Why men opt out of the (women’s) fiction world

by Leonce Gaiter

Fewer and fewer men read fiction. They compose only about 20% of the fiction market according to surveys. Some lay this off to genetics, suggesting that the way men’s minds work discourages them from entering into another’s experience the way fiction demands.

“Boys and men are, in general, more convergent and linear in their thinking; this would naturally draw them towards non-fiction,” wrote author Darragh McManus, pondering the question.

Others, like Jason Pinter, suggest that the overwhelmingly female publishing industry simply overlooks books that appeal to men because they fall outside the female experience. In other words, men now suffer the same fate women suffered at the hands of a male-dominated publishing industry for so many years.

Others suggest that boys are discouraged from reading at a young age by children’s books that fail to engage them. Give them the proper material, the story goes, and young boys will engage with reading. They point to the fact that young males were principal consumers of the Harry Potter books as proof. “More boys than girls have read the Harry Potter novels,” according to U.S. publisher, Scholastic. “What’s more, Harry Potter made more of an impact on boys’ reading habits. Sixty-one percent agreed with the statement ‘I didn’t read books for fun before reading Harry Potter,’ compared to 41 percent of girls.”

I always balked at these rationales because I read fiction all the time. However, thinking on it, I had to admit that I avoid modern fiction like the plague. I have tried the popular plot-thick page-turners and the feel-good tearjerkers and the occasional cause célèbre with a literary reputation. So many have left me so cold, that I simply won’t shell out the cash for a paperback or e-book version, much less a hardcover.

Trying to assess what I find lacking in most of the current novels I attempt, I believe their utter reliance on the world around them (and me) is supremely dull. So many work so hard to place characters in a world I will recognize. Too many work hard to create characters with which I (or their prime demographic audience) will ‘identify’ with and recognize as someone they could be, or someone they know.

It then made sense that men would ask why they should read something “made up” about this world when there is plenty of factual reading material on that subject. I have never approached fiction to re-visit “this world.” I’m already here. Instead, I want an alternative—a vision of this world exhaled through the writers’ and characters’ hearts, minds and eyes. Exhaled with the distinction of the smell of an individual’s breath. Fitzgerald’s Long Island in The Great Gatsby is his own creation, no kitchen sink recreation. Fitzgerald’s people and prose warp this place into something utterly unique.

Raymond Chandler’s Los Angeles is his distinctive projection of that city. You don’t pick up Jim Thompson’s The Killer Inside Me with the idea of identifying with the protagonist. You don’t grab Faulkner to meet the boys next door or titter with recognition of your kith and kin. You don’t visit Patricia Highsmith to look in a mirror. You pick them up to enter worlds as fantastical in their way as Harry Potter’s. I read fiction to meet characters I otherwise would not. I read fiction for the larger than life—not a retread of this one. I want to watch and think with characters who are nothing like me, who dare what I never would, who experience in ways that I cannot.

In an article titled, “Why Women Read More Than Men,” NPR suggested a biological reason why women read more fiction than men, quoting Louann Brizendine, author of The Female Brain. “The research is still in its early stages, but some studies have found that women have more sensitive mirror neurons than men. That might explain why women are drawn to works of fiction, which by definition require the reader to empathize with characters.”

Reading fiction does not require that you empathize with characters in the sense of “ascribing… feelings or attitudes present in oneself.” It requires that you regard and grow intrigued by characters such that you may come to a greater understanding of them—perhaps even to the point of empathizing with them. However, you need not imagine yourself as them, or believe that they behave as you or as members of your social circle would. That’s not reading; it’s narcissism.

Perhaps more men stopped reading fiction when fiction stopped regularly presenting unique, literary revisions of this world, and settled for presenting a photographic facsimile such that readers (most of them female) could better “empathize.” Maybe we’re too megalomaniacal and obsessed with grandeur for that, and thus want words recreated and re-imagined, instead of rehashed.

“Shall I project a world,” asks Oedipa Maas in Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49. Somewhere along the line, in tandem with the female domination of the publishing industry and fiction readership, the ideal of doing so fell from vogue. Instead, writers rely more and more on identification with this one. Male readers seem to have checked out.

