Creative writing workshop for Cultural Historians

Pälvi Rantala (University of Lapland)

Academic writing is not only an intellectual practice but an activity that involves both the mind and the body. Creative writing can be useful in every part of the research process - from generating ideas to formulating arguments and analyzing data. Creative writing exercises can provide the researcher with the means to speculate, imagine, fabulate, surprise, as well as to ask new questions. They can also help researchers renew their vocabulary and challenge fixed modes of thinking, as well as liberate oneself from a controlling and over-analytical mind. Plus, they enable one to experience anew the pleasure of writing!

In this writing workshop you only need a pen and a piece of paper (or a bunch of paper, or a notebook . . .) and the desire to write. We will undertake short exercises in which you will be asked to consider your research subject from different angles and express yourself through varied forms of writing.

Enrollment limited to 15. The workshop will be offered twice: once as part of the SGNCS program and the other as part of the ISCH program. Attendees of both conferences can register for either slot. The deadline to register is 1 June to societygncs@gmail.com.