Saturday, October 19 from 9:30am-6:00pm (includes half an hour lunch break)
$149
Writing can be healing. But writing can also re-traumatize, making it difficult to tell the stories that shape us. In this one-day intensive, writers gain an understanding of how the physiological processes of trauma and shame interact with a writing practice. Together, we’ll sidestep trauma writing stumbling blocks by using activities adapted from clinical practice to safely consider the structure of traumatic events. Drawing on two published essays about sexual and domestic violence, we’ll dive into the ways we might frame, order, and nuance our experiences of trauma, elevating a personal story into a universal inquiry and owning on the page our complicated, contradictory selves.
This class is not a support group. Nor is it intended to take the place of mental healthcare. But for those who have already begun to resolve physiological traumas, it will offer a stable, supportive environment to study the craft of writing these stories that, well told, have so much to offer society.
This class is hosted through Lifelong Learning at University of Utah in classroom UUCE 132.
Katherine E. Standefer's writing appeared in The Best American Essays 2016. Her debut book Lightning Flowers is forthcoming from Little, Brown in 2020 and was shortlisted for the 2018 J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Prize. A Fall 2018 Logan Nonfiction Fellow at The Carey Institute for Global Good, her recent work appears in Virginia Quarterly Review, The New England Review, Kenyon Review Online, and elsewhere. She earned her MFA in Creative Nonfiction at the University of Arizona and teaches in Ashland University's Low-Residency MFA program.
Her unique embodied pedagogy helps writers consider the physiological hurdles, social barriers, and craft challenges to telling stories about the body. She completed more than 30 hours of training at the Arizona Trauma Institute and has extensive experience in writing trauma herself. Check out her website here.
Comments (0)