1The objective of this paper is to present some preliminary conclusions on the defining aspects of creative writing, and in particular creative writing in second and foreign language learning, as a body of knowledge. It seeks to address a number of key questions in relation to the field with a view to offering some theoretical foundations and methodological tools for future research.
- 1 Poetry that explores the experience of living between languages and cultures, by poets from the Uni (...)
2The study is interdisciplinary in origin and form as it applies analytical tools developed within the field of the Educational Sciences to research work – itself interdisciplinary as drawing on plurilingualism and psychoanalysis – developed in the field of English Studies. Sara Greaves has researched and practised creative writing in relation to translation studies, the plurilingual Skin-voice and the Mother tongue (Greaves and Schultze, 2012; 2015, Greaves, in press) over a period of several years. Using a clinical approach and the theoretical tools of a didactic analysis, Tracy Bloor seeks to offer some insights into the use of creative writing teaching-learning practice by examining a course developed by Sara Greaves. Based on transcultural poetry1 and creative writing practices, this course was part of an English language degree programme in a French university.
3The use of the theoretical and methodological tools developed within the educational sciences to examine this programme sought to render visible how the teaching-learning practice analysed here, guided students to experience and experiment a creative use of the English language. This is a research question of particular interest: creative writing is a relatively new field which is difficult to comprehend as a teaching-learning practice. In some ways it still struggles for academic recognition, perhaps particularly in France.
4The effectiveness of the course, and the knowledge of the teacher as a practical connoisseur2 of the practice, are taken as an a priori. The focus of the study was not so much to assess the success of the course in relation to a pre-defined set of objectives, but rather to gain insight into how creative writing works as a teaching-learning practice. In other words, to identify the mechanisms at work which made this programme an effective means of achieving linguistic and literary enrichment so as to gain some insight into creative writing language learning practices in general. In founding the study on the analysis of the teaching-learning didactic activity of a practical connoisseur in the domain, the study is situated within the practice-based evidence paradigm (Bryk, 2015), or more precisely that of cultural evidence and the paradigm of accomplishment3 (Sensevy, 2022). That is to say, in examining the course content, together with the teaching strategies and know-how required for the course content to work effectively, its findings present the cultural evidence of a practical connoisseur’s practice. This expert practice, or art de faire, is itself founded on the skills and knowledge of the domain of creative writing and language learning acquired through research and experimentation over a period of several years using multidisciplinary sources; it is the source of the practical connoisseur’s effective regulation of the teaching-learning practice.
- 4 In the sense used by Kuhn (1970/1996).
5The article is organised in the following manner. First, the hypotheses underlying the course content as well as the research questions of the paper are presented, followed by a general outline of the epistemological underpinnings of the conception of language guiding the didactic analysis of the teaching-learning practice explored. A description of the theoretical notions of jargon and thought style used to model and analyse the “classroom” practice (the course was online) are next described. This includes the Oulipian writing constraints which are presented as an exemplar4 of creative writing practices as a body of knowledge. Detailed extracts of classroom activity, as well as examples of student productions, are then analysed using the notions of jargon and thought style. Finally, the findings of the study are reported: these are essentially a number of insights into how knowledge was constructed in the different teaching-learning situations analysed.
6The approach presented in this paper raises some questions regarding the social aspect of second language learning and the kinds of didactic activity that would be effective in its acquisition. A principle underlying the didactic analysis of this work is that meaning is constructed in social spaces, and that language is not a uniquely individual phenomenon (Vygotsky, 1934; Mead, 1931; Dewey, 1938/1997; Halliday, 1978; Maniglier, 2016; Sensevy et al., 2019; Bloor, 2020; Bloor & Santini, 2022). This principle was coherent with the underlying principles embedded in the teaching-learning practice analysed. The major tenets of the course developed by Sara Greaves were that poetry, and in particular transcultural poetry, is a fruitful genre for exploring personal expressions of a language; that in conjunction with creative writing activities, it facilitates the construction of teaching-learning situations that allow for the exploration of creative expression in communication with others. This objective was not intended as an invitation for students to write autobiographical texts, but rather to present them with an opportunity to explore the links between the personal and the universal and, ideally, to embark them on a journey of linguistic enrichment and transcultural emancipation.
