Adventures in the Blogosphere

I've decided to blog about the anthropology I find in everyday events. I'm hoping that this will help me think more about anthropology--and get me used to writing about anthropology in a non-academic way. One of the challenges I am having right now as I work on some fiction is that I feel it sounds too smart. So I hope you all will join me occasionally to help investigate anthropology as it happens.

Krystal

http://anthroinpractice.blogspot.com

Rejection DOES NOT Equal Dejection

So, hoity-toity Ethos has declined my article. The editor actually wrote me a rather nice letter explaining she did not think my piece was a good fit for the journal--bear in mind, that this was the second submission of that piece to Ethos after edits specifically requested by Ethos had been made. Nonetheless, she offered me additional suggestions, but felt that my topic did not adequately address the individual, which is what Ethos claims to focus on. I disagree--my piece is absolutely about the individual--but I am not disheartened. (Okay, well, maybe a little disappointed.)

I sent it out to another journal last night. I didn't make her suggested edits, since they were made for Ethos while making it clear that they weren't for Ethos.) If this other journal has suggestions--and they probably will (hey, I'm a realist)--then I'll go back and take another look. But it was so difficult to let the piece go that now that it's out in the wide world, I want it to stand on it's own before I start to "tweak" it again.

And, besides, I have other writing to do.

--Krystal

A Productive Way to Procrastinate from Reading Freshfolks' comp essays

I revised and sent out four poems to a journal instead of "working." Writing and submitting instead of doing school stuff may be best and sneakiest way to trick myself into doing it. And it made my soul thicker than a playing card. Jayne

For HC - Abstract

Holly, I had to sign an agreement that I would not post any part of my article until the review was completed and a decision made. I learned today that the approx. time frame for this is 2-3 months (which is an agonizingly long time). I'm trying to determine whether I can post the abstract. Once I have an answer, I'll share if I can.

Krystal

PS: I got some "notes" down on paper tonight for my creative piece.

Here's my new favorite writing quote:

From What If?, the book my intro creative writing class is using for fiction, from a Joyce Carol Oates Paris Review interview:

Q: How do you describe the perfect state in which you can write from early morning into the afternoon?

Oates: One must be pitiless about this matter of "mood." In a sense, the writing will create the mood . . ..I have forced myself to begin writing when I've been utterly exhausted, when I've felt my soul as thin as a playing card, when nothing has seemed worth enduring for another five minutes . . .and somehow the activity of writing changes everything.


(Promise? OK . . .) Jayne

If it helps at all...

I've learned a way of getting around the scary, and it works most of the time. I don't WRITE. I type notes, words, thoughts, sentences...and then when I have enough, I edit them. I never actually WRITE, because WRITING is scary. So scary, it has to be in caps. If I just "throw things on paper" and then edit them, I skip the WRITING. This works at least in the beginning.

Hope it helps a teeny bit.

Holly

"The scariest moment is always just before you start."
- Stephen King, On Writing

I have an idea. And I think I'm ready to see where it wants to go. I just need to give myself over to it. And it's scarier than I imagined.

But sending my article out has given me a new resolve. I am going to see if I can't get a plot sketch down tonight. I've got the King quotation to keep me moving.

Krystal