Yes, that's how it is here too, Doug, there are
usually more and sometimes all women in my classes,
and they're undergrads and vary from freshman to
seniors, to those who are creative writing majors and
therefore juniors or seniors and those who are new to
the school and haven't taken creative writing before.
Teaching is as much about the dynamics that the group
creates as anything, and it always changes.

When the group is mostly women, I've noticed that
there is a reluctance to talk, to participate in
discussion, and to read one's own work; I don't know
how to describe this really but I take it for a sort
of feeling circumscribed by fear of the other women's
opinions, that their own ideas or work aren't as
'good'. And so usually I have to do a number of
things, like read all their poems outloud myself
without saying who the work belongs to, or having
individual meetings with each of them the first couple
of weeks, and by the third week, it's much more like
you describe where they are so conversing that
'teaching' is mostly a matter of getting out of the
way.

One semester, I had about five men and six women in
the group and that was the most difficult, for a
number of reasons, but mostly because the men each had
a definite idea of his poetics (one was writing 19th
century Russian epics, another the same scatalogical
sonnets for 3 years, another a performance poet, etc)
and none of them agreed or even respected the other
guys' direction. So a couple of women, juniors and
creative writing majors, tried to create a sort of
moderated space in the room, which didn't work so
well, since the guys sat in their various realms at
the end of the table and wouldn't comment while the
women felt they were always commenting on the men's
work and not getting any feedback on their own. So
that took more individual meetings, because it seemed,
when it came down to it, that most of these men felt
isolated, that they felt scorned by the views of the
other men, and then they began talking to each other.

So I can't say as there ever seems to be any rule. At
the community college where I taught, it was generally
true that older men and women attending class had a
tendency to dominate conversations, and the Native
American students often said nothing, in part because
of the cultural sense of not putting oneself forward
unless one has something to say of significance to the
group.

And congratulations on the publication of yours and
Sheila's book!

best,

Rebecca

--- Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> In my junior classes, & for some years now, there
> were more women than
> men, but also the women tended to speak out more
> often than the men. In
> senior courses, pretty well the same situation. Also
> in the creative
> writing classes, where I arranged so that everyone
> had to speak out,
> but where usually the women did so more thoroughly,
> more carefully,
> more usefully.
>
> My last grad class, on Experimental Poetry by
> Canadian Women, had only
> women students, & after the first week or so, they
> talked to each other
> & I just listened most of the time -- one of the
> best classes I ever
> 'taught'....
>
> Doug
> Douglas Barbour
> 11655 - 72 Avenue NW
> Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9
> (780) 436 3320
>
> Even-
> ing
> will
> come
>
> They
> will
> sew
> the
> Blue
> Sail
>
> Ian Hamilton Finlay
>


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