Group's efforts putting emphasis on writing
URBANA – Just a generation ago, many folks in most professions seldom wrote a sentence after they graduated from high school.
How things have changed.
"Now it doesn't matter what you do, if you're a 21st-century person, you're on a keyboard," said Kent Williamson, executive director of the National Council of Teachers of English, based in Urbana.
To recognize and celebrate that, the council, along with 18 partners nationwide, established the National Day on Writing, which will fall on Oct. 20 every year.
The effort received a boost last Thursday when the U.S. Senate passed a resolution declaring Oct. 20 the National Day on Writing.
Integral to the initiative is The National Gallery of Writing, to which anyone may contribute a piece of writing – either text, audio or video. The compositions will be posted to online galleries.
"Let's imagine memoirs and memos, rants and remembrances, oral histories, letters to the future, postcards from the past, profiles profane and sacred, instructions, directions, reflections, retorts, factual and fancied," Doug Hesse, a member of the National Council of Teachers of English, wrote for a brochure on the National Day on Writing.
In other words, anyone may submit e-mails, letters, journal entries, reports, electronic presentations, blog posts, documentary clips, poetry readings, how-to directions, short stories and memos.
Each person may contribute only one piece or a link to a composition already on the Internet.
People may choose to have their work posted at one of three sites: the Gallery of the National Council of English Teachers, the Gallery of National Partners or the Gallery of Local Partners.
Champaign-Urbana residents can submit to the C-U Writes gallery at http://galleryofwriting.org/galleries/204036.
"We invite all forms of composition about life in C-U – any topic that people in this college town care about. By collecting stories, work samples, jokes, video clips, poems, text messages, recipes, even grocery lists, we'll gain a broad perspective on life in this small but vibrant urban community," curator Lisa Fink wrote.
Once writers have selected a destination, they will be asked to sign a permission waiver. Minors must have permission from a parent or guardian.
The writers also will answer a few questions about themselves and their composition; they may choose to hide that information from readers and search engines or share it openly with the world.
The executive committee of the National Council of Teachers of English decided to push for a National Day on Writing because of the "pretty deep misconceptions" about writing and literacy, Williamson said.
"We can say people can write and many more do than ever before, but the most effective thing is to show them," he said.
The aggregate of writing samples expected will be rich enough in variety and texture that people will come to think differently about how everyone writes, Williamson said.
With the National Day on Writing, the national council has some other goals, one being that a broad sample of Americans' writing will lead to better approaches to teaching and learning about writing, Williamson said.
Submissions are being taken now and through the end of June. The writings will be posted in the various galleries starting Tuesday. No violent or obscene language will be accepted.
Also on Tuesday, the National Council of English Teachers will host at the Urbana Free Library a free event related to the National Day on Writing. (Please see box.) And The New Yorker magazine will mark in Manhattan the National Day on Writing by honoring winners of the Norman Mailer High School and College Writing Awards.
For more information on the National Day on Writing, visit www.ncte.org/dayonwriting.
If you go
What: National Council of Teachers of English hosts "C-U Writes," featuring talks by Ernie Westfield, author, historian and former Negro League baseball player; longtime News-Gazette sports columnist Loren Tate; University of Illinois varsity student-athletes; and Dennis Baron, an English and linguistics professor at the UI.
When: 5 to 8 p.m. Tuesday
Where: Urbana Free Library, 201 W. Green St.
Admission: Free
Also: At the library, people will learn how they can celebrate the National Day on Writing by sharing their writing about life in Champaign-Urbana in the online C-U Writes Gallery. There also will activities for people of all ages and presentations of compositions written by community members.
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- Elm Street to be closed today for sewer-line repairs
- Brazilian beer magnate donates $16.5 million to UI
- Teen involved in fight released into mother's custody
- Identity of officer in Champaign teen shooting released
- Meeting will discuss future of Mumford House
- Obituaries