7The first hypothesis explored in the course, which emerged from Sara Greaves’s work on its development over a period of several years, is that one of the reasons the plurilingual creative writing activities are of interest for second language learning is that they enable students to explore and extend their own boundaries. In exploring multiple identities in interaction with others, students are encouraged to seek insight into the links within poetic language between the personal and the universal, the private and the public, the primary lalangue (Lacan, 1975) and the epic voice. The second related hypothesis of the course was that in exploring different ways of being, students might overcome the limitations of cultural determinism through artistic expression. The third related hypothesis of the course was that linguistic enrichment becomes possible in environments that provide students with the opportunity to explore the source of language itself; that is to say, in environments where the sense of self is developed in communication with others, where language takes form.
8To apprehend better the mechanisms at work in this course, the following questions are addressed in this paper. What can be posited as a useful epistemological underpinning for the study of creative writing, in particular as a language learning practice? What epistemic potential does this relatively new field hold? What criteria can be used to identify the knowledge at stake in creative activities undertaken in classroom practice and how can effective learning be identified? Finally, how might these criteria shed light on the hypotheses underlying the course analysed.
9The didactic analysis of the classroom practice presented in this article will be undertaken using a clinical approach (Bulterman-Bos, 2008; Foucault, 1963; Santini, Bloor & Sensevy, 2018). The course took place during a period of Covid restrictions in January-April 2020, and consequently in-person lessons were not possible. For this reason, recorded videoconferences played an essential role in documenting the main features of “classroom” activity. They provided a representation of the teaching-learning practice which included a maximum of detail without any additional commentary or interpretation. The recordings were then transcribed and carefully described (Ryle, 1968/2009; Sensevy, 2011, Bloor & Santini, 2022) before any attempt was made to analyse them. This was to provide an initial source of empirical data which was as close as possible to the actual practice.
10Extracts from the recorded activity were then chosen as emblematic examples (Kuhn, 1977) to provide clues (Ginzburg, 1979) to identify signs of activity pertinent to the questions explored in this research. This required identifying the language explored by students in class in relation to the culturally-constructed targeted body of knowledge of literary criticism and creation. The notions of jargon and thought style were used to model aspects of the didactic activity so as to situate the language explored by students in relation to that of literary criticism and creation as a specialist practice. This required some understanding of literary criticism and creation as a culturally-constructed body of knowledge. To that end, the practices of the Oulipo community are presented as an exemplar of this body of knowledge so as to lend some insight into the jargon and thought style inherent in poetry as a culture and creative writing as a body of knowledge.
11Identifying what might constitute the creative use of a target language is a complex task as it raises the question as to the nature of language itself. Depending on the field of research, language might be viewed as linguistic phenomena that can be studied as an abstract system (Bloomfield, 1933/1984; Chomsky, 1957), or as a semiotic system (Peirce, 1878), or as being inherently context sensitive (Foucault, 1969; Halliday, 1985). In the case of this study, being able to progress to a creative use of a target language implied the necessary condition of accessing the source of language itself. However, the question regarding the origin of language is complex. It involves questioning where the transition from thought to language might occur: in people’s heads or in some form of interpersonal space in a meshwork of semiotic systems? (For the latter view, see Vygotsky, 1934/2012; Mead, 1931; Dewey, 1938/1997; Halliday, 1978; Maniglier, 2018; Bloor, 2020).
12Wittgenstein’s conception of the nature of language is a useful starting point for a didactic analysis, and it is the view of language adopted for the analytical aspect of this study. From Wittgenstein’s perspective words, gestures, expressions and so on, come alive within a language game, a culture or a “form of life”: “For a large class of cases —though not for all— in which we employ the word ‘meaning’ it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language.” (Sect. 43 of Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations, 1953). In other words, the meaning of a word can be understood by an investigation of the different uses to which it can be put. As with the diversity of functions of different tools in a toolbox, words can be used in a range of functions.
