Writerland » fiction http://meghanward.com/blog Reading, Writing, and Publishing Tue, 22 May 2012 08:19:48 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 Ben Fountain: Author Interview http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/05/15/ben-fountain-author-interview/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/05/15/ben-fountain-author-interview/#comments Tue, 15 May 2012 08:01:26 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=4451 Today I had the pleasure to meet Ben Fountain, who came to lunch at the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto. Ben’s first novel, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, debuted this month. His short story collection, Brief Encounters with Che Guevara, won a PEN/Hemingway award, a Barnes & Noble Discover Award for Fiction, a Whiting Writers [...]]]> Today I had the pleasure to meet Ben Fountain, who came to lunch at the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto. Ben’s first novel, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, debuted this month. His short story collection, Brief Encounters with Che Guevara, won a PEN/Hemingway award, a Barnes & Noble Discover Award for Fiction, a Whiting Writers Award, an O. Henry Prize, and two Pushcart prizes. His fiction has been published in the Paris Review, Harper’s, and Zoetrope: All-Story, and his nonfiction has appeared in he New York Times and elsewhere. He lives in Dallas, Texas.

Ben will be reading at Book Passage in Corte Madera at 7 p.m. tonight night (Tuesday, May 15). In his quiet, self-deprecating manner, Ben calls himself a 54-year-old debut novelist.

MW: Can you tell us about your new book?

BF: It is generally speaking about football, cheerleaders, the Iraq war, capitalism, family, sex, death, and the general insanity of American life. Specifically, it’s about a group of eight American soldiers who are in the United States for two weeks doing a public relations tour to boost support for the Iraq war. The book takes place on the very last day of their tour. They’re guests of honor at a Dallas Cowboys game. And after that they go right back to Iraq, back into combat.

MW: Were you in the Iraq war?

BF: No.

MW: How did you research the book?

BF: I read lots of soldier memoirs, lots of reportage. Every magazine article that I came across I would put in the file, and after three or four years or research I had four or five big, thick files. I got to know a couple of vets of this war and had conversations with others. But there were two main relationships.

MW: Is your protagonist based on one of those relationships?

BF: No. Bits and pieces, but the main character, Billy Lynn, is really someone from my own head.

MW: So you spent three to four years researching before you began writing?

BF: Yeah, I was writing other things. So when I would read at night or on vacation, I would read something about the war. I was working on a novel called The Texas Itch at the time, which crashed and burned.

MW: Why?

BF: It wasn’t good enough.

MW: What wasn’t good enough about it?

BF: It took too long to get going, and the plot relied too heavily on arcane matters of law, at least according to my editor.

MW: And before that you wrote a collection of short stories?

BF: Correct. It’s called Brief Encounters with Che Guevara, the stories that I wrote between 1999 and 2004. I started writing in 1988, and I wrote for a good ten years before I started writing work that really pleased me. So all the stories in that book came after I’d been doing this for ten years.

MW: Who are your favorite authors?

BF: Robert Stone, Joan Didion, Walker Percy, Norman Mailer. I think Mailer went as far as any writer I’ve come across in trying to figure out the American Psyche—along with Joan Didion and Robert Stone. I think Fitzgerald wrote the Great American Novel.

MW: The Great Gatsby.

BF: Yes, which I didn’t like for many years. It wasn’t until I was in my 30s that I really appreciated it. And now I read it every few years, and I’m more and more ravished by it.

MW: What is it about it that ravishes you?

BF: He got it all. In one sense, the essence of American life in that love and identity are so bound up in money and also the idea of reinventing the self on the basis of money. And it’s a heartbreaking love story and a wonderful love story.

MW: What is your writing routine?

BF: Five days a week I’m at my desk by 8 and I work until lunch, say noon, and I read The New Yorker while I’m eating lunch, then I’ll lie down on the floor by my desk for 20 minutes, then I’ll get up and write for a couple more hours—so between 5 and 6 hours. And then I’m done. So I’ll go out and try to sweat at that point—run or ride the bike or work in the yard. I also like to work on Saturdays, but I’m not real hard on myself on Saturdays. I’ll work for half a day and make notes.

MW: Do you have goals during the week for how much you want to get done in those 5-6 hours?

BF: No, not as far as words or pages, no.

MW: You mentioned at lunch that you’d written one other novel.

BF: There were two. I worked on the Haiti novel from ’91-’96 and then there was The Texas Itch that we talked about.

MW: What happened to the Haiti novel?

BF: I got an agent for it, and we got respectful responses from the big publishers and the small publishers, but nobody would take it. It just wasn’t good enough. It was a very labored piece of work. It was very much an apprentice piece of work.

MW: How so?

BF: I didn’t know how to skip steps back then. I thought everything had to be spelled out, and everything had to be in its own dedicated scene. I hadn’t figured out how to go straight to the heart of it when that was called for. There was lots of bloat in that book.

MW: Was it long?

BF: Yes, it was about 600 manuscript pages.

MW: What did you do differently in your new novel?

