I would like to do a creative essay/write!
YOUR ASSIGNMENT:
• Instead of culminating in an essay, this final project will be creative. Whether you choose to work individually or collaboratively, your project should still show your understanding of course texts and themes; skills of analysis and/or connection; as well as creative and interpretative thinking. This project will allow you to engage with aspects of the course literature, context, and themes that were most interesting and meaningful to you.
• Compose a creative work that is imitative, inspired, or completely new and related to women’s literature, history, and/or themes. All of the remix ideas require you to play around with genre, style, context, theme, character, and/or medium, so while it is creative, it is also interpretive. My hope is that this project will be enjoyable for you as it also stretches your mind and abilities.
• Even though this project is creative and open, you should take it seriously as you would an essay. Show that you have put real thought into your project. Consider what you would like to say and how you want to say it, thinking carefully about your inspiration, overall vision, and specific choices. This is a chance to be an artist and assert a voice or point of view like those we have encountered this semester.
• Perfection in style/design is not a requirement to doing well on this assignment. It will be obvious who put in effort and who didn’t, and most importantly, I’ll be considering your ideas fueling the project even if execution isn’t perfect. Have fun!
CREATIVE IDEAS:
You may consider a creative work like any of the following possibilities (and some of these could even be combined):
•
• Write a different backstory, beginning, ending, or extension to a text
• Rewrite a text from a different character’s perspective or point of view
• Write as a character different genre (like journal entries by a character, for example)
• Modernize a text (setting, characters, etc), or set in a different time or place
• Rewrite a text in a different genre (poem, play, memoir, song)
• Mash up two or more stories (settings, characters, plots, etc) in some way
• Retell a text through voice/style of someone well-known (like a famous person) or another author so that the product becomes an interesting juxtaposition
• Do a parody or satire version of a text so that you gently or harshly make fun of the original text or ideas within
• Alter or add major element to a text (ex: the couple breaks off the engagement; a character doesn’t die; add a character who didn’t exist like a sister) and see what else changes
• Write a conversation between characters, authors, or critics about a historical or contemporary topic (like a written skit)
• Respond as an early author or character to modern events
• Represent a text—or an aspect of it—in a visual way (comic, painting, collage, skit, etc)
• Create an original digital, visual, 3d, or performance work in any medium inspired by women’s literature, history, or issues
• Write a personal creative work inspired by a literary text in order to see how literature can prompt exploration of your life
• Create a soundtrack and cover art based on the course, a time period, a genre, or a region
• Another amazing idea that you have! You are only limited by your imagination, inspiration, talents, and tools
GENRE & MEDIUM:
• You may decide to do a project that solely involves writing—which is fine.
• But, if you want to explore other formats, your project could be in a contemporary multi-media format (video, website, audio, visual) or more traditional multi-media format (needlework, paper, arts and crafts, painting, sculpture, music, etc).
• There are so many genres you could consider (these don’t cover them all!): infographic, LARP (Live Action Role Play) game design, diorama, lego stop-motion animation project, children’s story version, a board or card game, listicle, timeline, lesson plan for teaching, podcast, advertisements, comic, painting, manifesto, photo essay, film trailer….
• In the past, I have gotten a wide range of interesting projects such as original songs, new endings to works, scenes rewritten from a different character’s point of view, personal stories inspired by texts, paintings, collages, ethnographic interview projects, author skits, board games, place dioramas, video scenes, modern parodies of older texts, musical soundtracks, podcasts from a story character, video essays, cultural analysis essays, etc.
