The use of each brings examples of excellent writing, the Bildungsroman narrative form, the role of the author or character in his or her life of hardships, and portrayal and definition of students’ roles within their own individual journeys. Below are assignments which continue throughout the semester: 1. Commonplace books are introduced early in the semester; students will use these for their journaling, writing and revising papers, notetaking, experimenting with writing skills, and other purposes. Scratching out and changing ideas based on further knowledge is always accepted. Catlin 18 2. Students write responses to daily journal prompts designed to support the lesson for that class. In the journal prompts, I encourage students to write from perspectives which Nancy Mack presents: “the naïve self who was present at the time of the experience, the future self who imagines the person that the author wishes to become, the subjective self who interprets the experience as the culture would suggest, and the author self who negotiates among the other selves and constructs meaning … questioning the who, what, when, where, and why of the potential ways that the stories could be told” (Mack 58-59). However, whatever response the student chooses for each prompt is acceptable. 3. Topical articles specific to the purpose for each unit set the topic for most discussions. Unit One – The Writer’s Experience. Commonplace books are introduced early in this unit to encourage daily journaling and experimenting with writing. Reflection through journal prompts and Mack’s description of memoir: “who it happened to and how that experience represents an important theme in that person’s life” asks students to see more in their experiences as well as in those of others in society or history (Mack 58). Constructing memoir from multiple positions, as Nancy Mack suggests as well as questioning the “who, what, when, where, and why of the potential ways stories can be told” encourages multiple perspectives, assists in meaning making and reflecting on their individual identities (Mack 58-59). Continual writing and workshopping of these ideas will bring opportunity for new insight, if the student desires. Students identify and bring a favorite piece of writing to the second-class meeting, then tell the class why it is important to them. As students share their pieces of writing, the importance of writing is shown. The student identifies an important part of himself as he identifies his important piece of writing, and members of the class learn about each other bringing unity within the class. The entire class time is dedicated to each student reading his Catlin 19 favorite writing and explaining why he likes it. In my time using this assignment, students have told experiences which shaped them. As I watch students tell their peers of experiences which might otherwise be considered extremely personal, I see that students want to see more in their individual experiences and often are not afraid to divulge these to their peers. My students respond well to this assignment, each paying close attention to the other readers. The project for this unit is the documentary review. Students view the documentary, Joe’s Violin, which brings opportunity for students to learn about and reflect on hardships which others suffer. Teaching Aristotle’s Rhetorical Triangle helps them see more within the documentary, as well as how to use these rhetorical principles in their own writing. Use of They Say/I Say chapters particular to what is being taught in the unit are used each week. The Bildungsroman narrative is introduced in this unit through Frankenstein to present the idea that an author can use a protagonist to attempt to understand how his experiences “formed him [them] as social subjects” (Smith and Watson 10). Discussions of “creature” versus “monster” presents the concept that no one is a “monster,” and all are perpetually being created. Through study of Frankenstein students can see that the creature could have seen more in his experiences rather than simply resigning to blaming others. Comparison and contrast with the choices made by Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington and the creature in Frankenstein shows differing roles within individual journeys. Continued discussion about commonplaces within the university and their experiences will encourage students to see what they feel privileged to speak about. This will also encourage them to see their experiences as possible gifts which can become leverage rather than hardships which might be weight. Catlin 20 This unit can restore energy to the student who feels powerless, giving voice and authority to make informed choices. As stories develop, reflecting and questioning their purpose, their function, and interpretation within their journals will help the student to revise it to a truth that represents their ethical truth. Assigning meaning to memory through critical reflection then reinterpreting experiences may reveal patterns not previously understood. Unit Two – The Writer’s Point. With new envisioning and reorientation students may look forward to imagining greater purpose for themselves. Bartholomae’s suggestion of appropriation as a “narrative of courage and conquest” is more visible as the student understands more in his story (15). Bartholomae’s original suggestion of appropriation seems an impossible task for a first-year composition