Spring 2017: Self-Help Writing in a Neoliberal Economy
Course Description
This course will explore two seemingly disparate forms of non-fiction writing, both extremely popular and the intense focus of the publishing industry today: the poetic-essay and the self-help guide. These two forms line up very well with Roland Barthes distinction between ‘writerly’ and ‘readerly’ forms of writing. The former delights in an emotionally engaging and carefully constructed argument, drawing on ethnographic, journalistic, and literary styles. It is published in both niche and middlebrow literary or political journals. The latter amounts to a folk self-cure and can pop up in all kinds of miscellaneous and popular publications. Despite the obvious difference between the two forms—the former is more often high and literary, the latter more often popular and low—they share something common in their indisputable market success today, and thereby an ability to negotiate the neo-liberal economy. What unites these two radically distinct forms of writing? What are the clues that might make visible some kind of shared essence?
This is a writing class with a difference. It demands willingness to experiment and have fun, even to be funny and not always take one’s own writing absolutely seriously. You are expected to try your hand at writing both the poetic long-form essay as well as the self-help guide. This can take the form of a critical parody or it can be sincere. In either case one must think critically about the medium and the message. Style is repetition and as in advanced composition courses in Greek or Latin, your informal class exercises will consist in mimicking the class readings. It is expected that this self-conscious imitation will either channel your inner self-help guru, or enable you to be critically appreciative of the cultural conventions or clichés repeated or rewritten in these texts. In either case, you will have gained profound insights into the secret of both genres’ popularity in our current historical moment, and perhaps even be poised to become a stellar long-form essayist, or the next self-help guru.
Student Learning Objectives (SLO-s)
–Learn about all aspects of self-help writing, its form, content, and commercial dynamics
–Analyze the writerly and the readerly aspects of writing
–Learn about social registers in writing: from the highbrow, to the middlebrow, to the lowbrow
–In tandem with the above, gain insights into the field of contemporary publishing across popular and niche markets
–Cultivate creative writing skills in accordance with an understanding of literature as an institution within a broader culture industry
–Tap into both the critical and comic potentials of parody
–Learn to team-write or write in pairs through a process of workshopping and peer-reviewing
Course Requirements
Informal class exercises in mimicry/parody, individually as well as in small groups
One short meta-commentary reflecting on your informal class exercises (500 words)
One in-class oral presentation (15 minutes) on one of the critical readings prescribed in the syllabus
A final portfolio: consisting of all class assignments worked through and re-edited (one each on the poetic essay and the self-help guide, respectively) and a 2000-word thought-piece on the critical process of working through these two different forms
Required Readings
Mike Davis (2006), Planet of Slums
Joe Sacco (2012), Journalism
Robert Greene (1998), The 48 Laws of Power
Phillip MacGraw (2001), Self Matters: Creating your life from the Inside Out
Barbara Ehrenreich (2010), Bright-Sided: How Positive Thinking is Undermining America
Michel Foucault (1986), The Care of the Self (Selections)
Roland Barthes (197), S/Z (Selections)
Theodor Adorno (1967-8), “Sociology and Psychology” Parts I & II.
Benjamin Noys, “The Power of Negative Thinking”, unpublished working paper.
Michael Taussig, “The Mastery of Non-Mastery”, August 2, 2015, http://www.publicseminar.org/2015/08/the-mastery-of-non-mastery/#.Wdb4FBNSy1t
Ta-Nehisi Coates, “The First White President”, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/10/the-first-white-president-ta-nehisi-coates/537909/, October 2017
Adam Phillips, “Against Self-Criticism”, March 5, 2015, https://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n05/adam-phillips/against-self-criticism
“Dealing with Disappointment”, March 8, 2001, https://www.lrb.co.uk/v23/n05/adam-phillips/dealing-with-disappointment