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Everyone has a story to tell. What is your legacy? What is your life story?  How would you write your own obituary?  This workshop will focus on memoir, portraits/profiles, personal essays, and writing your life experiences. Writers of these types of essays often marry memory, experience, creative storytelling, obituary, playful language, and the factual.

Students in this course will read short examples of memoir, profiles, reflective essays, and obituaries, discussing the elements of writing from experience that make for evocative and meaningful reading. We will also learn about drafting, revision, and publishing strategies. This course is ideal for beginners, particularly those who have always wanted to write or share their story, but weren’t sure where to start. It is also a welcoming a supportive place for more experienced writers to meet others, build community, and share their own strategies. Each student will leave with the beginnings of a piece that they may continue to develop toward publication. The instructor is an Associate Professor of Writing and Rhetoric at George Mason University, with over two decades of publication experience in journalism, creative nonfiction, life writing, poetry, and academic writing.

Please bring a journal/notebook/pen or laptop/iPad, and your most creative self.

About Michelle: Michelle LaFrance (Ph.D., University of Washington, 2009) is a feminist critical ethnographer, who teaches courses on community writing, feminist methodologies, writing studies, and critical pedagogy. Michelle has published on institutional ethnography, the materialities of academic labor, e-portfolios, e-research, and writing center pedagogy. Her current work has her participating in urban communities, studying discourses of volunteerism and belonging, and treating the evolution of research practice and sensibilities in Writing Studies.

In 2021, Dr. LaFrance was awarded the College Composition and Communication Research Impact award for her book, Institutional Ethnography: A Theory of Practice for Writing Studies Researchers (USUP 2019). This book was also awarded “Honorable Mention” in the 2021 Best Book category from the International Writing Across the Curriculum Association.

A minimum of 4 students is required for the class to occur. Students will be notified if the minimum is not met. Please note that registration ends at 10 am the morning of the class.

If you need assistance registering, please check out these step-by-step instructions, video tutorial or call (202) 549-4172 for assistance.

More Upcoming Writing Workshops:

Writing for Change: May 13, 2023