student; yet this avenue of appropriation suggested allows the student to take what he learned in Unit One, his vision through experience, and add more to the discourse because he has more understanding. As this student enters and lives within the discourse, developing by seeing more in his experience, he finds within himself the ability to speak commonplace language within his own privileged experiences – those experiences which none other sees as he does. This place of privilege now allows the student to find more in himself, believe in more, and see much more in others (including in literature) than he would have previously. Students now located within the discourse of their personal narrative, can change their own history, reinterpret it, make use of it for finding their place of privilege, their voice, authenticity, and authority. The literature review is an excellent assignment to push the student toward research. Allowing the student to choose the one topic from his experience which he feels he must Catlin 21 investigate for his own purposes, propels the student to search until he has found needed answers. Research also brings in other voices which advise the student to see more in his chosen experience than he may have seen previously. Asking him to narrow and refine his topic means that the student must look deeper, often pinpointing to himself exactly why he cares about this topic. Teaching the student to find their point within the literature review, even though it is a third-person project, means again that they are looking within themselves for that one thing they must say. Teaching students to use sources persuasively to make important points reinforces their voices. Discussing the value of research as a tool, empowers the student to search out anything they need to find answers to or seek others’ viewpoints in their futures. One-on-one meetings with students and their drafts allow me to hear their thoughts, their viewpoints, and often their experiences which prompted their paper. Students enthusiastically share incredible perspectives with me, including what makes them care so much about their topic. This is a fantastic bonding time for the student and teacher. I try to plan this just after a major break in the semester (such as Spring or Thanksgiving breaks); thus, students are given time to do the bulk of their semester’s writing. They submit their draft to me on Canvas; then I print it and go over it carefully. Our one-on-one meetings are always successes. After this meeting with me, students are assigned Chapter 11 of TS/IS “Using Templates to Revise” which pushes students to see more in their writing as they are constructing their final literature review papers. Other chapters of They Say/I Say are assigned particular to this unit. Unit Three – The Writer’s Voice. Critical memoir in Units One and Two gave students their “insider” place of residency and granted them a special right to speak for themselves. Their own voice and authority will begin to show in their writing as they identify their own distinctiveness within their very individual experiences. This identification allows the student to feel that he Catlin 22 stands out among his peers – his experiences giving him strengths and vision others may not have. With this, the student’s voice will emerge. This unit shifts focus to the writer’s voice, giving multiple opportunities for students’ authenticity and authority to speak out. In this unit students’ voices begin to sound. The digital portion of the class brings fun opportunities to show their creativity as well as reason to speak aloud. The first project is the InDesign editorial which gives opportunity for the students to stand on their soapbox about something they feel most strongly about. Often students who have suffered extreme hardships see more in the world than those who haven’t. After suffering abuse at the hands of a parent, for instance, one student might choose to speak about the value of good parenting. Another who lost a loved one to suicide might speak about the suicide epidemic and its need to be recognized. Students enjoy finally being given opportunity to use their own voice to say their very personalized and “privileged” messages, and because of Units One and Two, they are ready. Time and again I have watched students who feel strongly about an issue raise their voice and suddenly realize that they have a voice. The final project in this unit is the digital documentary in which students continue to speak in their very personal and privileged voice. Students can use their same literature review and editorial topic, which means that they won’t need to do further research. This can simply be made from InDesign into digital documentary format using the Adobe Rush program. I have often noticed, however, that students alter their voice from their previous project because they realize that they had more to say than they originally thought. When they do this, their language is stronger and voices more authentic – full of authority. Discussions of rhetorical design for both InDesign Editorial and Digital Documentary make these projects fun explorations for students who are already capable with digital media. We Catlin 23 discuss how students can best raise their voices through rhetorical moves. We discuss how they can best reach their audiences. Students enjoy these discussions. Even though discussions in this designed class are