BF: I’ve gotten better at knowing what to leave out and maybe become a bit more skillful at leaving it out. But the words that are in there carry all that weight. I suppose something I’ve gotten better at is compression and concentration, getting as much bang as I can out of each page.

MW: How did you develop that skill?

BF: By writing. That’s the only way to do it.

MW: You mentioned at lunch “keeping it simple?”

BF: Yes, it helps if you aren’t very smart to keep it simple, and that’s where I’ve come out.

MW: What are you working on now?

BF: I turned in the final version of this book in mid-January. That was on a Friday, and on Monday I started this new thing. I didn’t know if it would be a long short story or a novella or something in between. It was just something I wanted to write, and I thought it doesn’t have to be anything because I just finished a book, but it seems to be developing into a novel. It starts in Nicaragua and ends in Haiti.

MW: Are you using any of the research you did for your first Haiti novel?

BF: Well, I continue to go to Haiti. I started going in 1991 specifically for that novel, but I’ve been going there twice a year since then. So I’m drawing on all of my experiences there—twenty years’ worth.

MW: Why do you go to Haiti twice a year?

BF: I’m connected now. I’ve got two godchildren there. I’ve got a lot of friends there.

MW: How much time did you spend in Haiti when you were researching your first novel?

BF: I was going two to three times a year for two to three weeks at a time. But then I would have a specific agenda. Now it’s much looser. I get to see my friends and just see where things take me.

MW: How important is it for writers to read?

BF: I think it’s really important. Maybe there are certain times when you step back from reading anything serious. I’m sure there are writers who don’t read much of anything, but for most of us, if nothing else, it’s a great pleasure. It’s one of the pleasures of living, so why not.

MW: How much do you read?

BF: I read The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books, and I’ll skip around in Harper’s. Lately I subscribe to The Paris Review. I think really interesting things are happening in there. And books. I try to keep a French book going and a poetry book going.

MW: Do you speak French?

BF: I read it, but my speaking is pretty bad.

MW: What is your last favorite book that you read?

BF: This will sound kind of snobby, but René Depestra is a wonderful Haitian writer. I think he should get the Nobel Prize. He wrote this wonderful book of short stories called Eros dans un train chinois. It’s hysterical and wonderful and tender and full of humanity. At the back of it, he has a glossary of slang terms for the male sex and the female sex, and it’s hysterical. That’s worth the price of the book.

MW: Is it translated?

BF: No, it’s in French. My last favorite thing in English is Of A Fire On the Moon by Normal Mailer. It’s his reportage on the Apollo 11 moon shot.

MW: What do you think of the changes going on in the publishing industry?

BF: I think everyone’s running around looking for their ass. Nobody really knows what’s coming. Borders is gone, that was a huge part of the bookseller market. B&N seems to be hanging in there. I think the e-book revolution is really turning things upside down.

MW: Do you have an e-reader?

BF: No. I’m not really a gadget person. I like books. I like the way they feel and I like the way they sell. E-books, as far as I can tell, have no smell.

MW: You don’t have a website.

BF: No.

MW: Why not?

BF: It would be another thing to take care of. I try not to look at e-mail until the afternoons. It’s hard enough to do this work without having a million distractions coming at you. And plus I’m just not that interested. Instead of doing a website, I’d much rather be reading.

MW: Is it possible to make a living as a full-time fiction writer?

BF: For me, for the first fifteen years I would have starved a thousand times over if not for my wife. Now I’m making enough that I could pay rent, pay for groceries. Paying for health insurance would probably be beyond reach.

MW: But you’re not interested in teaching?

BF: I like teaching, but for me it takes a lot of time and energy, and I’m very wary of any kind of path that would have me teaching full time.

MW: Because it would take away from your writing time?

BF: Yeah. Writing time and energy. It’s what you walk around with in your head. Are you walking around with your story in your head or sixteen students’ stories that you’re trying to do justice to?

MW: Do you think it’s important to write every day?

BF: Everybody’s got to figure out their own way. For me it’s important to write five or six days a week. I’m pretty slow, so that’s the only way I’d get anywhere.

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/05/15/ben-fountain-author-interview/feed/ 12 Does Publicity Sell Books? The Debate Continues http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/03/13/does-publicity-sell-books-the-debate-continues/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/03/13/does-publicity-sell-books-the-debate-continues/#comments Tue, 13 Mar 2012 08:00:18 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=4265 Two weeks ago, I wrote a post titled “If Publicity Doesn’t Sell Books, What Does?” in which numerous published authors offered insider tips on how they publicized and marketed theirs books, and numerous writers responded. This week, Paul J. Krupin, a publicist who blogs at Direct Contact PR, offers his perspective on the publicity debate. [...]]]> Two weeks ago, I wrote a post titled “If Publicity Doesn’t Sell Books, What Does?” in which numerous published authors offered insider tips on how they publicized and marketed theirs books, and numerous writers responded. This week, Paul J. Krupin, a publicist who blogs at Direct Contact PR, offers his perspective on the publicity debate. Paul’s post will make you want to jump out of your chair and join Toastmaster’s. Welcome, Paul!

