Poetry Writing for Social Change and Empowerment: Online Workshop course (4-6 weeks), taught by acclaimed poet and author

Methodology

Duration : 6 weeks (90 minutes per week) - Price : $150.00 - Place : Little Elm (75068)"There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story within you."

Maya Angelou

What the phenomenal author, poet and essayist Maya Angelou said about depicting one's stories to the world is equally applicable to poetry and storytelling, more so in poetry as poetry writing is the by-product of a restless, volatile mind that reacts instantaneously to the incongruities, prejudices and constraints of our society. From Walt Whitman to Charles Baudelaire, from Rita Dove to Maya Angelou to the most contemporary poets have used their poetic voice and unique styles of visual storytelling as forms of empowerment and dissent.

As a published poet of two poetry collections and of contemporary anthologies, in this course, I propose to illustrate how poetry/spokenwords can be vehicles of social change in a prosaic, comatose world, with readings from these poets/anthologies that matter and conduct poetry writing workshops emphasizing on both style/forms of poetry as well as the content that narrates, educates and empowers society. The workshops are supposed to include constructive critiquing and sharing insights. The aim is to strengthen the aspiring writers' literary voice with the tool of poetry.

Targeted students:
Adult (college level/undergrad, graduate student, any aspiring writer)

Techniques and methods of instruction:

Poetry workshop and lecture combined, with the objective to focus on substantial poetry reading and analysis, explaining the context and relevance of the poems and offer poetry prompts and workshops based on those readings.

Characteristics as a teacher:

Creative, analytical, detail-oriented
Focusing on various themes and social contexts, focusing on style