Leonce Gaiter is a prolific African American writer and proud Harvard Alum. His writing has appeared in the NY Times, NYT Magazine, LA Times, Washington Times, and Washington Post, and he has written two novels. His newly released novel In the Company of Educated Men, published by Astor + Blue Editions, is a literary thriller with socio-economic, class, and racial themes.

The 10 Tips For Getting the Most of Readings ( And This Program )

by Lance Eaton

The following is a handout I provide for participants on the first meeting to help them think about literature and how the program runs. What they receive is the numbered items, and the text below each is usually what I explain as we go over the handout.

1. Learning is a building exercise, not a filling station.

The research increasingly shows that one’s approach to learning can be pivotal to their ability to learn. To this end, it’s important to understand that learning is something they can continue to do throughout their lives and that their mind is not necessarily finite. Basically, so long as they maintain a belief that they can learn, they will continue to learn.

I make this point first because we often carry the limited view in our heads about our learning abilities and I hope to help them break negative expectations about their ability to do well in this program and life in general.

2. Reading fiction further develops your empathy and understanding.

Reading is often the closest thing we have to being put into someone else’s mind or to learn another’s point of view. By immersing ourselves in fiction, it helps us to stretch our mind and understand the world around us. Emphasizing the importance of empathy, I go further and explain that it’s more than just a “feel-good” emotion to connect with other people. Being able to understand and connect with other humans allows us to make better decisions, as well as present ourselves better in situations .

3. All stories are 1 story.

This seems strange, but I’ve taken tips from Thomas Foster’s How To Read Literature Like a Professor. He says all literature is telling the same story, and that story is the human condition. At the cornerstone of every story is an author attempting to convey some truth or element about what it’s like to live in this world as a human—even (and especially) when the story has no humans in it. Therefore, if all stories are about the human condition, it makes it easier to understand why there is so much literature and why we can interweave all the readings in the program.

4. All stories are a mystery.

No matter the genre, all stories are a mystery. The mystery is determining where the author is leading the reader and why. I encourage participants to think about the stories in this way because just like an advertisement, the author is trying to sell us something. Instead of selling us products, they are selling us ideas and we want to be quite aware of what we are being sold. To do that, we have to be constantly reading and questioning the story.

This also comes from Foster and his discussion of intentionality in literature. I explain to the participants that nothing in a piece of literature is an accident. When bad things happen, they didn’t happen accidentally. The author chose it to happen, and in choosing things to happen, he or she is communicating something about the story’s purpose. Dying of heart disease is different from being crushed to death by a piano, which is different from being struck by lightning. Each might tell us something different about a character and his or her role in the story.

5. Anticipate the story.

I am constantly trying to guess what is going to happen next and I’m wrong at least 75% of the time. I tell the participants this so that they understand that the guessing game in literature often goes wrong, even for people well-versed in literature. Getting it right isn’t the goal—continuing to guess is. The guessing means that the reader is thinking, projecting, and ultimately, immersed in the story enough to want to think about where it is going. It means the reader will get more out of the story.

6. Read the Intro sheet.

For each reading, I provide an introductory sheet that identifies the author (often a picture too), publication information, trivia, some background about the author or writing, other good pieces by the author, and other authors that readers might enjoy if they liked this story. Most importantly though, I include an essential question. The question is vague enough that it doesn’t give away much about the plot, but specific enough that readers can have it in the back of their minds while they make their way through the story. It’s a useful way to prime focus and attention so readers get the most out of the story.

7. Re-Read the story. Always.

Our first encounters with stories are usually attempts to wrap our heads around the plot. If we want to get more (and for a program like this, getting more is beneficial), then re-reading is useful. It’s also good because we pick up things that we missed and it can help to clarify things that we were confused by.

8. Read aloud.

We are much better listeners than we are readers. In part, that’s because we have been listening more often and longer than we have been reading. Reading a text can be challenging in many ways but one way to make it easier is to read it aloud. This doesn’t mean standing up on a table and shouting it to the masses, but it can mean mouthing the words under breath. Hearing the words can help to make sense of them in a way that otherwise might be inaccessible.

Read in an accent

It sounds strange but in addition to reading aloud, it might be useful to read in an accent. Adding an accent (I often like English), can provide an element of tone that can provide additional meaning to the text that reading flatly might not produce. Furthermore, by adding an accent, it requires more attention and thus reinforces the content in a reader’s mind.