Response to Publicity Doesn’t Sell Books
By Paul J. Krupin

Quite a number of authors express great frustration and anguish over the fact that the publicity they received didn’t result in lots of book sales.

In fact several of them conclude that publicity doesn’t work.

Their experience with media may be due to a lot of things. But to me what appears to have happened is that whatever the media published certainly didn’t result in them “turning their people on.” I don’t see that as a reason to conclude that “Publicity Doesn’t Work.” I see that a failure to make effective use of any number of golden media opportunities.

In the middle of February, one of my clients, JJ Smith, did one interview on The Steve Harris Morning Show, and sold over 6,000 books and made it to the top of Amazon’s best seller list ahead of The Hunger Games trilogy. Sure, it was only for 24 hours or so, but it was a single talk show interview that did it.

One of my favorite authors, Vince Flynn, did an interview with USA Today on Feb 6. He’s a best selling author of 13 books. He was asked three questions, and he spent one to two minutes more or less, answering each question. I was tickled to see how he handled the last question from the USA Today interviewer, one that he apparently had never been asked before: “What is it about your stories that brings the reader in?” BTW, it worked since I ran to the local bookstore and bought a copy.

For those of you who have worked with me, I challenge you with this very same question: “What do you do that turns people on?” Whenever we seek get media coverage whether it is for a review, a feature story, or an interview.

Think about what happens—just for example, when was the last time you read the newspaper or a magazine or watched TV and grabbed your credit card?

It probably doesn’t happen very often., does it? In today’s world, it may actually happen more often if you read something on a trusted blog or on a friend’s Facebook and they say, “This is cool. You gotta have it.”

Think carefully about the times that it does happen. How did you feel? Weren’t you amazed, galvanized, and stunned? Wasn’t your attention riveted?

Well, if you want publicity or any other marcom (marketing communications) that you create to do that, then you’d better figure out what is happening when it happens to you first. Then you have to learn what you can say and do to make it happen to others.

Realize that if you want to be a successful author, you not only have to write a really good book, but when you get in front of media you need to turn your audience on. You have to learn how to do that or else people won’t respond the way you want them to.

Now I’ll share with you something I’ve learned doing publicity for a few tens of years.

I believe that you can learn to do this anywhere. I call this the miracle of the microcosm because I’ve found from working with real people, from all over the country, that it really doesn’t matter where you are. You can learn what to say that turns people on one person at a time. Yes you can.

You just have to keep talking to people and pay attention to what you said when it happens!

You can ask people at a speaking engagement to tell you. You can have a partner watch the audience and take notes while you are speaking. You can record your talks and track sales or how many people raise their hand or come up to you after your talk. You’ll find hints in your reviewer comments and testimonials where people tell you why they love what you do.

The miracle is that once you learn the magic words that produce the action you want, you can then you can use all the media and other marcom technologies as a force multiplier to repeat the message and keep reproducing the effect.

In a nation with 330 million people, you have very good reason to focus on that message. Even if you are successful in reaching and converting an itsy bitsy tiny percent, you can be phenomenally successful.

Before you think that doing publicity or any other marcom technology is going to help you, you really need to learn what you can say and do that turns your people on. You need to develop a script that produces action.

Can you stand in front of 50 people and talk for three minutes so that half the people come flying out of their chairs and hand you money? That is what you need to be able to do. You need to hit their hot buttons by being the very best you can be. You need to give people a transcendental emotionally engaging experience. Learn how to do this in a small audience and then place that script into your interviews and feature story proposals.

The same is true by the way with social media. The real promise of social media is only achieved when what you’ve done is so good people rave about it to all their friends. If it’s not good enough, it’s just panned.

If you learn how to turn people on, and then use that in your targeted communications so that you help the people you can help the most, you’ll see your success with the media hit maximum levels. This isn’t easy to do. But if you are strategic and test, improve, and prove your communications systematically, it can be done.

Make sure that the content you offer is like candy. Create a recipe that tastes so good that people just can’t get enough of it. and they want the whole bag.

BTW, I’ve created a five minute, self-serve Prezi that describes how to do this process in a highly entertaining and visual way. Here’s the link.

Enjoy.

Paul J. Krupin, Publicist
blog.directcontactpr.com www.directcontactpr.com
Comments welcome. Send them to me anytime paul@directcontactpr.com

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/03/13/does-publicity-sell-books-the-debate-continues/feed/ 10 The Edge of Maybe: Author Interview with Ericka Lutz http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/02/21/the-edge-of-maybe-author-interview-with-ericka-lutz/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/02/21/the-edge-of-maybe-author-interview-with-ericka-lutz/#comments Tue, 21 Feb 2012 08:24:08 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=4141 Today I am honored to present you with two wonderful new guests. Author, teacher and book editor Elizabeth Bernstein will be interviewing author, teacher and performer Ericka Lutz about her debut novel The Edge of Maybe, which takes place right here in the East Bay of San Francisco.

