Women's Autobiography

PAGE 2 OF 4
============================================================================
Date:         Fri, 10 Dec 1999 11:35:11 -0600
From:         Jane Olmsted <Jane.Olmsted  @  WKU.EDU>
Subject:      autobiographical essays

I'm teaching my Women's Biography and Autobiography course in the spring. Have
ordered all the books but would like to do one week on the autobiographical
essay. I'll use Adrienne Rich's "Split at the Root" and Gloria Steinem's
"Ruth's Songs" for sure.

Do any other stunning autobiographical essays come to mind, written by women,
and perhaps especially dealing with mothers and fathers (as do Steinem and
Rich's)?

Much thanks. Send privately and if I get more than one or two suggestions,
I'll post to the list:

jane.olmsted  @  wku.edu
============================================================================
Date:         Fri, 25 Feb 2000 08:06:37 -0600
From:         Jane Olmsted <Jane.Olmsted  @  WKU.EDU>
Subject:      autobiographical essays

Some time ago I asked for suggestions for autobiographical essays (not
excerpts). Here are the responses. Apologies for forgetting to send these
earlier.
jane

jane.olmsted  @  wku.edu
----
Autobiographical Essays

Minnie Bruce Pratt's book Rebellions is excellent.  They are all
autobiographical essays, but my favorite (to teach) is "Maps in my Bible"
another is by Irena Klepfisz.  I'm not sure of the title, whether it is Words
from the Mother Tongue or her other book (one is a book of poems).
Vicki Kirsch
=======

Although not an essay, per se, but I just have to suggest Mina Loy's
autobiographical long poem, "Anglo-Mongrels and the Rose." It intriguingly
critiques language in relation to the  the male symbolic's effect on women as
subject -- within in and against its own  autobiographical structure.  It also
crtiques the 19th c. Victorian
culture of virginity and certain other economic ideologies.
Megan Jewell
=======

Take a look at _The Female Autograph_, edited collection of essays; ed. Is
Domna Stanton.  The introductory essays (2) are excellent; the internal
autobiographies/ essays are unusual and provocative.
=======

How about Alice Walker's "In Search of Our Mothers Gardens" in the collection
of the same name?
=======

Loy's "Anglo-Mongrels" in its best known entirety, is in The Last Lunar
Baedecker. Ed. Roger Conover. Highlands: The Jargon Society, 1982.  I think
there is also a 1985 edition. Also, I think both are out of print, but am not
completely sure. ILL is probably in order. Hope this helps, enjoy reading Loy!

Megan Jewell
mjewell  @  belmont.cc.oh.us
=======

There have been a number of anthologies that would be relevant.  I believe the
Florence Howe might post a note about something I remember her press putting
out.  Also there is I'VE ALWAYS MEANT TO TELL YOU, ed by Constance Warloe,
Pocket Books, 1997 reprinted as FROM DAUGHTERS TO MOTHERS.  They are all
essays in the form of letters to the mothers of various women.

marge piercy 
=======

Although it's in book rather than essay form(but short), you should consider
Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy..... exquisitely and movingly written.
Also, Shevy Healey's "Growing to Be an Old Woman: Aging and Ageism"in Woman
and Aging: An Anthology by Women (Calyx Books).
Joan Starker, Ph.D.
jstarker  @  teleport.com
=======

A colleague forwarded your posting re:autobiographical essays by women. I'm
teaching a course on Women's Personal Essay and Memoir next semester so am
interested in the same thing.  The first name that comes to mind for me is
always Nancy Mairs, who talks about motherhood from the mother's point of
view in Plaintext.  I've forgotten now whether any of her essays focus on
mothers or fathers.

There is always, of course, Alice Walker's "In Search of Our Mother's
Gardens."

Oh yes, another really good one is Janet Campbell Hale's "Daughter of
Winter" in her essay collection called Bloodlines: Odyssey of a Native
Daughter.

I'm sure there are others that aren't coming to mind at the moment because
I don't have my list in front of me.  (This is the way my rapidly aging
mind works.)  Are you familiar with the Beacon Book of Contemporary Essays
by Women?  I've ordered it for my class but haven't read the essays in
advance--I'm going to ask them to choose some things and then we'll all
read them together.

PLEASE let me know what you hear from others.  I'm very interested!
P.S.  Oh, don't forget Jane Tompkins' "My Father's Penis"!

