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| ARTICLES |
| A PERSONAL REFLECTION: CAUGHT IN THE AMERICAN WRITING WORKSHOPS AS A SECOND LANGUAGE WRITER |
| Guifang Xue, University of New Hampshire, Durham, New Hampshire, USA |
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I am currently a writing MFA student at the University of New
Hampshire. As the only nonnative-English-speaking student and one of the
few minorities in my degree program, I often feel discouraged
participating in American creative writing workshops. English is my
third language (Mandarin is my second language)1,and it is challenging for me to write in English like a native speaker.
One of the comments I received in a writing workshop was, “To help your
writing move to the next level, you better correct your grammar.”
Vocabulary and grammar also limit my desire and ability as a second
language writer to reach my audience.
I feel particularly troubled to write for an American audience
who does not share the same educational, historical, and sociocultural
backgrounds as me. For instance, my background is collectivist and
family oriented. Though the American audience for my writing is not a
monolithic group, Americans tend to be more individualistic. We also
have different concerns and perspectives on life events. The language
that I use in my writing and the approaches that I use to reach the main
points in my writing are often different from common rhetorical
patterns in American writing. Therefore, the flow and the style of my
writing may seem awkward to an American audience. It is also hard to
convey what I am saying when we do not have common knowledge and shared
life experience.
Challenges I Have Faced
“Tell what you think, that is it,” an American classmate said.
Certainly it was very easy for them to do so—“Tell what they think” in
their mother language, but it was never easy for me to “tell what I
think” in my third language. At first, it seemed that this was because
my English oral skills were not that good, and I was too intimidated to
speak in class. Because of that, my professor encouraged me to take a
bridge-level English speaking class. However, later I found that the
reasons behind this issue were more complex. In my past educational
experience, we learned English mostly through reading rather than
writing. It was more about passing the standardized tests than speaking
the language fluently. I was from an educational setting where I was
supposed to stay silent. There were no workshops, and students did not
need to give feedback to each other or speak in class.
In
addition, American creative writing workshops are usually focused on
craftsmanship and a set of writing techniques such as voice, character
development, stories, situation, and showing rather than telling. The
last technique, showing rather than telling, promotes the art of
developing the characters and plot through scenes and dialogue and
discourages the authors from directly expressing their thoughts and
feelings. For instance, in one of my writings, I tried not only to show
the scenes that my father killed our dog and beat my brother in public
after my family was publicly humiliated, but also to tell the
complexities of the situation—my father wanted to do something good for
his son who has Down Syndrome but was caught in a culture that failed
individuals with disabilities. However, it seemed the desire not just to
show, but to tell was not encouraged in the workshops when I tried to
express my feelings and thoughts that involved the complexities of
society, culture, and the system. “Show, don’t tell” is the most common
constructive comment that I have received from my American classmates.
Finally, I wonder whether creative writing in a second language
is more than the art of writing strategies. Sometimes, I feel
uncomfortable when I see readers and writers who place themselves in a
superior position and morally judge right or wrong without understanding
the sociocultural reasons behind the stories. For example, the spirit
of Japanese samurai and the act of killing dogs seem foreign, weird, and
wrong to Americans. It is hard to express traditional and sociocultural
differences without telling because it is hard to show. When I “show”
it, they measure it by putting themselves in the situation with their
own cultural feelings and opinions, without any relation to its history
or understanding of the culture.
Overcoming Difficulties
I took a TESOL class in the spring. It was designed to provide
some basic insights into the process of language acquisition, along with
an introduction to the approaches and methods that have been or are
being used to teach languages in various circumstances. In that class, I
gained some very valuable and inspiring perspectives that my cultural
knowledge could be my strengths as a second language writer. In this
class, I gained the courage to talk to my professors about my struggles
and open up about my feelings. I was so surprised when my professors
said that they appreciated my presence in the workshop and my cultural
perspective. Though I received critical comments on what I have to
improve in my writing, I also got compliments on my voice and my
stories. I started gaining confidence when I realized that my minority
background as a nonnative-English-speaking student is not only my
constraint, but also my strength. That is, I can apply my cultural
perspective to my writing. Moreover, I immersed myself in reading
minority writers’ work and learned to seek my voice while writing to an
American audience like they did in their work. As the saying goes, “Read
more, write more.”
1I didn’t learn
Mandarin until I went to school at age 6. I am from Hainan Island,
China. People speak more than 10 dialects on this island. My native
language is “军话” (pinyin: jun hua; the literal
translation is “military dialect,” the standard language in the military
during the Ming Dynasty), and it is one of the extinct languages in
China. It doesn’t have a written form. It’s entirely oral.
Guifang Xue is a current writing MFA student, and
she is the only nonnative English speaker in her degree program. Before
coming to the United States, Guifang had work experience as an English
teacher and translator. Now she is seeking her voice in her writing as a
second language writer. |
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