Ericka Lutz is a writer, teacher, [...]]]> Today I am honored to present you with two wonderful new guests. Author, teacher and book editor Elizabeth Bernstein will be interviewing author, teacher and performer Ericka Lutz about her debut novel The Edge of Maybe, which takes place right here in the East Bay of San Francisco.

Ericka Lutz is a writer, teacher, and performer. The author of seven previous books, including The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Stepparenting, her stories and essays have appeared in many literary magazines, journals, and anthologies. A long time columnist for Literary Mama magazine, she teaches writing and public speaking at UC Berkeley and performs her solo show A Widow’s To-Do List around the Bay Area. She lives in Oakland, the city from which she draws much of her inspiration. The Edge of Maybe is her first novel.

EB: You’ve written seven nonfiction books. What made you want to write a novel?

EL: I was writing novels before I began writing nonfiction books, and also while I was writing nonfiction books. I just didn’t have success getting them published. Short fiction, yes… but I have two slaved-over novels that I wrote before I wrote The Edge of Maybe that will never see light of day.

I wrote the nonfiction books as a “day job.” Once I started teaching (writing and speaking) at UC Berkeley, I was able to take down my “parenting author” placard. Happily. I enjoyed doing those books, and I’m proud of them, but they were never—to put a woo woo phrase on it—my “heart work.”

I long took solace in a story I once heard about Annie Proulx, author of The Shipping News. Apparently, she wrote a huge number of gardening books before her novels started selling. So, I knew it was possible, at least theoretically, to transition from parenting books to novels.

EB: What drew you to this story?

EL: I started working on The Edge of Maybe by throwing together a lot of seemingly disparate elements that I was interested in and concerned by. I wanted to write about a family that felt familiar to my own… but wasn’t my own… and the Bay Area community of mostly-white, progressive, food-loving, yoga-practicing, lefty-liberal, self-satisfied Oaklanders. I wanted to write about how “we” live, and to poke some gentle satirical fun at them/us.

I also wanted to explore family and marriage. A number of friends have had maybe-members of their family arrive on the proverbial doorstep, and had to figure out big issues of responsibility and privacy. I was interested in writing about long-term marriage (as I was, at the time, in one), and how we damage each other and ourselves by sweeping the hard things under the rug. And I was interested in exploring how children are affected by what happens in their parents’ relationship.

And, there were issues of red state/blue state conflict, poisons in our food and atmosphere, and reproductive rights that I wanted to say something about. All subsumed within the context of a compelling story, of course. I wanted characters whose dilemmas the reader would care about.

When writing a novel, I never fully know what it’s going to be about until the first draft is done. I just throw in everything I’m concerned about and drawn to, and hang it on a preliminary structure, and go from there. It morphs. Many times.

EB: How did you research the book?

EL: A lot of the novel takes place in my own city and neighborhoods, so research for those parts largely consisted of going shopping, driving around town, and eating dinner out. A chunk happens at Harbin Hot Springs, a clothing-optional retreat in Northern California. I used to go there a lot for writing retreats, so that was easy enough—I’d already done the research I needed.

For medical scenes, I relied on my own experiences, the experiences of my friends, and our friend Dr. Google. A number of important scenes take place in Elko, Nevada, so I got in my car and drove there, 500 miles from my home—taking copious notes and pictures. I spent four days on that research trip, met some buckaroos, stayed in the dive casino/hotel that Adam stays in, and had an amazing time. That trip really changed the shape of the book.

EB: You sold The Edge of Maybe directly to a small publisher without an agent. How did that come about?

EL: I’ve known Armand Inezian, Last Light’s publisher and editor-in-chief, since 2006 when he was running the Boston Fiction Festival and I submitted a short story and won. I went to Boston to read, and after that we stayed in touch. I finished the manuscript of The Edge of Maybe in summer 2008, and had just begun sending it out when, in December of 2008, my husband suddenly died. So, my life crashed around my ears, and that was the end of sending the book out. I had a hard copy of the manuscript riding around in the back of my car—and I rarely thought about it—until the summer of 2010 when Armand told me he had started Last Light Studio, and asked if I knew anybody with an appropriate novel to submit. I shyly admitted that I had one, and he read it and loved it and asked me if he could publish it.

EB: You’ve worked with big publishers and now a very small publisher. How has the experience been different?

EL: In my experience, there’s more money with the big publishers, but the writer is the smallest cog in a big machine, and I often felt lost and uncared about. I’m thrilled to be working with a tiny publisher of amazing books with more of a cooperative press model. I had huge input on every aspect of the process, and I loved that. And I have huge emotional support and respect from everybody at Last Light Studio. Of course, working with a small press means doing all my own promo, but that would likely happen anyway if I’d been with a big press. I mean, for my first book with a big publishing company, the PR intern misspelled my name in the press release.

EB: In promoting your book, you’re using some traditional methods, like readings in bookstores. But for your main book launch, you’ve rented a theater and are having a show, with musicians and comedians and other performers that you don’t typically see at book releases. What was your idea behind this?