Libby Rankin
Professor of English and
Director, Office of Instructional Development
Box 7104
University of North Dakota
Grand Forks, ND 58202
(701) 777-4233
=======

You may want to consider the essay by Jeremy D. Popkin, "Historians on the
Autobiographical Frontier," American Historical Review, Volume 104, Number
3 (June 1999)735-748.
=======

    Your class sounds great--I just finished teaching a similar class this
semester, and it wen't quite well.  I wanted to put in a plug for bell hooks's
essays.  Most of them are autobiographical to begin with, but I'd particularly
recommend pieces in _Talking  Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Back_ and in
_Yearning: Race, Gender, and Cultural Politics_.  In my experience, students
like hooks's essays, which tend to approach fairly complex issues in ways that
are fairly easily grasped.

Good luck with the class!
Debbie Mix

Visiting Assistant Professor
Dept. of American Thought & Language
Michigan State University
=======

Are you open to autobiographies that are not only White American?  Colette's
In My Mother's House is stunning, as are Maya Angelou's I Know Why The Caged
Bird Sings, Harriet Jacobs'  Autobiography of a Slave Girl by Harriet
Jacobs, Maxine Hong Kingston's Woman Warrior, and how about a book that
shook the world,  the Diary of Anne Frank?

Dr. Phillipa Kafka
Professor Emerita,  English
English Department, Kean University
Union, New Jersey 07083
kafka  @  cybernex.net
=======

lyn hejinian has an experimental essay called _my life_ briefly excerpted
in _from the other side of the century_, ed. douglas messerli.  as a
proponent of radical writing i like to mix up the "form" of autobiography,
and the nice thing about this one for students is that this excerpt is
short, so they get a taste of experiment without having to struggle too
much.  you might also consider a piece of mary karr's _liar's club_.  if
you're brave you could try a piece of  _the kiss_.

kass fleisher
=======

Try the "Identification and Love" section in Maria Lugones' "Playfulness,
'World'- Traveling and Loving Perception" (in Anzalduas' Making Face, Making
Soul). It is short and very interesting--on women of color.

Cheers,
Maria Proitsaki
=======

There's a wonderful theoretical text, THE AUTO/BIOGRAPHICAL I by Liz
Stanley, which focuses on the mother/daughter relationship (among other
things).  --Temma Berg
=======

try germain greer's  'daddy we hardly knew you' - some time since I read
it, but in might be a good one.
Hilary.
=======

I wouldn't describe my own work as "stunning autobiographical essays" but I
have written a book of personal-philosophical essays called _Family
Pictures: A Philosopher Explores the Familiar_ (Open Court, 1998).  There
is an essay about something I have learned from my father ("My Father the
Philosopher), another about something I learned from my mother (My Mother
the Mirror), and another about something I learned from my mother-in-law
(Her Silks, Her Self).

The three essays are quite different from one another.  Perhaps one of them
would be appropriate for your class.

Thanks,
Laura Kaplan

Dr. Laura Duhan Kaplan
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Coordinator, Women's Studies Program
University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Charlotte, NC  28223
phone: 704-547-2780
fax: 704-547-2172
email: ldkaplan  @  email.uncc.edu
============================================================================
Date:     Wed, 18 Oct 2000 14:40:03 +0000
From:     Jane Olmsted <Jane.Olmsted  @  WKU.EDU>
Subject:  Re: Women's autobiography course (fwd)

Sorry this is coming so long after the original query about activities in a
women's autobiography course.....I wanted to share what my class did last 
time I taught our Women's Biography and Autobiography course.

Inspired by Sidonie Smith and Julia Watson's "Getting a Life: Everyday Uses of
Autobiography," I asked students to present on some "other" form of
autobiography in a 15-minute oral presentation, towards the end of the semester. 
I provided a list of possibilities, and they also came up with their own. 
The presentations were so much fun, such a release for all of us, after a 
semester of "heavy" reading.

Here s what they did:
*One group presented a skit of four passengers on an airplane, one of whom moved
from one to the other, spilling her guts.
*One group interviewed hairdressers to have them talk about why people talk
personally to them during haircuts; they got some fabulous footage on video.
*One group did photographic autobiographies (self-portraits).
*One group presented on personal ads.

We did this in addition to their "final," which was a memoir. The class was
unanimous about hearing something from everybody, so they were each given about
8-10 minutes (if I remember right) to present whatever part of their narrative
they wanted. We had about 22 students, and everyone got to read. The effect was
stunning. All of us were moved to tears and laughter, depending. One person read
very little, saying she wanted to skip all the hard parts, and that was an
option . . no one was forced to read, but all ended up doing so, and I heard 
again and again how powerful a way it was, to end with their own stories, after 
a semester of reading and analyzing and theorizing about it all.

It s a great course to teach, full of opportunities for meaningful writing and
analysis and for sharing and creative thinking.

Jane

jane.olsmted  @  wku.edu
Western Kentucky University
============================================================================