13Wittgenstein introduces the concept of language games in his activity-oriented perspective on language. He doesn’t give a strict definition of the term but rather a long list of examples as an illustration of how words have meaning in the context of different activities (Philosophical Investigations 23). He states “… the word ‘language-game’ is used here to emphasise the fact that the speaking of language is part of an activity, or of a form of life” (Philosophical Investigations 23).
14Thus, in this study language is seen as being composed of language games within forms of life which produce certain thought styles (Fleck, 1935/2008; Bazerman, 1988; Sensevy, Gruson, Le Hénaff, 2019; Bloor, 2020; Bloor and Santini, 2022) together with an associated jargon (Sensevy et al. 2019; Bloor, 2020; Bloor and Santini, 2022). Based on a Wittgenstein conception of the nature of language, the notions of jargon and thought style are proposed as useful tools for modelling and analysing didactic practice (Bloor, 2020; Bloor, 2022). These notions are described in detail below; they will be used to analyse the teaching-learning practice explored in this transcultural poetry/creative writing course.
15In general usage, the term jargon tends to have a somewhat negative connotation and can be associated with an obscure, even pretentious use of language. However, there is no negative connotation in the notion of jargon as used in this study. Its use is akin to a dictionary definition of the term, for example, that of the Cambridge Dictionary: “special words and phrases that are used by particular groups of people, especially in their work”. Our use of the term goes beyond this definition of specialised vocabulary to include an understanding of how the skills and crafts of a domain can literally be embedded in the language of its associated practice: it thus denotes more than vocabulary as it includes an understanding of the background to the practice which also gives it shape. In the case of this transcultural poetry/creative writing course it can therefore be understood as a system of expressions specific to this cultural practice; it both produces and is produced by that same cultural practice and its accompanying thought style.
16The jargon of a cultural practice is thus its linguistic system: a network of terms, expressions and various discourses that might occur within the forms of life specific to that cultural practice. An example to illustrate this point, taken from this study, is the critical literary analysis of a poem and the way it might be described and discussed within a literary community sharing that form of life. Such discussions would entail specific language games (Wittgenstein, 1953) associated with literary criticism. These would then be both the source and the result of the jargon related to the practice. This point will be illustrated with specific examples in 4.1.1.
- 5 Cf. Christine Collière-Whitehead’s contribution to this issue.
- 6 Cf. the Skin-voice (« Voix-peau ») in Sara Greaves, Côté guerre côté jardin : excursions dans la po (...)
- 7 For instance: Scottish poets Jackie Kay and Tom Leonard, Guyanese poets Grace Nichols, Fred D’Aguia (...)
17As it is in acquiring and mastering the jargon of a particular form of life that individuals ultimately come to be integrated into the thought style of a community of practice, evidence was sought in classroom activity of students’ use of the jargon of critical literacy as a sign of developing knowledge. Similarly, evidence was sought in student productions of the style and content (the jargon) of poems analysed in class. The creative aspect of poetry as a cultural practice is more complex to illustrate due to its inherent, and even ideal unpredictability. As Craig Raine writes in Strong Words: Modern Poets on Modern Poetry, “Often language tells us what to think. Poetry, though, can use language to help us escape this tyranny of language” (Herbert & Hollis 178-9). Poetry might be seen as the crucible in which language is melted and re-moulded, a language that reaches back to what Lacan terms lalangue (1975) with its insistent sound patterning and wordplay. As such it explores our most intimate relationship with language.5 At the same time, poetry often pertains to what might be seen as the collective, rallying point of the epic voice. For this reason, it offers the potential to explore intimate language in relation to wider social, political or existential themes. It is a genre that straddles the gap between the epic and the lyrical, in which public, even political, and personal voices often meet; the language of intimacy and sensual pleasure that transports the reader back to the early experiences of language, while challenging the norms and representations of language and society or frames of thought.6 There is no space here for an in-depth discussion of the specifics of poetry and prose, but contemporary, transcultural poets such as those used on this course7 often engage in fairly direct terms with the private/public divide, thus providing inspiring models for students.