EL: In general, the old publishing models are dead, dying, or at the least changing radically, which means the old promotional models also need to change, and authors need to get creative in order to get any attention at all. But, it was more than that. I’ve done a lot of solo performance and storytelling. I have a one-woman show called “A Widow’s To-Do List” that I’ve performed all over the Bay Area. Having a book launch that’s also a Cavalcade of Stars—musicians, authors, dancers, comedians, clowns (all of whom are friends of mine)—feels like a great way to marry my communities together and do something more original than a typical launch party in a bookstore.

EB: What other ways are you promoting your book?

EL: Lots of ways! Bookstore readings and talks (always with food); a private party where I’ll cook a dish from The Edge of Maybe, serve wine and talk about the book; several reading series in the Bay Area; Facebook, Twitter; giveaways on Goodreads and Redroom.com and through various blogs; interviews here and there.

I also have a kickass website for the novel, and I made two book trailers on my own just for fun and recorded a podcast of me reading an excerpt. And there’s more coming. I even have swag! You can buy coffee mugs that say “Serenitize your Multi-Tasking” and aprons that say “Life with Foodies: You’ll get used to it.” Those are both quotes from the book.

I wanted Edge of Maybe action figures, but that didn’t seem to happen. Maybe for the next book.

EB: You have hundreds of Facebook friends and Twitter followers. How long did it take you to cultivate that? Do you think that’s a requirement for authors these days? How have you tapped into the networks in ways that have paid off for you?

EL: Actually, I have thousands of Facebook friends and Twitter followers. I’m active on social media for my own sanity and entertainment (and have been for years). Yes, it’s nice to be able to access those people for book promotion purposes, and I think it’s helpful for authors to be involved in social media, but only if they aren’t just using it to promote. Because that gets old fast. I will hide or unfriend or unfollow somebody if they are obviously just there for the self-promotion. Social media has “paid off” really well for me, that said. I’ve developed many very real relationships through it, gotten some interesting opportunities… and now, perhaps, I’m selling a few books.

EB: Is your novel going to be available in electronic formats?

EL: Eventually, yes. We are concentrating on this paperback release, with the plan to go e-book in 4-6 months.

EB: How do you support yourself? Are you a full-time writer?

EL: I’m a full-time teacher. I’m a full-time mother and solo head of household. I’m a full-time writer and performer. Only the first full-time job supports me… financially. The other jobs support me emotionally and, to an extent, spiritually.

EB: You’ve gone a fairly nontraditional route to get where you are now. You didn’t get an MFA, yet you teach at the university level without one. You sold this book without an agent. Now you’re releasing it in this unusual way. Is this a path you recommend to up and coming writers? Is there anything you would have done differently, looking back?

EL: I think most of us take a nontraditional path in this profession, and in fact, I don’t know what a standard path would be. I guess the fantasy is that you get a BA in English from a great school and an MFA from a greater one where you are mentored by a master who introduces you to a top agent who sells your first novel for a gazillion dollar advance… and then, book awards, Oprah, film rights, and sycophants who peel you grapes while you lounge by the seaside and write the best novel of the century. That doesn’t happen that often, and I’m not sure that’s a path you can really plan. Or, if you plan it, you’re likely to be disappointed.

My path has involved a lot of working for free, taking strange digressions, believing myself to be a failure and living long enough to have that not matter—and to even, in some ways, stop believing in the concept of failure and success completely.

One of my big mottos has been: “Circumvent the gatekeepers.” I believe none of us knows much of anything, really, so if somebody says “no,” there’s probably a way around that “no.”

EB: What are you working on now?

EL: I’m working on promoting this book and teaching my Giant Schnoodle puppy not to nip people, even if you really love them. But, I also have another novel in the works—I’m about 1/3 of the way through the first draft, and I have most of an outline written. It, too, is about life in the Bay Area, and about family and responsibility. Characters include a new widow, her homeless aunt and two cousins who live in a car, and her long dead grandfather. Yes, this book has a ghost.

To win a signed copy of The Edge of Maybe, tell us in comments what you think of when you hear the phrase “The Edge of Maybe.” Ericka will pick her favorite answer on February 29, the release date of the book. If you don’t win, be sure to order a copy on The Edge of Maybe website to get a free inscription or at Laurel Bookstore in Oakland. To buy tickets for “A Night on the Edge,” Ericka’s February 29 launch party and performance, visit Brown Paper Tickets.

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2012/02/21/the-edge-of-maybe-author-interview-with-ericka-lutz/feed/ 28 Samuel Park on Social Media http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/08/02/samuel-park-on-social-media/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/08/02/samuel-park-on-social-media/#comments Tue, 02 Aug 2011 11:30:14 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=2897 I’m on vacation for a couple of weeks, but I’m looking forward to catching up on everyone’s blogs and tweets when I return. Meanwhile, here’s a guest post from Samuel Park, author of This Burns My Heart. If you haven’t bought his book yet, do! Samuel is an exceedingly intelligent and talented writer. I loved [...]]]> I’m on vacation for a couple of weeks, but I’m looking forward to catching up on everyone’s blogs and tweets when I return. Meanwhile, here’s a guest post from Samuel Park, author of This Burns My Heart. If you haven’t bought his book yet, do! Samuel is an exceedingly intelligent and talented writer. I loved his reading so much, I bought three copies. And now, Samuel Park will share what he has learned about social media.

