With more than 240 poems selected from 80 leading poets, this anthology is the first comprehensive collection of post-World War II Japanese poetry to survey all of the major tendencies and developments directly influenced by the war. Beginning with Nishiwaki Junzaburo (1894-1982), who studied Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot, and concluding with Osada…

A hypertext entitled "Reading the Map" comes from the exploration of an individual's own life. Observations, experiences, whatever comes to mind, become part of the text. This constant addition of information adds physically to the text, making a perceived move outward into the social. However, this additional information actually moves…

Although it is satisfying and fulfilling to be part of the professional conversation on English teaching, and to have had one's writing published in journals, two difficulties should be noted. First, the notion still persists that it is publication alone that validates the writing experience. Second, it is wrong to encourage teachers only to write…

Stephen Tchudi, among others, argues that the distinction between expository writing and creative writing is finally a false distinction. Louise Rosenblatt explains that whether readers are reading creative writing or expository writing, they expect the experience of reading to provide them with both information and pleasure. A corollary of these…

A graduate student who was the only composition person in a two semester teaching seminar experienced the dilemma of defining and establishing that identity in the midst of a classroom struggle between cultural studies and literary theorists on one side and creative writers on the other. The factious teaching seminar mirrored the fact that English…

An instructor who teaches composition, poetry, and creative nonfiction at Delta Community College in central Michigan language makes connections and helps people imagine their way fully into subjects. People have a deep, if unconscious and unfocused, need to discover and tell the truth. For one semester his students act like writers. They keep…

This paper describes the way in which the author moved from what might have been a textual explanation of a narrative analysis of qualitative data to a poetic rendition. The focus is on the work of a female graduate student working collaboratively with another graduate student. The story emerged as a teacher-as-researcher study on graduate…

In an episode of MASH in which Radar O'Reiley takes a correspondence course in writing, Col. Potter advises him, "The first rule if you want to be a writer is to be yourself." But what if O'Reiley wrote a series of stories about a corporal's negotiating his place in a system which urges, "don't ask, don't tell?" The colonel's…

A practicum was designed to help 40 students enrolled in creative writing classes at a suburban high school develop criteria with which to evaluate the aesthetic qualities of what they read. They were able to discern the differences between good and bad literature. Students were active participants in the process, performing skits, writing prose…

Effective writing is nearly impossible without engagement with the material. The informal journal may be the only place in the composition class which clearly respects and encourages students' individuality, and which cannot be accused of trying to force them into an academic straitjacket of a sometimes loose, sometimes tight, fit. At the same…

Effective informational writing assignments show students that creativity and imagination are essential to the generation of new ideas in all content areas. A collection of these assignments has been arranged into five categories of increasing complexity based on the following criteria: whether the point of view is assigned as self-selected;…

Inventive activities in the creative writing classroom can generate a great deal of excitement for the writing of poetry. Such activities might begin with improvising ways in which poetry can be written in alternative media, such as haiku on clay tablets that can be glazed and fired, then macramed together into wind chimes. Another activity,…

Skilled writers, contrary to what we tell students, do make frequent use of cliches.

The junior high English teacher should encourage creative writing to make the students more aware of themselves and the world around them. (JH)

Feminist literary criticism seems to have the potential to bring new life to old standards taught in the high school English class even if the students are not themselves feminists. A feminist approach to literature instruction was first attempted using "This Is Just to Say" and "The Young Housewife" by William Carlos Williams…