18Based on this understanding of poetry, didactic activity in which students used their second language creatively, was seen as evidence of the creative aspect of the jargon of poetry and of students engaging in the culture of poetry and creative expression. That is to say, use of language in which students seemed to capture something of the pleasurable dimension of the Mother tongue thereby irrigating their second language expression with the affect it often lacks. The conception of the Mother tongue relevant here is as a plural, not monolithic, entity that as theorised by Monique De Mattia-Viviès:
In fact, all children are at least bilingual, and most often trilingual within their Mother tongue, which can be broadly subdivided into three categories:
– lalangue, body and sound oriented, a private language shared by mother and child;
– language of the interior, articulated language, at once sociolect, idiolect, and language of affect, the language of the child’s close family circle, of their people; and
- 8 Cf. Monique De Mattia-Viviès’s original article, in French: « Entrer dans la langue ou dans les lan (...)
– language of the exterior, including the language used at school, of varying degrees of sociological and idiolectal discrepancy with the interior language. (Greaves and De Mattia-Viviès 22)8
19The Mother tongue spans the spectrum from intimate to public varieties of language, just as transcultural poetry straddles the private/public divide.
20A thought style refers to the intertwined perception and conception developed within a particular form of life. What one sees is not an action that is independent from the conception of the “object” of one’s gaze: there is an organic relationship between perception and conceptualization. A few common optical illusions to exemplify this disposition are the rabbit/duck and older/younger woman images: one sees a rabbit but in the next instant a duck; the wizened contours of an older woman’s face and in the following second the smooth profile of a young woman’s face and shoulders. These experiences of our own cognitive processes teach us how strongly our existing disposition to ‘see’ in a particular light will determine our take on reality: realities constructed not as individuals, but as communities in the meshworks of semiotic systems that make up the interpersonal spaces of the forms of life within which we exist (Vygotsky, 1934; Mead, 1931; Dewey, 1938/1997; Halliday, 1978; Sensevy, Gruson and Forest, 2015; Maniglier, 2016; Bloor, 2020). From this perspective, language is not separate from culture, nor an abstract tool to be used, but rather an environment in which we live (Wittgenstein 1953/2014; Maniglier, 2016).
21This moulded disposition of any given community to perceive/conceive in a particular light is denoted in this study by the term thought style (Sensevy et al., 2019; Bloor, 2022). What might be considered to be the appropriate thought style of literary criticism and creative expression? This is a complex question and it is beyond the objective of this paper to provide a complete answer. However, the following phenomena are posited as useful indications of students developing an appropriate thought style with regard to this cultural practice.
- 9 This includes the impact of criticism on writers (the example of Keats comes to mind, with the nega (...)
22First, based on the premise that there is a fundamental relationship between criticism and creation9 and that critical insight is enhanced by creative expression and vice versa, signs of students developing literary critical skills in relation to the transcultural poetry material were considered to be evidence of students developing an appropriate thought style.
23Second, student engagement in Oulipo-inspired creative practices, described below. The Oulipo workgroup are posited as specialists of the creative process. As such, their methods can be seen as an exemplar, in the sense used by Kuhn (1970), of the thought style of a creative community. Many of the plurilingual writing practices explored in the course were loosely based on Oulipian constraints10 in that they sought to jolt students out of their natural, habitual train of thought and mode of expression. Therefore, signs of students not writing “as themselves”, were also considered to be evidence of students developing an appropriate thought style with regard to creative expression.
24What does it mean to write or not write as “oneself”? This question touches on issues at the heart of creative practices. When Roland Barthes claims “Language is neither reactionary nor progressive; it is quite simply fascist; for fascism does not prevent speech, it compels speech” (1977), he is decrying the coercive, socially imposed laws of language which, it might be argued, distance us from the Mother tongue. When learning a second language, this distancing effect may be increased. We have all forgotten how we learned to speak; disrupting students’ habitual writing style with the oulipo-inspired plurilingual, creative writing activities was a strong feature of the course. The intention was to invite students to regress back to the early stages of language learning and to plunge them into situations where they would be required to imitate and improvise, copy and create, like an infant. This was based on the hypothesis that they would in this way recapture something of the pleasure of the Mother tongue as they creatively mixed languages, irrigating their sometimes overly formal second language speech. This is what is meant by students not writing “as themselves” and why it was considered to be evidence of students developing an appropriate thought style with regard to creative expression.
