Homework for Wednesday, March 28

Response Paper #3

1. Read “Shitty First Drafts” by Anne Lamott in your course reader, pp. 103-106.

2. Read actively: Mark passages that strike you. Note words, ideas, or images that resonate for you. Consider how Lamott’s idea of the “shitty first draft” could be useful to you in writing your inquiry paper for this class.

3. Jot down notes in response to the following questions:
o According to Lamott, what is “the fantasy of the uninitiated”?
o What does Lamott mean when she says that she needs to “quiet the voices in [her] head”?

4. Take a few moments to get ready to write by quieting the voices in your head. Then, freewrite for 15 minutes, laying out in broad strokes the points that you want to cover in your inquiry paper. Work fast and don’t stop to edit. Share what you know, what you think, and what you need to find out more about. Tell yourself that it doesn’t have to be great—it can even be, in Anne Lamott’s words, “shitty.”

5. Save your freewrite and do something else for awhile.

6. Read your freewrite. Note what is good in it. Note vivid, specific, concrete references. Note persuasive arguments. Mark phrases and sentences that are worth saving. Make a list of the questions it raises for follow-up research. Save these notes.

7. Using elements that you selected from your freewrite as the foundation, write two paragraphs of your inquiry paper. (You don’t have to know yet where these two paragraphs will fit into your paper. They can be for the beginning, the end, somewhere in the middle, or somewhere that you don’t even know yet.)

8. Save a copy of these two paragraphs on your computer, and print a copy to bring to class. (Your paper should be double-spaced, with one-inch margins. At the top of the page, please include your name, the date, “Seattle Arts Ecology,” and “Response Paper #3.”)