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| Demetria Martinez is
a novelist, poet, and columnist for the National Catholic Reporter.
She has taught creative writing courses and workshops at universities
and colloquiums in the US and abroad. Based in Tucson, she is active
with the Arizona Border Rights Project-Derechos Humanos and on the
editorial committee of Curbstone Publishing Company. Her award winning
novel, Mother Tongue, is based in part upon her 1987-1988 federal
indictment in connection with writing about the entry of Salvadoran
refugees into the United States. Martinez was accused of conspiracy
to smuggle refugee women into the country. The trial drew international
attention to First Amendment issues such as the right of a reporter
to cover so- called illegal activities, and the right not to have
political and religious beliefs used against a person in a court of
law. Her 1989 acquittal was hailed as a major First Amendment victory.
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Creativity, Crisis & Change:
The Writer's Life
Demetria Martinez
Wednesday-Sunday February
27-March 3, 2002
Thurman J. White Forum Conference Center (OCCE)
University of Oklahoma, Norman Campus
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Throughout history, writing has been a means of self-exploration
and transformation. Indeed, to know the self is a key tenet of
the world’s great wisdom traditions. At the same time, writing,
by its very nature, opens the self to the world at large; writers
have long been voices for the voiceless, vanguards in movements
for social change. Tragically, our society, shackled by its cult
of expertise, has relegated “the writer’s life”
to so-called professional writers. Nonetheless, we have, in recent
years, witnessed a countertrend: increasingly, people from all
walks of life are keeping journals, writing stories and poems,
and taking workshops. They are sharing their work at readings
and rallies. Some are publishing—or simply savoring the pleasures
of the process in private. In other words, they are tapping the
spiritual, intellectual and political energy that the writing
process can awaken. This is an especially critical undertaking
in a time of global crisis, when events can leave us speechless
if not hopeless; this at a time when we most need to cultivate
vision. As Eduardo Galeano writes in his landmark essay, In Defense
of the Word: “A literature born in the process of crisis
and change, and deeply immersed in the risks and events of its
time, can indeed help to create the symbols of the new reality,
and perhaps—if talent and courage are not lacking—throw
light on the signs along the road.”
Our seminar will be an intensive immersion in “the writer’s
life.” Our activities will include in-class writing exercises
that encompass poetry and/or journaling; and discussions on craft
and process based on assigned readings and facilitated by Demetria
Martinez. Visiting lecturer/photographer Douglas Kent Hall will
work with students on a fiction section in which students will
learn to map out a story using photos as a point of departure—images
taken by students using disposable cameras.
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The Class Reading List: (These books and articles supplied
by OSLEP)
Mother Tongue,
Demetria Martinez, Ballantine, 1996
Breathing Between the Lines, Demetria Martinez, University
of Arizona Press
Writing and the Spiritual Life: Finding Your Voice by Looking
Within, Patrice Vecchione, Contemporary Books, 2001
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