25The creative writing processes developed within the workgroup known as Oulipo (Ouvroir de Littérature Potentielle) are the inspiration for many of the activities developed in this course. A description of the processes will thus serve as a useful reference for defining aspects of creative writing as a body of knowledge.
- 11 Our translation of “L’auteur oulipien est un rat qui construit lui-même le labyrinthe dont il se pr (...)
26The group was founded in Paris in 1960 by the mathematician François Le Lyonnais and the writer Raymond Queneau and would go on to include writers and poets such as Jacques Roubaud (also a mathematician), Italo Calvino and of course, Georges Perec. Oulipo takes a firm stand against the myth of the divinely inspired writer-creator and promotes a materialist demystification of the Platonic tradition. Oulipians draw attention to writing constraints – meaning rules or structures derived from maths, music, board games such as chess or Go, outmoded literary forms etc. – and underline their often under-exploited yet highly efficacious creative power. Writers often impose formal or organisational constraints upon their writing, such as writing at certain times of the day, or a certain number of pages per day, or use rhyme and metre according to pre-existing forms. Oulipian constraints tend to act on the materiality of language – its letters, words, sounds, sentences etc. – in unexpected ways in a spirit of novelty and playfulness. The constraints are self-imposed: Raymond Queneau famously described the Oulipian author as “a rat that constructs its own maze then tries to find a way out”.11
27Two firm principles underpin the Oulipo-inspired activities explored in this work. The first is that of indirection or distancing that is to say, whatever subject the students’ poems may end up being about, it is not tackled frontally but via a circuitous route. The second is that of decentering: as explained earlier, the writing tasks are designed to prevent the participants from writing “as themselves”, and to jolt them out of their natural, habitual train of thought. Oulipian writing derives from the paradox that literary potentiality is found to spring from linguistic constraint. In the approach undertaken in Sara Greaves’s course, creative potential was encouraged to arise from the constraint of alterity – using other people’s words and ideas.
28Following the above presentation of the hypotheses of the course, the research questions of this study, its epistemological foundations, the theoretical and methodological tools used to investigate classroom practices, as well as the Oulipo principles as an example of the body of knowledge at stake, the remainder of this paper will be devoted to presenting examples of classroom data and their analysis.
29In this activity, students were introduced to the Afro-Guyanese poet John Agard, who lives in Great Britain. Several of his poems were explored, including “Half-Caste”. A partial transcription of this poem is presented below and readers are invited to follow the link (Half-Caste) to view John Agard performing the poem.
30Class Documents John Agard (1949-): “Half-Caste”
Excuse me standing on one leg I’m half-caste. Explain yuself wha yu mean when yu say half-caste yu mean when Picasso mix red an green is a half-caste canvas? explain yuself wha yu mean
when yu say half-caste yu mean when light an shadow mix in de sky is a half-caste weather? Well in dat case chaiko weather nearly always half-caste in fact some o dem cloud half-caste till dem overcast so spiteful dem don’t want de sun pass (…) Half-Caste and other poems, 2004.
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- 12 Standard English is to be understood here as a variety of English.
31The students view John Agard’s performance of his poem “Half-Caste”. They are asked by the teacher to take notes during the viewing and given access to the poem’s text. The teacher then separates the group into pairs and asks them to discuss the poem. She gives them a number of instructions: to compare the language in the poem to that of standard English;12 to look at the rhythm of the poem, the prosody and how the words are organised on the page; to think about the way the poet is addressing his readers and the way the reader is positioned in the poem; to think about what is meant by “half-caste” and how the poet uses the word.
32Included as appendix no.1 is an extract of the transcription of the exchange between the teacher and the students following this pairwork activity.
33A common epistemic background emerged within the group as a result of the interactions between the teacher and the students.