10. NARPH! Notate, Actively Read, Paraphrase, Highlight.

I often reiterate the importance of physically interacting with a text. Doing so makes the reader a more engaged reader and allows for the reading to stick longer in his or her head. Additionally, it means when the reader re-reads or comes to the meeting, he or she can more easily move through the reading with clear markings around things that are of interest or importance.

That’s my tip sheet for participants! What kinds of tips do you provide to your participants? What would you add from this list? What would you borrow?

Lance Eaton is an instructional designer at North Shore Community College, where he also teaches courses in American Literature, popular culture, and comics. He writes for several magazines and websites. He also serves as a social media consultant for several companies. His musings, reflections, and ramblings can be found at his blog. You can find out more about him on his website.

A call for change

by Marissa Matton

With 2.4 million inmates, the United States has the highest prison population of the world. Behind only Seychelles, we also have the second highest incarceration rate. The United States makes up only five percent of the world’s population, yet we have twenty-five percent of the world’s prisoners. These are alarming statistics, but what do they really mean for our nation?

As a nation, we’re led to believe that people who break laws are bad and should be put behind bars. We never consider much past that– how long they should be in prison, where the money comes from, what happens to the prisoners after they’re released.

The sad fact about released prisoners is that the majority of them are incarcerated again. A study showed that 62.5% of released prisoners were convicted of another crime after being released from prison. Two-thirds of them committed another crime within just one year of their release.

What good is a prison sentence if an inmate is going to repeat the same actions upon release? You’ve only temporarily delayed new crimes from being committed. Shouldn’t our nation be aiming for a higher goal? Isn’t prevention what we should be targeting? The United States prison system is severely suffering when it comes to reforming inmates.

A prison sentence alone is not enough to keep a prisoner from committing future offenses. This fact is abundantly clear when juvenile detentions are taken into consideration. A study of Chicago youth incarceration showed that young offenders were sixty-seven percent more likely to be in jail again by the age of twenty-five. What’s even worse, is that they were more likely to commit violent crimes, including homicide.

On average, it costs twenty-four thousand dollars per inmate per year. Billions are spent on incarceration every year. The billions of dollars that go into keeping these prisons not full but overcrowded would be better spent on alternative sentencing programs.

Changing Lives Through Literature is an excellent example of a program that truly works. A study showed that less than fifty percent of graduates committed a new offense after completing the program. Why is this program so more effective than incarceration alone? Students in the program  are are learning hands-on in the classroom, gaining the tools necessary to reevaluate their decisions and change their perspectives.

Locking away everyone who breaks the law is not only not possible, but also not feasible. We need to recognize the issues associated with the prison system, and just as the Changing Lives Through Literature students learn to change their perspectives, we need to as well. Alternative sentencing programs overall produce better results than prison sentences and are often less expensive. This is the direction we need to head towards, instead of relying on prison sentences.

Inmate violations at halfway houses

This article, previously published on Oklahoma Watch, discusses inmate violations at two of Oklahoma’s halfway houses, citing issues including the admittance qualifications and staff oversights. With issues like this prevalent across the country, there is a definite need for a change in the way the justice system responds to criminal offenders.

Questions of oversight: inmate violations at halfway houses
by Clifton Adcock

Serious violations by inmates plagued Oklahoma’s two largest halfway houses for three years before the state took action in January by removing all inmates from one and later demanding a corrective plan at the other.

State data analyzed by Oklahoma Watchshow that from 2010 to 2013, the rates of serious “misconducts” by male offenders quadrupled at the Avalon Correctional Center in Tulsa, run by a for-profit company, Avalon Correctional Services Inc. After a video of an alleged guard-sanctioned fight there came to light in January, the Department of Corrections pulled out all 212 inmates.

Ten months later, more than 200 inmates again are in the facility.

Violations also spiked at the Carver Transitional Center in Oklahoma City, also operated by Avalon. The rate of serious misconducts nearly tripled from 2010 to 2012 before slipping last year. In March, the corrections department gave surprise random drug tests to 153 Carver inmates, and more than half tested positive. The state ordered an action plan to fix the problem, and since has added offenders to the facility.

