Barton, Greg. Making a Place: Autobiography in Composition Classrooms. Language Arts Journal of Michigan. 16.

1 (2000) 27-30 Barton begins by describing the challenges he faced during the Autobiography Unit in his Composition class. Despite his goals to turn his students from spectators into participants, he describes unengaged students who fail to take inspiration from readings and activities and produce stale, dry, and vapid writings. Barton spends the rest of the article giving practical advise to potential teachers who wish to use autobiography in the classroom and detailing his and the students success. He begins using in class writing exercises to prompt students to examine the backwaters, their background, seemingly meaningless memories in a search for something that will become meaningful. After focusing in on the less obvious memories, which are not the traditional subjects about which student autobiographies are written, the students are left with the job of making this event meaningful or as Barton puts it discovering elements of meaning [by] investigating the raw material of [their] own [lives] and conveying that meaning to the reader, thus making effective rhetorical choices. This meaning is personal, giving the student both insight into their own life and ensuring a level of engagement with their writing that they might not have when writing an academic analysis paper. Boegeman, Margaret Byrd. Lives and Literacy: Autobiography in Freshman Composition. College English. 41.6. (1980) 662-669. Boegemans piece is extremely useful because it breaks down the controversy over using memoir and autobiography in the classroom. It methodically introduces objections, and then it refutes each one. She starts by examining the most common objection to it, that personal writing is too informal. Too informal, for Boegeman, is code for too little effort. Formality she suggests, denotes laziness. However, she emphasizes that this is not necessarily true. Autobiography can be careful and deliberate; it can be as formal as it needs to be. Next, Boegeman tackles the first problem objection, which is the second most common objection. She suggests, in response to this, that the use of the first person has pedagogical advantages. Students, she says, are reluctant to think for themselves, and the use of the first person forces them to. Echoing another person is safer, Boegeman posits, but forcing the students to claim their own opinions because it is important step in their intellectual independence. Finally, she argues against the notion that narrative is not as rigorous a form of writing as academic writing. But narration is not simple; there are many rhetorical devices at work: thematic unity, Aristotelian wholeness, balance, proportion, and selectivity. She ends by suggesting that if we teach autobiography rigorously, that the skills learned will transfer to writing for other disciplines.

Brown, Megan. The Memoir as Provocation: A Case for Me Studies in Undergraduate Classes. College Literature. 37.3 (2010) 120-142. While acknowledging and responding to criticisms of memoir as both the cash-cow of the moment and self-aggrandizing, inauthentic cries for attention, Brown offers insight into the

usefulness of memoir inauthenticity included in contemporary composition and college English classes. Despite her own reservations about teaching a memoir based writing class, referring to the class to her colleagues as Me Studies and Self-Help 101, Brown finds ways to work these concerns into a course which encourages the questioning and critique of a culture focused so intensely on the self. She argues that the memoir is in itself highly provocative; it allows students to, as I mentioned earlier, problematize American cultures fixation on individuality, but it also prompts students to think of the way these life stories are commodified and consumed. This leads to discussions about the ways in which identities are culturally created and incite debates about ethical issues, ultimately honing students analytical skills. Thus, students become critical of readings in the class as well as their own life writing; they begin to consider the importance of and develop a narrative voice, a skill that will transfer to the academic analysis paper. Culhane, Alys. Memory, Memoir, and Memorabilia: A Generative Exercise Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture. 4.2 (2004). 310-312. In this essay, Culhane imagines a course in which memoir would be tied to memory and memorabilia, and offers a practical model for instructors who wish to teach memoir. Explicit in the essay is Culhanes belief that memoir belongs in college writing classes; she argues first that memoir is a valid form of scholarly discourse, and second that memorabilia can and should be used to trigger memories. Memories, she argues, are the most important part of the process. Using objects to trigger memories, then, is an effective way of uncovering memories writing material that one thought lost or irrelevant. Jewelry, shoes, and glasses: these things should be considered when writing memoir. The students must ask themselves how did this object come into my possession and why is it important to me? Culhane stresses that the teacher must encourage the blurring of boundaries between fiction and non-fiction. A series of free-writes should be used to construct dialogue; characters should be altered. Workshops are essential to the process, and a conference with the teacher required. The most compelling suggestion Culhane makes, though, is that the teacher must take part in the process. He or she should write a memoir piece along with the class and must share it, workshop it, and revise it along with the students. This creates a unified classroom and provides an example for the students. Cutler, Ronald. The Autobiography as Creative Writing. College Composition and Communication. 9.1 (1958). 38-41. Cutler takes a different tack than the majority of authors who focus on memoir and its use in freshman composition; he focuses on the use of autobiography in relation, primarily, to its effect on the students psychological well-being. While Megan Brown disputes the use of memoir as a kind of self-help, insisting on its academic benefits rather than its personal ones, Cutler maintains that freshman, uprooted from their homes and in a brand new place, need the release autobiography offers. However, Cutler does not stop with this argument. He also proposes that autobiography is useful academically for college freshman. He admits that the majority of freshman autobiographies are a recitation of names and dates, but he offers a solution, this prompt: How did I get to be the kind of person I think I am now? This prods students to think critically about the self. It encourages reflection the self becomes, then, a