34Finding One: In encouraging the students to share their reflections on the poem (e.g., What do you think is going on? What’s going on with language? Speech Turn 1), the students are guided by the teacher to contribute a number of pertinent observations: Meg introduces the idea that the language is more orally based than written (“… his writing, he wrote in a very oral way” Speech Turn 4); Elise introduces the fact that the language has phonetic particularities (“th” becoming “d’s” and the “you” becomes “yu” Speech Turn 8); Ahmed and Marie notice there is a word play on the word “cast” with half-caste, and the word shadow (“…there’s another with the word shadow” Speech Turns 12-15).
35In discovering the way language is used in this poem the students can be seen to be acquiring specialised terms (the jargon) to describe and discuss poetry; this was seen as a sign of their developing the critical literacy aspect of poetry as a practice. It was also seen as a sign of their gaining an insight into literary and cultural issues in transcultural poetry as a genre. That is to say, issues of in-betweenness, bi-culturalism and identity, which can be seen as inherent in the thought style of transcultural poetry as a body of knowledge.
36Finding Two: The students have not as yet identified some key aspects of the poem. Following this preliminary exchange, the teacher strongly encourages the students to go beyond their observations to interpret the tone of the poem (“he goes further than that, doesn’t he?” (Speech Turn 17), “Yes, sending people back to their contradictions” Speech Turn 19). She also asks them to focus on dialogue as a technique (“Can somebody say something about the dialogue?” (Speech Turn 19). The group recognise that by addressing the reader or listener by “you”, the message of the poem is more powerful (“One of the ways poetry avoids being overtly political is by setting up this personal “explain yuself” (Speech Turn 21). A student (Jean) suggests that this forces the reader to question their own position on racism (“we have to wonder ourselves if we are racist” Speech Turn 22). The teacher ends with a general description of the style of the poem “a satirical poem, it provides a critique of society” (Speech Turn 23).
37The following ways in which language is used in this exchange were seen as signs of the students acquiring the thought style of the culture of poetry: discussion of the dialogue, the provocative stance of the poem, the satirical strategy of the poem, its use of metaphor and polysemy (“cast”), and technique (addressing the reader personally), or dialect (creolised English). These can be considered as examples of the jargon of the practice; it was in acquiring and practicing the jargon of the practice that students could be seen to gain insight into the thought style of the culture of poetry, thereby expanding their understanding of poetry as a creative practice and potentially empowering them to use the culture as a model in their own productions.
38The poem explored also provided the students with a poignant illustration of the private/public divide (the ending reads as follows: “I half-caste human being / cast half-a-shadow / but yu must come back tomorrow / wid de whole of yu eye / an de whole of yu ear / an de whole of yu mind. / an I will tell yu / de other half / of my story”). It provided an example of a very strong voice and the power of poetry as a model, so that whilst acquiring the jargon of literary criticism to interpret the message of the poem, the students potentially became aware of the poem, and poetry in general, as a means to empower individuals through the creative use of language. Evidence of a student becoming empowered by the model of a poem to find a strong voice can be seen with the student production inspired by a Jackie Kay poem in Example 1 below.
39Interspersed between the critical literacy activities such as that described above, a range of plurilingual, creative writing activities were introduced to the students as opportunities for them to stretch their own boundaries and explore language and identity. An example of such an activity is presented as appendix no.2.
40In this optionally plurilingual activity, students were encouraged to delve into each other’s language repertoire. Seeing and hearing their own words or phrases woven into someone else’s signifying chain, or writing a text that incorporated other students’ signifiers which, in the process, had become their own – these creative acts sought to enable students to step back from a certain self-image in the direction of a more fluid, self-confident, plural identity. As Mikhail Epstein states, “Transculture is a freedom that cannot be proclaimed, but only sought and partly realised through the risky experience of one’s own cultural wanderings and transmutations” (2009). This transcultural, translanguaging (Williams, 1980; Garcia, 2009) aspect to the creative writing activities also broadened the spectrum of possible senses of self that were opened to the students, inviting them to explore a kind of “supra-cultural” creativity. After this plurilingual practice, the final version of their poems was often monolingual (many of our students take great pleasure from writing in English) but, we would contend, in a style enriched by the plurilingual experience.