Originally born in Sao Paulo, Brazil to Korean parents, Samuel Park moved to the United States at age fourteen. He went to high school in Southern California, in the South Bay Area, and then studied at Stanford University, where he graduated with B.A. (with honors) and M.A. degrees in English. He has a Ph.D. in Literature from the University of Southern California, and his scholarly writing has appeared in journals such as Black Camera, Theatre Journal, and Shakespeare Bulletin. He is currently an Assistant Professor of English at Columbia College Chicago. His debut novel THIS BURNS MY HEART has been called “mesmerizing” and “stunning,” and has been selected by booksellers as a Great Read Indie Next List Pick for July and an Amazon Best Book of the Month.

How Social Media Has (and Hasn’t) Helped My Writing Career


Social media, like much affecting publishing these days, is a relatively uncharted landscape—no one knows yet if it helps, or how it helps, though everyone feels it’s important. I’ve been told by more people than I can count that I should blog, tweet, and have a website, though it’s impossible to quantify how that translates into book sales. Here’s the rundown on what it’s been like for me, and my advice for other writers:

1. Twitter:
I think twitter is the best place for writers—published, aspiring, retired—to be. It’s fun, it’s quick, it’s casual. If there’s only one thing that you have time for, I’d say tweet. Twitter can lead to links to excellent articles and blog posts, and serve as a quick education into the business. Also, following other writers give you a very clear sense of who the players are. I’d recommend following @eleanorwrites and @alexanderchee, both very active and full of wisdom (and me, of course! @SamuelPark_). Of all social media, I waited the most to join twitter, but it turned out to be the most useful. It’s a fantastic way to connect to potential readers. Make friends with other writers, who are going to be your support system through this. On my release date, most of my congratulatory tweets came from other authors. I’ve made quite a few real life friends through twitter, first meeting them online and then translating that into real life lunch or dinner. Use your tweets to promote other writers and advance the conversation. Don’t worry—by promoting others, you’ll get back too. Twitter is like karma on speed dial.


2. Website:
It is absolutely key that you have a website. Your prospective agent will check it out, and so will potential editors. Once your book comes out, everyone uses your website as a ground zero, from journalists looking for information, to readers considering coming to your readings. Make sure it is constantly updated, and full of information, including listings for your events, contact email, even Q & As and Reading Guides, which will make it easier for journalists and bloggers to write about you. I recommend Word Press, and then linking it to a custom domain, so that it’s yourname.com, instead of the less aesthetically appealing yourname.wordpress or yourname.blogspot. Thesis can be an easy and cheap way to make it attractive. I haven’t tried Thesis personally yet, but a lot of writers use it, and create fantastic-looking sites on their own.


3. Blogging:
I recommend blogging, even though it is not as popular as it was a while back. Books are really hand-sold, either by booksellers or by you. Blogging allows you to reach potential readers and supporters one by one. If you’re able to maintain hundreds of followers—who really like you and value you—that’s an incredible platform to have. Name your blog after yourself—your name is your brand. Blog at least three times a week. I don’t recommend posting your own work—blog about writing, or about the biz. The downside of blogging is that it’s incredibly time-consuming; Twitter definitely has an advantage over blogging in that sense.


4. Facebook:
Facebook is most useful for writers who already have a fan base. Authors can translate those “likes” into sales for their next book when it comes out. It used to be that you had to wait for a review or an ad to hear about your favorite writer’s new book, but with Facebook, you learn months ahead from your news feed. This means established writers can get an early jump on pre-orders for their books.


5. Tumblr:
This is the social platform I’m least familiar with, though some people seem to be crazy about it. Tumblr appears to combine some of the best aspects of blogging and Facebook, and makes it very easy to share photos. I don’t see a whole lot of writers on Tumblr, though, so I think that makes it, along with Google+ at this point, entirely optional.


6. Flickr:
Useful for making high resolution photos of yourself available to media. You can download your photos, and then put the link up on your website.


An Overall Thought:
Bookselling is about handselling person by person. The more friends an author has on Facebook and followers on Twitter, the easier it is for her to do that. So how does social media help? It helps if you have lots of friends. They will buy your books and want to support you. They will become advocates and evangelists for your book. They will spread word of mouth and create buzz. In other words, social media helps insofar as it helps you to make and maintain friends. Nowadays, people want to buy books from writers they know!

What about you? What have you learned about the benefits of blogging/Twitter/Facebook since you began building your author platform? Do you use Tumblr, Flickr or Google+? What are your thoughts on those platforms?

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/08/02/samuel-park-on-social-media/feed/ 10 Author Interview: Nina LaCour http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/04/05/author-interview-nina-lacour/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/04/05/author-interview-nina-lacour/#comments Tue, 05 Apr 2011 08:06:41 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=2353 Today we have an interview with Nina LaCour, author of the YA novel Hold Still, which is a fantastic book (I read it last week).