product of various influences. Rather than a static structure, pre-built and unchanging, the students begin to think of their personalities as a process. They are constructed, but then rebuilt and changed; they shift according to what they meet. This kind of critical thinking, Cutler stresses, is crucial to further study. And during students freshman year, when they are so vulnerable, the autobiography serves a dual purpose: to comfort and to hone critical thinking skills. Johnson, Rebecca Ruppert. Autobiography and Transformative Learning: Narrative in Search of Self. Journal of Transformative Education. 227.1 (2003) 227-244. Johnson begins by describing what the average composition teacher looks for in student essays: logical arguments with solid analysis and evidence. But what teachers get or at least what Johnson received are personal essays, essays grounded in the students personal experiences even if the assignment is a formal academic analysis paper. Johnson suggests that teachers should work with this pattern rather than trying to change it. She then details her experience using autobiography in her classes, arguing that its use in composition (and other English classes) helps students to understand themselves and other classmates. It asks students to take risks, to expose their pasts to scrutiny. This, according to Johnson, both places other students and the teacher in the role of listener, thus making teacher and students equals, and fosters students respect for each other. Johnson also notes that students feel more comfortable sharing their autobiographical work when teachers also share; so she encourages teachers to share details of their personal life to, in essence, level the playing field. On a more academic note, Johnson posits that students who write autobiographically must examine their familiar pasts critically, giving them a fresh perspective on something they thought they knew. Kass, Amy A. Who Am I? Autobiography and American Identity College Teaching. 43.3 (1995) 93-99. Kass begins her piece by remarking upon undergraduates preoccupation with self. They spend their time, Kass believes, asking themselves the same question: Who am I? Other scholars have touched on this, and have expressed the same sentiment that Kass does, that teachers should take advantage of this preoccupation. However, Kass differs from other scholars in way she theorizes and channels this preoccupation. Kass argues that when students reflect upon their own lives, that they are automatically reflecting upon themselves in relation to others. The meaning of these experiences, then, relies on how others react to them just as much as how the students themselves react to them. This points beyond the self and asks students to make connections between themselves and the larger world. They being to reflect upon the institutions, culture, and cultural beliefs that powerfully shaped [their lives]. Kass refers to this as social self-consciousness, the awareness that humans are fundamentally cultural beings. This source is useful because it, without trying, argues against the notion that the autobiography is self-centered by nature. It highlights the ways in which self-reflection leads to larger reflection. Kraus, Carolyn. The Discovery that Changes Everything: Teaching Memoir Writing with Documents Pedagogy Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture. 9.3 (2009) 547-554.

This article is a helpful mixture of practical and theoretical information. Kraus encourages the use of documents when searching for ideas for memoir writing. She emphasizes that requiring students to search outside of themselves for material is crucial. This search for documents and she recommends restricting documents to written records, certificates, essays, baby books, love notes, diplomas, et cetera, with no photographs a lot is a type of research. She aims to communicate to students that memoir requires research just as typical academic papers do. Once the students find their documents, they must draw out a story. They examine these texts, discuss them with the class, and wait for these documents to summon a memory; they search for a new meaning. Kraus suggests that discussion and analysis (a goal of English 101 and 102) of these documents helps students realize that their lives are neither mundane nor inconsequential. These documents help students link their or their familys private lives to the larger social context. They help connect the students story to the wider story, to the human experience, and this, according to Kraus, is the basis of all successful memoir. Root, Robert L. Variations on a Theme of Putting Nonfiction in Its Place. Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture. 4.2 (2004) 289-295. Most relevant in Roots piece is his examination of the place of non-fiction, which he redefines as the written expression of, reflection on, and/or interpretation of observed, perceived, or recollected experience A genre of literature made of writing which includes the personal essay, the memoir and poetic prose texts generated by students in college composition class [italics added], in English Studies. He argues that non-fiction actually belongs in many subcategories, including literature, creative writing, and composition. Nonfiction (a category in which memoir and autobiography belong) offers connection to the full scope of the discipline. Root also offers more support for the inclusion of non-fiction, as he defines it, in the composition curriculum. He draws on comments from his students, citing their surprise with non-fictions ability to help them discover the meaning of their experiences. Root summarizes this phenomenon in one pithy sentence: we write what we want to find out. So, essentially, by writing what you know, you will find out what you do not know. Root also connects this process of discovery to revision. With each revision, the student has an epiphany. Implicit in this argument is that students, when writing non-fiction, will learn the art of revision, that non-fiction writing will introduce them to revision in a relatively painless way. Roots article supports the notion that the personal and the academic are and should be connected; they are not in opposition. Wyngaard, Sandra The Memoir Writing Project: Responding to the Developmental Needs of Students. The English Journal. 87.3 (1998) 69-81. Wyngaards article is about high school freshman rather than college freshman, but this memoir project could easily be used in a composition class. Just as as Wyngaard points out in her article high school freshman go through a transitional period [of] loneliness that leads to preoccupation with the self, so to do college freshman. Wyngaard suggests that teachers take advantage of this by attempting to channel it into a memoir. She presents a pre-writing process that could easily be used in the composition classroom. There are daily journal entries

where students are asked to reflect on their first weeks as freshman. The teacher encourages students to write about their feelings and thoughts rather than listing the events of their days; this type of writing, Wyngaard hopes, will lead to a cathartic experience. Next, the students must write from an altered point of view from a he/she perspective. Wyngaard theorizes that this will help students examine their motivations. The third step before the actual writing begins is the memento box. The students prepare a shoebox of things that are of importance to them. They are prompted to pick objects that they would consider leaving to their descendents. The teacher then displays the memento boxes anonymously in the classroom. Other students write their comments about the contents of the boxes, and after this process, the owner of the memento box must present the box to the class. According to Wyngaard, the similarities and contrasts between the conclusions drawn by students [gives] students a clearer understand of themselves as historical entities. The memoir comes together as a sort of amalgamation of these activities. The students focus on recurring themes revealed by these activities, and this becomes the theme of the memoir.