41The following poems were produced as a cumulative result of the activities described, as was the example of a self-reflexive comment on the work undertaken. The productions were analysed in relation to the epistemic potential inherent in the course using the notions of jargon and thought style. This enabled the identification of signs of an emerging thought style of poetry as creative expression in student productions.
42In our first example (appendix no.1) which apparently contains autobiographical elements, the author’s reflexive comment indicates the way reading poetry dealing with family conflict enabled them to use the word-building process of poetry, the jargon, to explore conflict in his own family. Certain elements from the Jackie Kay poem may have been transformed and reused by the student: “so part I must,/and quickly” might be discerned in “I am hungry to free myself from you”, and the punning phrase “Father, your breath/smells like a camel’s and gives me the hump” possibly suggested the following metaphor: “I saw all the changes/How years smoked your soul like a cigarette” (the camel in Kay’s poem leads to the famous cigarette brand).
43In this way the extracts can be seen to be inspired by the style and content (the jargon) of poems analysed in class; this can be seen as evidence of the student exploring the fundamental relationship between criticism and creation and in doing so developing not only literary critical skills in relation to transcultural poetry as a genre, but also a strong voice of creative expression, inspired by the model. It was thus considered to be evidence of the student acquiring the jargon of poetry as a creative writing practice and in doing so developing an appropriate thought style with regard to this body of knowledge.
44The second example (appendix no.2) is a production that resulted from the writing assignment presented above (5). The everyday activity evoked, with references to “click on the goddamn link” and “This computer my only friend/My only tutor until the end”, conjures up student life and online teaching during lockdown. The student chose the protection of national health as the overarching norm that the class were asked to identify as part of the assignment.
45In this poem, the author moves into the public sphere and explores feelings of injustice and rebelliousness with respect to the doxa concerning safety; he propounds a new cultural entity and sense of belonging – the “lost generation” of COVID 19. As presented in the description of the writing activity, students are invited to write collaboratively. The poem thus takes off with words and phrases provided by another student and expands thanks to a strong rhythmic scheme (tetrameters and rhyming couplets) reminiscent of the English nursery rhyme. The poem is an example of how personal frustration (“Oh I miss that brown-eyed girl”) and recalcitrance can translate to political dissidence, and offers variations on the theme of identity, from individual to generational.
46The use of language in this poem (the jargon) was seen as an example of a student recapturing the pleasure of the Mother tongue in their production and not writing automatically “as themselves”; that is to say, not writing using a socially-imposed form of language, but one infused with something irrigated by the primary relationship with language. It was also seen as an example of a student finding a strong voice to express the frustration of their generation; a nuance of something of the epic poem, expressing the sense of a sacrificed generation. This was considered to be evidence of the student developing an appropriate thought style with regard to creative expression as a practice.
47In the didactic activity in 4.1.2. students could be seen to use specialised terms (the jargon) to describe and discuss poetry. This was seen as evidence of their acquiring the critical literacy aspect of the jargon of poetry, and of their thus engaging in the culture of poetry and creative expression. In this way they were considered to be developing an appropriate thought style with regard to this body of knowledge.
48In the student production on family conflict presented in 6.1, traces of the model of the Jackie Kay poem studied in class were discerned. These were considered to be signs of the student becoming empowered by the model of a Jackie Kay poem; that is to say, as evidence of their finding a strong voice of creative expression through exploring the fundamental relationship between criticism and creation. In this way they were considered to be developing an appropriate jargon and thought style with regard to literary criticism and creation as a body of knowledge.
49In the student production on the COVID-imposed social restrictions presented in 6.2, the student was seen to explore a strong voice with something of the pleasure of the Mother tongue. They were also observed to be writing not automatically, not “as themselves”. In this way they were considered to be developing an appropriate jargon and thought style with regard to creative expression. This example would appear to confirm the hypothesis that poetry is a fruitful genre for exploring the links between the personal and the universal, the public and the private, the original lalangue (Lacan) and the epic voice.
50These examples are potentially useful exemplars, in the sense used by Kuhn, for the foundations of a better understanding of creative writing and second and foreign language learning as a body of knowledge.