Writerland: When did you first know you wanted to be a writer?

NL: I’ve always been in love with stories—listening to people tell them, reading them, writing them. My [...]]]> Today we have an interview with Nina LaCour, author of the YA novel Hold Still, which is a fantastic book (I read it last week).

Writerland: When did you first know you wanted to be a writer?

NL: I’ve always been in love with stories—listening to people tell them, reading them, writing them. My mother has all of these stories that I dictated to her before I knew how to write. They make very little sense, but they show dedication. So even though I’ve been telling stories almost all my life, I think it was in high school that I started being serious about writing. I wrote a poem about a painful experience I had with a childhood friend and then revised it to the point where it wasn’t the angst-ridden spilling of emotions that most of my poems were in high school, and was actually a restrained and carefully crafted piece. That marked a shift for me. What I had been doing for entertainment or catharsis developed into an earnest exploration of craft. But, of course, I didn’t think of it that way then. I was just doing something I loved.

Writerland: Do you still write poetry?

NL: It’s been years since I’ve written a poem. Once I started writing short stories, the poems got scarcer, and now that I write novels, I’m afraid I may have abandoned poetry altogether.

Writerland: When did you beginning writing YA fiction? Did you know you wanted to be a YA writer?

NL: I kind of stumbled into it. I started grad school at Mills (with you!) with around eighty pages of a novel for adults. I was really excited about where it was going. And then I had my first graduate novel workshop and I got crushed. The workshop comprised all second-year students except for me and one other new student. I was really young, 21-years-old, and coming from a program where I had been treated as one of the strong writers. And then suddenly I was in this room with people actually laughing at what I’d written. I went into a bathroom stall and sobbed during the break. It was humiliating. I hadn’t learned to differentiate between the work I’d produced and what I might be capable of writing.

So I suffered through the next workshop, which went a little better, and then put that novel aside. I wrote short stories, also for adults, after that, and then I enrolled in the YA craft class. At that point, I was deciding between writing a collection of short stories for my thesis or writing a novel. And as soon as I started writing my YA novel, I knew that’s what I would focus on. The teen voice, the exploration of high school, of what it means to be on that threshold to adulthood. . . after trying to inhabit the lives of much older people when I was barely of legal drinking age, writing about things I knew and had experienced felt really good. So I kept writing.

Writerland: Hold Still chronicles the life of a teen girl in the aftermath of the suicide of her best friend. What inspired you to write it, and how did you learn to write so well about the anger, sadness, and guilt that accompanies the loss of a loved one?

NL: A few experiences converged to inspire Hold Still. When I thought about my life in high school, I found myself returning to lingering questions and sadness over one of my classmates who took his life in our freshman year. I knew from the beginning that I wasn’t going to write a book in which all of these answers about suicide emerge, because I don’t believe many people who lose someone in this way ever get that kind of closure. But I was interested in exploring the healing process, in looking at what happens when a life is unexpectedly shattered and the survivor has to find a way to move on. I was really shy in high school and I could so clearly remember that sense of feeling out of place in an intensely social environment. When my best friend was out sick, I remember feeling lost and self-conscious because I didn’t know where to sit at lunch. So Caitlin, my narrator and protagonist, has many of those feelings as she starts the school year without her best friend. One of my greatest sources of inspiration was, at the time of writing the first chapters, when my mother invited me into the high school photography class that she taught to look at her students’ work. There was a series of images that a girl had taken of her friend who had been cutting herself. The images focused on the scars. I found this deeply moving–that one girl would be brave enough to reveal what she had been doing for to her friend and the camera, and that the photographer would be strong enough to not only confront her friend’s actions but also to turn something painful into art. Those girls, though I never met them, influenced me so much.

In terms of accessing the emotions, I just tried to immerse myself in my character. I spent a lot of time in Caitlin’s head, in her room, in her car . . . I listened to sad or angry music. I just made myself go there and discover what I would feel. It wasn’t always a pleasurable thing to write a book about grief, but then, when Caitlin does find her way and begin to feel alive and excited about life, that emergence was pretty exciting for me, too. I’m glad you felt that the emotions came through. I’m glad it worked.

Writerland: After having earned your MFA, would you advise other writers to pursue an MFA?

NL: Part of the reason I pursued an MFA is that I knew I wanted to teach. But, of course, I also wanted to study and become a better writer. I had some brilliant professors and classmates who taught me so much. And I’m a school person. I’m happiest in that environment. But would I recommend it? I don’t know. There are gifted teachers who work outside the structure of MFA programs, and writing groups and workshops and seminars. The most valuable part of the program for me was that I produced so many pages. I wrote constantly and by the sheer act of writing and failing and writing more, learned so much. Being a student gave me license to devote myself to my work, so I would recommend it for that reason. But then I graduated, and I had a couple tough years when I realized that private school teaching jobs were scarce and that even after selling a novel I would need to work full time to pay back my school loans. If you’re really fortunate and money isn’t an issue, then yes, definitely go. But if you’re like most of us, it’s worth considering that in exchange for all the time you have to write during those two years, you might have less time and freedom afterwards. Still, would I do it again knowing what I now do? Yes. So maybe that’s the answer.

