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'Teaching Bad Writing'
Journal article   Peer reviewed

'Teaching Bad Writing'

Paul A Williams
New Writing, Vol.13(3), pp.368-377
2016
url
https://doi.org/10.1080/14790726.2016.1184682View
Published Version

Abstract

craft critical reading editing genre literary value self-expression
Peter Elbow advocates that we need to allow students to write 'badly', if only to expunge the dross and then move onto 'good' writing. Bad writing is not only poor grammatical expression, but also derivative, banal and formulaic writing borrowed from popular genre fiction. Bad writing is often characterised by melodrama, overwriting and 'telling' more than showing. However, 'bad' writing can also be regarded as a construct of masculinist power. In this paper, I examine the false binaries of 'good' and 'bad' writing, explore how I teach 'good' and 'bad' writing, and share some conventional and unconventional methods of leeching 'bad' writing from student work.

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