A prison watchdog group, OK-CURE, questions whether the state Department of Corrections should place so many inmates in Avalon-run facilities given the history of oversight problems. Avalon Correctional Services, based in Oklahoma City, now houses more inmates in its two male halfway houses than it did two years ago, when serious violations were climbing.

Corrections Director Robert Patton said Avalon has taken steps to address concerns of oversight at Avalon Tulsa and is paying for a corrections department monitor to stay at the facility. The department also is monitoring the Carver facility, corrections officials said.

Preliminary data show that in recent months serious violations by inmates have dropped at the Carver and Avalon Tulsa halfway houses.

A big reason the state wants to reduce violations, such as drug use, at halfway houses is because the rise in serious misconducts has hampered the state’s ability to shift more inmates from overcrowded prisons to halfway houses, Board of Corrections minutes show. Inmates with egregious violations are usually moved back to higher security levels, taking up beds that might be filled by other inmates eligible to be gradually moved down into halfway houses.

To ease the problem, the state earlier his year revised its policies to expand the pool of offenders eligible for placement in halfway houses.

A Surge in Violations

The goal of halfway houses is to help nonviolent offenders near the end of their sentences find a job and prepare for life outside of prison walls.

Oklahoma has eight male halfway houses holding about 1,050 inmates. Avalon operates the two largest facilities in addition to running the largest female halfway house, located in Turley. (Lawsuits filed earlier this year allege problems there, including a failure to report sexual abuse.)

Inmates live at the facilities and can leave for a job or to find work or attend church; halfway house staff members are supposed to track their whereabouts. Drug tests are also given to the inmates.

When halfway house inmates violate rules or laws, they are subject to discipline. They can be removed and returned to a higher-security facility and, until recently, were ineligible for halfway-house placement again for at least a year.

With serious violations, called “Class X Misconducts,” offenders are almost always removed and rarely, if ever, returned to a halfway house, corrections officials said. Examples of Class-X violations are escape, possession of drugs or a weapon, and assault of staff members.

In 2011, serious violations began to rise sharply, driven largely by increased numbers and rates of violations at Carver and Avalon Tulsa. Many of the violations were possession of an unauthorized substance and escape. From 2010 to 2013, the annual number of egregious misconducts at Avalon Tulsa more than doubled, to 48; the rate, meaning the number of violations per 100 placements, quadrupled, analysis of data shows. At Carver, the number of Class-X violations more than doubled in 2011, to 49, and the rate more than doubled; the rate and numbers at Carver dropped in 2013.

Empty Beds

From 2011 to 2013, the total number of inmates placed in Oklahoma halfway houses declined by nearly 30 percent. Late last year, more than 380 halfway house beds under contract were not being used, Board of Corrections minutes show.

Read the article in its entirety on oklahomawatch.org

The two moments you know they’ve succeeded

by Lance Eaton

I’m a newbie to Changing Lives Through Literature, so what I say here might seem old-hat to some or naive to others. I’m about two-thirds through my second group and there are two moments in the program that I find most rewarding.

I choose a mixture of challenging and strange texts. There’s a method to my madness in terms of the range and type, as well as the alignment, but I often get raised eyebrows from the participants and even the parole officers. The texts are evocative, usually leading the participants to come in with clear opinions. These opinions are usually a mixture of confusion, frustration, and dislike because the readings don’t always have clear endings and are sometimes outright confusing.

As participants enter, they’re often ready to engage with the story, sometimes venting before the meeting starts. They want answers to what they just experienced, which is always great to see. You know you’ve chosen a good text if you have to encourage them to refrain from discussing it too early.

The first moment of success is towards the end of the session. After spending nearly two hours discussing the text, the tide turns. Frustration and confusion give way to excitement and enthusiasm. Opinions move from disliking to liking, or at least a better appreciation of the story. It’s worth doing a quick poll at the beginning and at the end about participants’ feelings on the story to see what has changed.

It’s the change of opinion and thought about the story that I think is most important because it’s the best indicator of their learning and investment in the process. The program’s charge to change lives is generated by learning, which happens when there is investment. However, the program (rightfully) doesn’t require any more than participation: read, show up, discuss. This formula in itself doesn’t guarantee learning. We’ve all met on rare occasions the person who resists learning and performs the bare minimum. But overwhelmingly, the participants do so much more. Therefore, any change of opinions and thoughts becomes an indicator of their investment and their learning, which sets them down the path of changing their lives.

