Ideas about how to encourage FLOW with storytelling

"Scholarly values — like comprehensiveness and objectivity — are so often at odds with our storytelling impulses. Setting aside those values and conventions can sometimes be useful, especially during the drafting process."

From Rubinstein, Helen Betya, and Anna Zeide. 2021. “Lessons for Academics From a Weekend Writing Retreat.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. August 19, 2021. http://www.chronicle.com/article/lessons-for-academics-from-a-weekend-writing-retreat.

• It’s possible to use your imagination to bring life to your work, without losing credibility. Frame imaginative details with words like “maybe” or “might have.” Paint a variety of possibilities (“Maybe she has a well-thumbed copy of Harland’s cookbook, or maybe she can’t afford a cookbook, and goes to her friend’s house to get recipes …”). Be clear that you are grounding your speculation in research (“Like many laborers of the 19th century, he might have …”).

• It’s not only OK to be transparent about the fact there are things you don’t know, it’s compelling. It builds your ethos as a narrator and gives the reader a position to identify with.

• Including more of yourself in your scholarly writing doesn’t have to mean describing yourself in an archive or using the first person. It could just mean including more of your own thought process — from that first earnest, searching question to an eventual hypothesis or claim.

• You don’t have to shy away from evaluative claims: Readers are drawn to moral judgment.

• It’s almost always worthwhile to follow the part of the story and the mode of engagement (reflection, argument, narrative) that is most genuinely interesting to you. It will lead to a richer, more lively final text, and a more positive writing experience.

• Especially during the drafting process, try not to fixate on “showing your work” — that is, getting caught up in the citations and evidence that substantiate your argument. Sacrificing comprehensiveness (at least in the early stages of writing) can help you clarify the trajectory of your thinking. You can add evidence later, when your sense of which details are necessary to include is clearer.

• Sometimes when we think of “narrative” or “public facing” scholarship, we feel obligated to turn toward individuals, especially larger-than-life historical figures. But it’s not necessary to lean on individuals to illuminate a larger story. Instead, try focusing your work around the members of a community, or on a question with clear public relevance.

• Consider how an essay (or article, or chapter) takes its readers on a journey. How can you invite the reader into your thought process from the very beginning? How can you give readers an entry point, and then hold their hand as you proceed?