Cyber-Writing-Space-Junkie

I've avoided electronic writing for as long as electronic writing has existed. Maybe it was a fear of exposing too much, or perhaps a fear of seeing too much of others due to their self exposure. Wait-- I think it was actually poemophobia. You know, being forced to read every body's really bad poetry on their MySpace and blogs and wherever else they can post it. There's so much of it that even the good poetry in the mix starts to wear on me. However, thanks to a multi-media course taught by Dr. Sarah Pace, I have overcome my fears and have learned to appreciate all forms of the written arts.

I use the phrase "written arts" because I do consider writing an art form, and I also use the phrase to refer to the digital canvas as well as the paper, parchment, stone, wood, or even skin canvases-- whatever medium the artist chooses. In Dr. Pace’s class, we discussed how the web is not always viewed as true writing. In Jay David Bolter's book, "Writing Space" there is a lot of discussion as to what a writing space actually is. Is the printed word and bound book the only real form of writing, or can writing actually include cyberspace or even solely the human mind? Coming from the view of an artist, I say artists choose their medium. Christo used thousands of yards of fabric, Michelangelo used marble,

(The David: www.boingboing.net), Andy Warhol used screen prints, and many others have used whatever the hell they wanted. The viewers may decide that some particular form of art is not for them, and even consider the form sub-standard. Regardless of opinion, it is still art. Does modern art routinely anger me? Yes. But it is still art.

In addition to contemplating the written arts and overcoming poemophobia, in Dr. Pace’s class I did gain a much greater respect for electronic writing spaces. As mentioned before, I try to approach things from the view of an artist, and I had no idea how much I would enjoy combining two of my life’s great loves: writing and visual art. I honestly had never thought about cyberspace as a writing space. Until this class I never really considered my mind an actual writing space either. It always feels like my mind is a clipboard with random ideas crammed under the clip. But why can’t it be a writing space? And why not cyberspace? Cyberspace doesn’t run out of paper, ink, erasers, and it never gives me a paper cut. It is safe from coffee stains, cat claws, teething puppies, and anything else that can wreck havoc on a delicate sheet of paper. A favorite quote of mine from Kahlil Gibran says a lot to me about the traditional paper writing space: “Trees are poems that earth writes upon the sky; we fell them down and turn them into paper, that we may record our emptiness.” With cyberspace, we can record all the emptiness and bad poetry that we could ever want, and never have the guilt of felling a tree.

In Dr. Pace’s class, we all created our own blogs. This was a little scary for me. However, this wasn’t a class about writing uber-personal thoughts and bad poetry. It was a class on writing and using all forms of writing, especially electronic forms. I was shocked at how much I loved creating blogs and loved reading the other class members’ blogs. We all learned how complex writing for blogs and websites could be. There are many parts to consider, such as background colors, font colors, pictures, videos, hyperlinks, and of course, how to make our subject matter relevant to the class without boring our classmates to tears. Everyone seemed to immediately understand a different style of writing. The blog posts were witty, informative, creative, and absolutely captivating. I felt like I was able to take a peek into the mind of all these writers-- and I actually wanted another peek.

This class changed my entire perspective on writing. I would take this course every single semester if I could. I conquered my fear of electronic writing; reading other people’s electronic writing, and I grew to understand an entirely new way to write.

To me, the written and visual arts are now a perfect balance, yin and yang, a marriage of soul-mates, coffee and creamer, cake and ice cream, new shoes and a little black dress.

(coffee:www.gbahtavern.com)

The two need each other to be complete. My mind is more open as a writer, and I feel that I have finally found the area of writing that I just cannot seem to get enough of. Thanks to Dr. Pace’s incredibly successful course, I’m now a cyber-writing-space-junkie.

(Yin Yang Bugs: www.walyou.com)