The second moment of success happens sometime past the half-way mark in the program. By this point, a sense of rhythm and expectation has been established. Participants know what to expect of the facilitator and the facilitator is familiar with the rhythm of the meetings. It’s usually around this point that the participants start to make the observation that the readings are “easier”. It becomes clear that they’re picking up on more ideas and significance within the stories. It’s usually around this time that I start to hear lines like, “This was easy” or “I knew what was going to happen after that first sentence”.

I mark this as success because the readings themselves don’t necessarily get easier. In fact, I often choose increasingly harder texts, recognizing that with the flow established, they’ll begin to feel more comfortable with more difficult texts. This comfort stems from knowing we will clarify things they don’t understand. However, their remarks indicate they’re developing stronger reading and analytical skills. They often overlook this but I take the time to draw out the point. When I do, I see not only smiles about the fact, but also realizations about their own abilities. It’s a great moment for facilitator and participant. It’s the crux of why we’re all sitting in the room, and it’s proof positive that their lives have value and meaning and that they have some control over it.

These two moments are part of the major reason I enjoy Changing Lives Through Literature. I don’t believe that the program directly produces grand change in every participants’ lives. But I believe the nature of the program does set them down the path of learning, self-reflection, and inner-value, which can change their lives in the long run.

Lance Eaton is an instructional designer at North Shore Community College, where he also teaches courses in American Literature, popular culture, and comics. He writes for several magazines and websites. He also serves as a social media consultant for several companies. His musings, reflections, and ramblings can be found at his blog or you can find out more about him on his website.

Lessons from my childhood friends

by Marissa Matton

I recently came across an article about the “lessons” that can be learned from classic children’s books. Somewhere between the piece mocking The Very Hungry Caterpillar for glamorizing gluttony and criticizing Matlida for favoring magical powers over parents, I moved past my indignation at my favorite childhood books being knocked down and stopped to consider what lasting lessons I truly learned while reading growing up.

Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree is one of the best examples of a children’s story that seamlessly weaves an important life lesson into a child-friendly tale. Although a case can be made that the tree’s selflessness was her downfall, isn’t the boy’s journey through life sadder? He takes and he takes from the tree, but in the end the canoe, the house, everything he’s able to get from the tree doesn’t last him. All the tree has left to give is her love and support, which is all he needs in the end.

There’s a fine line between not giving enough and giving too much, which The Giving Tree shows. If the boy had cared more about what he needed than what he wanted, he wouldn’t have used the tree, his friend. Through the boy’s mistakes I learned what it takes to be a good friend and how selfish acts won’t make me happy in the end.

E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web was the first, but certainly not last, book that made me cry. While the sad tale teaches us about loss, the real moral of the story lies within the friendship between Charlotte and Wilbur. Unlike the friendship between the boy and the tree, Charlotte and Wilbur are loyal to each other. Whereas I learned how not to act from the boy, these two friends taught me how I should. Charlotte looks after Wilbur, an act he repays by looking after her children after she dies. Her death may have been heartbreaking, but it was a lesson within itself. Life is hard. There will be setbacks, but life continues. Following the two friends on their journey, I learned about compassion.

It would be impossible to talk about books I grew up reading without mentioning Nancy Drew. With an eight-decade history behind her, I was able to grow up with the teen detective. She may have been more of a role model for girls, but her impact could leave a lasting impression on anyone. Influential women such as Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton, Sandra Day O’Connor, and Sonia Sotomayor have all listed Nancy Drew as one of their role models. With each mystery I solved alongside Nancy, I learned about the pursuit of truth and justice. I found the courage to pursue my goals and never squash my curiosity.

Published in 1964, The Giving Tree is the newest of these three. The story is still very much present on the bookshelves of children. Sixty-two years after its publication, the same can be said for Charlotte’s Web and Nancy Drew has been a role model for the past eighty-four years, crossing over into other forms of media including television, movies, and video games. There is a reason these books have remained in the hearts of their readers long after they’ve grown.

