The mission of Memoir Journal’s (In)Visible Memoirs project is to nurture, publish, and circulate memoirs that don’t commonly find their way into the conversation of living arts and letters. Our focus is on communities that are traditionally underserved by literary programming and underrepresented in contemporary literature. We recognize that the exclusion of so many voices from literary publishing limits our understanding of the world in which we live, and we facilitate partnerships in communities where literary programming can help to change that. Our core belief at Memoir Journal—that everyone has a story to tell, and that an inclusive field for our stories has intrinsic value for all—translates to the communities we serve through the (In)Visible Memoirs series by helping to make visible both the diversity and the universality of human experience. We believe that writers are born when individual people start to write—and we’d like to see writing encouraged everywhere.
The (In)Visible Memoirs project provides teaching writers with a unique opportunity to design open-genre, memoir-centered workshops in communities they resonate with personally and locally—as well as an opportunity to edit and have published an anthology of writings they have helped to shape. At present we are working to expand the project’s reach for 2012 and beyond, and we actively seek proposals from teaching writers and community organizations nationwide to develop future initiatives. Memoir Journal is committed to funding half the cost of (In)Visible Memoirs workshops in 2012, and providing a stipend of $600 to teaching writers for 20 hours of classroom teaching, with program-cost grant matches from community sponsors and/or third party grantors. Please see our workshop proposal form for additional information and details.
Upcoming (In)Visible Memoirs workshops include programs with My Friend’s Place and the Gay and Lesbian Center in Los Angeles, and St. Mary’s Center in Oakland. Work developed in these and other (In)Visible Memoirs workshops will be featured in a future program anthology: check back for details in late 2012.
Questions? Interested in submitting a proposal for a future workshop? Contact Education Programs Manager Rae Gouirand at rgouirand [at] memoirjournal.com. (If you’re a community organization interested in hosting a workshop, we may be able to connect with a teaching writer to jumpstart a proposal. Drop Rae a line).
