Threshold Concepts for Creative Writing
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The following threshold concepts emphasize the complexity of creative writing and what is at stake in shared ideas of craft.
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ATTENTION |
CREATIVITY |
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Creative writing involves specific modes of attention as writers learn to be close and critical observers of the world. Writers learn to account for the ethical considerations involved in perceiving and reinventing the world through their research and observation.
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Writers benefit from a robust toolkit of applied theoretical frames and process heuristics for generating texts. Principles from creativity studies are useful for increasing the versatility of writers.
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AUTHORSHIPWriterly identity is constructed by a range of cultural forces. Cultural messages about the identity and lifestyle of the writer can be critically examined as we gain resources for building a writing life.
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LANGUAGELanguage choices are bound to issues of power. Supporting a polylingual and multimodal literary community requires deliberate attention from writers, in each writing occasion.
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GENRE |
CRAFT |
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There are no universal standards for ‘good writing’; however, there are conventions that are particular to established genres.
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Craft choices produce effects in the reading experience. While these effects cannot be entirely predicted, writers can weigh the risks and possibilities of each craft choice.
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REPRESENTATION |
RESISTANCE |
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The writer does the cultural and political work of representation. All forms of representation, including literary production, can be interrogated for assumptions, values, and ideologies.
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Literature can forward social change and the transformation of culture. Literary production is a unique means of putting the world into question.
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THEORYHistorical knowledge of aesthetic theories is important to the practice and craft of writing. Writers write within and against traditions, and thus benefit from a robust theoretical knowledgebase of cross-cultural artistic thought.
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REVISIONWriters learn to be responsive to what emerges in the process of creation, as they also bring comparative literary analysis to bear on their revision process.
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For more discussion of these threshold concepts, see:
New Writing & Toward an Inclusive Creative Writing |