Some of these lessons may seem simplistic, but they’re important life lessons that last. They build the foundation for us to be the best version of ourselves we can be.

John R. Manson — Carl Robinson Award

Changing Lives Through Literature was awarded the John R. Manson — Carl Robinson award last week. The award is presented to those who have made a significant contribution to the field of criminal justice within New England.

The award joins a long list of accomplishments for the program including an Exemplary Education Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, a New England Higher Education Excellence Award from the New England Higher Education Board, and articles in The New York Times, Parade Magazine, and The Los Angeles Times.

The program’s greatest accomplishment is the thousands of men and women whose lives have been positively impacted in the two decades since the program’s inception. Having been provided with the tools necessary to succeed, graduates of the program have gone on to continue their education and find new jobs.

In addition to recognizing the program’s success and the hard work of all those involved, this award brings awareness to the potential literature has to offer–not only for criminal offenders, but for society on a whole.

Writing therapy for addiction recovery

by Eve Whittaker

Young addicts who enter a rehabilitation center to overcome a powerful addiction to substances and/or alcohol are usually introduced to a 12-step program, the kind employed by Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous. Author Anne Fletcher, a specialist in addiction and rehabilitation, however, notes that while these programs have doubtlessly been successful for many, studies show that just 25 to 35 percent of those who attend one AA meeting go on to become active participants. Others may find that the 12-step approach is not for them, yet they are not often told of the many alternative treatment approaches that exist. These approaches include Women for Sobriety (WFS), founded by Jean Kirkpatrick and focusing on healing the emotional causes that may lead to addiction; or SMART Recovery, which uses cognitive-behavioral therapy to recognize triggers for drug/alcohol use, and encourages those recovering to identify and utilize with new ways to respond to these triggers.

Yet another interesting approach involves the use of writing therapy as an adjunct in the treatment of addiction. Writing has been found to help recovering addicts recall and recover from possibly traumatic experiences and to discover different parts of their identity through the creation of fictional characters. Writing can also help those recovering discover a new talent, thereby increasing their sense of self-confidence and give them hope about the future.

Documented benefits of writing

Some of the benefits bestowed by writing on those undergoing therapy include:

• The ability to express one’s feelings in an immediate manner.
• A sense of greater control over how much the writer reveals, at what pace, etc. Recovering addicts sometimes complain about feeling ‘pushed’ into revealing more than they are ready to reveal.
• Less shame: Writing can make one feel anonymous, thereby making it easier to express emotions and recall experiences without the fear of being judged or criticized.
• Active participation: Writers can feel more confident because through their writing, they are taking an active role in their recovery.
• Permanence: Writers can look back and note the progress they have made as time passes. They can also identify past situations and experiences that may have led them to relapse.
• Benefits for therapists: Having a document to consult prior to a therapy session (written by a recovering client) can aid therapists when preparing for sessions.
• Less anxiety: In an excellent study entitled Emotional and physical health benefits of expressive writing, one clinical psychiatrist notes “I have found expressive writing to be a useful addition to my repertoire of short-term psychological interventions for people who harm themselves… and for out-patients with stress-related symptoms, anxiety and depression. I use it together with daily mood charts, problem-solving, goal-setting, relaxation, mindfulness, exercise prescription and other interventions…”. In a study published in the journal, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, writing therapy was found to be as efficient as cognitive behavior therapy in lowering levels of ‘intrusive symptoms, depression and state anxiety’ in persons suffering from acute stress disorder and posttraumatic stress disorder. Since recovering addicts are forced to face extremely stressful situations as they battle temptation and worry about their future and the effects of their actions on family/friends, writing can form part of an integrated approach to addiction that also values mindfulness-based approaches. Yoga is another popular complementary therapy for the treatment of drug abuse; with its focus on controlled breathing and ‘staying in the moment’, it has been found to lower levels of stress hormone, cortisol; yoga has also been found to battle fatigue. A nutritional regime comprising whole, seasonal foods is likewise a crucial pillar of embracing a healthy lifestyle that promotes both physical and mental well-being. In this sense, writing is just one of many complementary therapies that can address the same problem from various standpoints.
• Writing has been found to increase the amount of exercise performed in therapy groups: Often, those recovering from addiction are in a poor physical state; the pursuit of an active lifestyle is thus vital if lost strength, flexibility and fitness are to be restored. In addition to encouraging more physical activity, expressive writing has been linked to a host of positive outcomes, including higher grades for college graduates, higher rates of re-employment following a period of unemployment, fewer visits to general practitioners and health centers, and the consumption of a better diet.

