Writing Style

As with elsewhere within this website, I am allowing the writing style per se to evolve over time. However, I am aware at the outset of a particular style of writing in which I am interested and want to keep at least in the back of my mind: performative writing.

Performative writing

Performative writing (not to be confused with writing that is performed or even with writing about performances) is a style of academic writing associated with postmodernism. Often the subject matter of performative writing is associated with a piece of visual or performance art. My object of interest, because of its visual and performance aspects, is the body - Human and otherwise.

Performative writing also allows the writer considerable scope which, as a result, allows that writer to feel less straitjacketed by the form via which ideas are conveyed. Given what I have said elsewhere on this site, this seems to me to be a very attractive proposition. However, I do not want to have so much scope that what I write appears undisciplined. Nor do I want to fall foul of the many criticisms that have been levelled at performative writing that, for example, it is self-indulgent and insular. I seek to be neither of these; indeed, quite the opposite.

What to expect – or not expect

At the outset, I do not expect there to be the usual 'Beginning – Middle – End' structure to each entry. I am not setting out to produce complete wholes or fully rounded arguments but ideas and impressions as they appear to me. As such, it will be reasonable to ask questions and leave them unanswered or only partially explored. Academic resources should be as much about unanswered questions as they are about propositions. All too often they are only about the latter.