51This article is an interdisciplinary contribution to a growing body of research which explores creative writing practices in second and foreign language learning. The study sought to identify the mechanisms at work in the teaching-learning practice of a creative writing and second language learning university course so as to contribute to this emerging field as a body of knowledge. The following conclusions were reached in answer to the questions addressed at the outset of the paper.
52First, as an epistemological underpinning for the study of creative writing, in particular as a language learning practice, a Wittgenstein conception of the nature of language was posited as a useful starting point. In this analysis, language is seen as being composed of language games within forms of life which produce certain thought styles (Fleck, 1935/2008; Bazerman, 1988; Sensevy, Gruson, Le Hénaff, 2019; Bloor, 2020; Bloor and Santini, 2022) together with an associated jargon (Sensevy et al. 2019; Bloor, 2020; Bloor and Santini, 2022).
53Second, the notions of jargon and thought style were thus posited as useful tools to explore the knowledge at stake in the creative activities undertaken in classroom practice, as well as the knowledge appropriated in effective learning during the course. The notions were the means used to identify the epistemic potential of this relatively new field, from which it became possible to define the criteria of the knowledge at stake. That is to say, the notions served to identify the linguistic and cultural aspects of poetry, particularly transcultural poetry, as a culturally constructed body of knowledge in didactic activity in class and in student productions. They also served to identify what were considered to be the recognisable features of creative writing, thereby making it possible to discern the epistemic value of student productions: students not writing “as themselves” was considered to be evidence of students developing an appropriate thought style with regard to creative expression.
54Third, with the use of these theoretical notions in a clinical approach, evidence was sought of students acquiring the style and content (the jargon) and appropriate apprehension (thought style) of literary criticism/creative expression as a cultural practice. The analysis of classroom practice identified effective learning where students were seen to be engaged in the jargon and thought style of critical literature. In the discussion of the poem “Half-Caste”, an example of frequent teacher-student discussions of this kind on the course, students were seen to be acquiring the critical literacy aspect of the jargon of poetry. In the student production presented in Example 1, traces of poetry-inspired creative writing were identified. The author could be seen to be inspired by the style and content (the jargon) of poems analysed in class in their creative expression, possibly illustrating a link between literary criticism and creative expression. In the student production presented in Example 2, the author could be seen to recapture something of the pleasure of the Mother tongue in their poem. They could also be considered to have reached a mode of expression straddling the private/public divide by means of a creative process involving writing not “as themselves”, not following their natural bent, but by decentering themselves and adopting other private spheres. In expressing the frustration of their generation, they appeared to gain insight into the links between the personal and the universal, the lalangue and the epic voice. These findings were considered to be signs of students developing the jargon and thought style of poetry and creative expression as a cultural practice and body of knowledge.
55Fourth, the results shed light on the hypotheses at the origin of the course. They appear to confirm that opportunities in a target language to explore identity in creative writing teaching-learning practice is an effective means for learners to develop a more authentic voice in that language. They also suggest that, in this kind of work, learners can potentially harness something of the affect of the Mother tongue in their written expression.
56Future research exploring creative writing teaching-learning practices will help to clarify to what extent these results and the course hypotheses are valid. It will also serve to determine more precisely the mechanisms at work in these kinds of practices. The examples presented in this study, resulting from the analysis of the didactic activities which enabled learners to acquire the jargon and thought style of critical literacy and creative expression, are potentially useful exemplars, in the sense used by Kuhn, in this emerging field of research and practice. It is hoped they will contribute to the foundations of a better understanding of the field so as to contribute to its visibility as a body of knowledge.
57Many questions remain to be explored: how might such practices be shared? What potential do they offer for other educational environments? Research work based on similar interdisciplinary collaboration offers potential for further reflection. In exploring and defining the mechanisms at work in other examples of creative writing practice in second and foreign language learning, a more comprehensive view of this emerging field should emerge. In this way it will be possible to lend further insight into the potential of the practice, in particular with regard to their impact on the confidence and motivation of the learner, the learner’s quest to find a style (Lecercle, 56), and finally, their impact on overall language proficiency.