Yana's Van Manen Reponse

[Anonymous]

#753

I’m usually hard on myself for not writing enough, or sitting down to write but doing everything but. I usually think about the space I write in as “conducive” or “non-conducive” to writing, based on noise, physical comfort and light. I really liked Van Manen’s discussion of entering the space of a text, as well as the space we’re writing in, and the temporal experience of reading/writing a text. It prompted me to think about about the physical space that we generally write in: The space of the computer screen. Right now, I’m writing on the space of the internet, which we often think of as virtual space. In addition to this box where I write, I see all my programs and apps in my dashboard below, all my other open browser tabs, my bookmarks, emails popping up as they come in, gchats blinking in my gmail tab. No wonder most of us avoid writing by clicking around from site to site (particularly social sites that put us in conversation with others like email, facebook, blogs, or dating sites). Regarding the temporality of writing in such digital spaces, what we write is also logged in temporal structure. Who, what and when one posts can draw out the context of the next post. I often feel that both the limitations and possibilities in digital composing are so overwhelming.

Regarding drawing, I started to think about whether I prefer to write to call forth an image that then evokes a feeling, or to just go from text to feeling? I’m wondering what is more effective, and what I’m better at. Thinking through all the words I associate with the term “draw” helped evoke ideas about evocative linguistic techniques:

DRAW: pull, extract, enchant, seduce,
DRAW: design, create, decorate
DRAW: represent, mirror, copy, duplicate, mirror

[Sondra Perl]

#769

I love all the varied meanings of ‘draw.’

[Author]

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