Eve Whittaker is a full-time feature writer, as well as an art and photography aficionado. She has written for numerous sites on various topics over the past few years.

Hello, readers!

As the new editor, I wanted to take the time to properly introduce myself. My name is Marissa Matton and I will be in charge of the content for this blog until the end of the Spring 2015 semester.

I am in my first year of the Professional Writing Program at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. I graduated last spring from UMass Dartmouth with a bachelor’s degree in Writing, Communication & Rhetoric and minor in Literature & Criticism. I have worked in the field of web writing for the past year, and I look forward to this new position.

With your help, my goal for this year is to produce articles on a regular basis. I am eager to work with previous guest writers and I hope to see new writers as well. I encourage any readers who may not think of themselves as writers to try their hand at writing a piece or to contribute by actively commenting.

We are accepting submissions. If you’re interested in writing an entry, please read our guidelines and contact us at cltl@umassd.edu. I look forward to your comments, submissions, and questions!

– Marissa

Is Blogging A Threat to Quality Writing?

Literary expression takes many forms; from short stories to expanded documentation covering myriad subjects.  Throughout history, authors have set themselves apart offering written works as diverse as romantic novels and epic tales of adventure, spanning several volumes.  Within each genre, sub-specialists write in styles running the gamut from concise academic form, to sprawling embellishments of everyday encounters.  Thanks to technology and the proliferation of the World Wide Web, there is a relatively new player on the field, begging the question:  Are bloggers a threat to literary integrity?

Motivation Dictates Value

Before people had pencils and pens, drawings and symbols left on cave walls were effective communication.  So who took responsibility for preserving thoughts in this way?  The cave people skilled at drawing most likely bore much of the burden, but lesser illustrators surely weighed in too.  As communication became more important to society, formalizing language and alphabets, more and more people took up writing as a form of expression.  Early writers were not necessarily highly-skilled. But they wrote anyway, because they could. So the slippery slope of unskilled writers sharing ideas, whether or not they have the slightest clue how to do it properly, is nothing new.

It could even be argued that the same motivation existed for cave drawers as for some of today’s bloggers.  Fame and recognition, the desire to be heard and remembered, are motivators for taking pens to paper, charcoal to cave walls, and most recently, fingertips to keyboards.  What has changed over time is the relative importance of fame, heightened in an information age placing great emphasis on celebrity and adulation.

The evolution of the World Wide Web continues to change the landscape for fame-seekers.  An instant audience, perhaps millions, is a powerful draw for those committed to being noticed.  As a result, many bloggers put the cart before the horse; adding to the blogosphere, before they really have something to say.  Blogging’s greatest threat to quality writing is found among ‘vanity’ blogs, serving only their authors; rather than informative, relevant content shared by capable writers blogging online.

Blog Economics

In addition to personal rewards for bloggers, the practice of sharing online carries cash benefits, once bloggers establish followings.  Unfortunately, poorly written blogs yield returns for bloggers able to draw traffic, in spite of themselves.  When poor content is rewarded with cash, it might appear as though it undermines quality writing, but it may be too soon to judge.

Blogging is an evolving pursuit, subject to corrections as it matures into a long-term phenomenon. And just as competition influences other economic trends, bloggers face free market influences, which may eventually serve to elevate good writing and take incentives away from bloggers spewing drivel.

Purely promotional blog content, disguised as education, is increasingly being called-out for what it is, filtering-out blogs without intrinsic value. Spam gives blogs a bad name, but it also makes legitimate content shine amid the noise.  In other words, bloggers with something meaningful to share will prevail, but only with a firm commitment to high quality content, and perseverance sharing their messages.

Discouraging signs may show themselves in the short-term, but blogging is not a threat to quality writing over the long haul.

 

This guest post is contributed by Rebecca Gray, who writes for Backgroundchecks.org. She welcomes your comments at her email: GrayRebecca14@gmail.com