meant to help students see more within their lives, it is most important that we as teachers don’t cross lines to the role of psychiatrist. To guard against this, I present readings, topical articles, and assignments simply, just as any poetry or story is presented, with applicable lessons. Any time an epiphany happens for a reader, it is because that reader’s experiences help him see more within the story or poem. This same idea may happen in the reading of Frankenstein or any discussion of topical articles. If the student finds more, it is because he sees it, not because I force it. My purpose is two-fold: to bring to light the concept that today’s students are more than they show because for many of them, experiences have robbed them of their most valued agency; and to present tools of literature, teaching writing through critical memoir, workshopping, and research to facilitate personal growth. Todays’ students deserve the right to see more within themselves. Lessons herein are constructed to allow that vision, not to force it. CONCLUSION Victor Frankenstein’s choice for abandonment instead of responsibility sacrificed the happiness of his creation. Each of the creature’s kind acts was repaid with further mistreatment and abandonment until his abuse overcame him. He gave in to the role of victim, calling himself the slave, and seeing no agency for his life as he had an unkind master. Today’s students are much more than they know. Their journals confirm this, often showing their similarities to Victor’s creation. In some cases, hardships have constructed individuals who may believe that their broken selves are all they can become. I know this isn’t true, because I was once in their position. Catlin 24 Just like Mary Shelley’s creation, each still can be created. When they come to the university, they may feel like they don’t belong or that failure is imminent. However, examining experiences for the destructive narratives they create allows shamed and marginalized students to assume control of their lives and facilitate their own growth through their experiences. Looking back to what Keats called the “school” of hardships can help students see lessons from which they can learn. Learning the methods of critical memoir, will bring more to the surface for students than is now visible. Seeing experiences through lenses which help realize gifts instead of only what is lost will help our student to find their privileged knowledge within experiences. Our students deserve to see more within themselves, to find their “insider place” of residence with their special right to speak for themselves, which they may not see until this time. As Keats said, our world is the “vale of Soul-making.” Often, we wish to not have the experiences that we do. However, seeing more within them, seeing their gifts instead of only their losses, can allow these experiences to become leverage instead of weight in our lives and the very lives of each of our students. Catlin 25 Works Cited Bartholomae, David. “Inventing the University.” Journal of Basic Writing. April 1986. Jan 2011, pp. 4-23. Bawarshi, Anis. “Inventing the Writer in Composition Studies.” Genre and the Invention of the Writer, Logan, Utah State University Press, 2003. Brueck, Hilary. “Depression among Gen Z is Skyrocketing — A Troubling Mental-Health Trend that Could Affect the Rest of Their Lives.” Business Insider, 14 Mar. 2019. Burke, Kenneth. A Rhetoric of Motives. Berkeley and Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1969. Butler, Judith and Joan W. Scott. Feminists Theorize the Political. New York, Routledge, 1992. Cardon, Lauren S. “Diagnosing and Treating Millennial Student Disillusionment.” Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, 9 Dec 2014, pp. 34-41. Cooperman, Kahane. Directed and Produced by Joe’s Violin. Produced by Raphaela Neihausen, 2016. Douglass, Frederick The Narrative of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. New York, Barnes & Noble Classics, Dover Publications, 2003. Graden, Sherrie. Romancing Rhetorics: Social Expressivism on the Teaching of Writing. Pourtsmouth, Heinemann, 1995. Graff, Gerald and Cathy Birkenstein. They Say/ I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing Fourth Edition. New York, W.W. Norton & Co., 2009. Keats, John. “Letter to Benjamin Robert Haydon” Keats Letters Project, Margate, 10,11 May 1817, edited by Michael Theune, Illinois Wesleyan University, 2017. Catlin 26 Keats, John. Letters of John Keats to His Family and Friends, edited by Sydney Colvin, London, MacMillan and Co. and New York, 1891. Kegan, Robert. In Over our Heads: The Mental Demands of Modern Life. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1994. Lupton, Julia Reinhard. "Creature Caliban." Shakespeare Quarterly 51.1, Spring 2000, pp. 1-23. Mack, Nancy. “Critical Memoir and Identity Formation: Being, Belonging, Becoming.” Critical Expressivism: Theory and Practice in the Composition Classroom, WAC Clearinghouse, 2015. Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. New York. Dover Publications. 1994. Shelley, Percy. “On Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.” Athenaeum, 1832, edited by Thomas Medwin. Smith, Sidonie and Julia Watson. Reading Autobiography: A Guide for Interpreting Life Narratives. 2nd ed., Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2010. Washington, Booker T. Up from Slavery. New York, Doubleday, Page and Company, 1901.