Writerland: You’ve recently begun a partnership with YA author Kristen Tracy called WriteTeen. Your blog says that your classes “range from investigations of craft to the practical, nuts-and-bolts information about approaching the publishing industry that we wish we’d had when we were trying to find our places in the publishing world.” What are a couple of things you wish you’d known about the publishing world when you started out?

NL: When I finished Hold Still I felt like I was setting out on a road trip without a map or even a clear destination—which could have been fun except that I really wanted to get somewhere as quickly as I could. I ended up making some mistakes, mostly around my agent search. An agent who had found me through Zoetrope: All Story’s fiction contest expressed early and enthusiastic interest in my work, and instead of keeping my options open I placed all of my hopes on her. Ultimately she just never got back to me when I sent her the second half of my novel which she had told me she was dying to read. It took me half a year to realize that I should move on, and when I finally did, everything happened quickly. I followed the traditional path and wrote a query letter. I got a dream agent and the editor I always wanted to work with. So it all worked out, but I wish that I’d had someone tell me about the rules and etiquette surrounding the agent search and how to identify someone who would be a good fit for me and my work. My lack of information made me feel pretty desperate during those months of waiting. It’s so important to be informed.

Writerland: Amanda Hocking, who is famous for becoming a millionaire self-publishing paranormal romance novels, recently accepted an offer from St. Martin’s Press because “The amount of time and energy I put into marketing is exhausting. I am continuously overwhelmed by the amount of work I have to do that isn’t writing a book.” Have you felt the pressure to self-promote? How have you balanced marketing your book with your writing and your day job?

NL: What Amanda Hocking achieved is amazing, and it’s such a good example of what social media can do for artists and writers. I’m a pretty low-key author when it comes to self-promotion, though. It’s hard to find time and I’m not good at approaching people and talking about myself. I did do something early on: I made a book trailer. I didn’t know anything about book trailers before, but they’re popular in the YA world and gaining popularity in other genres as well. I was motivated to work on a trailer because I love projects and films, and it was something I could do from behind the scenes. It was a group effort, and I’ll be eternally grateful to the people I love for working so hard on it, and to Tegan and Sara who let us use their song.

Writerland: What is the most common problem you see in the writing of beginning YA novelists?

NL: Like writers of adult novels, some YA writers are better at certain elements of fiction and weaker in others, so problems vary from person to person. But in our classes Kristen and I always look for a clear teen perspective and teen situations, and if those are missing, we know exactly what the writer should address first. When I read YA, and when I write it, I seek out the experiences that are so formative and exhilarating and terrifying for teenagers, those moments that people return to when remembering the big events of their lives. For me, that’s what makes YA literature so immediate and captivating.

Writerland: With the advent of ebooks and with self-publishing gaining popularity, how do you feel about the future of publishing?

NL: I feel good about it. I mean, publishing is undoubtedly going to change, but the world is changing, and that’s okay. I think that in time fewer books will be printed on paper and more will be available only as ebooks, and that this will be a good thing for many writers who self-publish and a good thing for the environment. And for people like me, who love to collect books and turn pages, I’m sure that we’ll still have the option to buy many books in paper form. Wherever publishing goes, as both a reader and a writer, I’ll go with it.

* * *
Nina LaCour grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has tutored and taught in various places, from a juvenile hall to Mills College, where she received an MFA in Creative Writing in 2006. She currently teaches English at an independent high school and is the co-founder of WriteTeen, a series of YA writing classes.

Hold Still, Nina’s first novel, was published by Dutton Children’s Books in 2009. Hold Still is a William C. Morris Honor book, a Junior Library Guild selection, an ALA Best Book for Young Adults, and a Chicago Public Library’s Best of the Best Books of 2009. Nina won the 2009 Northern California Book Award for Children’s Literature and was featured in Publishers Weekly as a Flying Starts Author.

Nina is working on her second YA novel, The Disenchantments, which
will be published in 2012 by Dutton Books. She lives in Oakland, California with her wife, photographer Kristyn Stroble.

*If you’re in the Bay Area, Nina and Kristen still have room in their upcoming workshops at the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto.

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/04/05/author-interview-nina-lacour/feed/ 13 How To Get A Fulbright http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/02/15/how-to-get-a-fulbright/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/02/15/how-to-get-a-fulbright/#comments Tue, 15 Feb 2011 08:30:53 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=1970 What could be more awesome than spending a year in a foreign country while you get paid to write your book? Well, that’s what a Fulbright Scholarship offers, and today we have several Fulbright Scholars with advice on the application process. One said that what helped her most was reading essays written by former Fulbright [...]]]> What could be more awesome than spending a year in a foreign country while you get paid to write your book? Well, that’s what a Fulbright Scholarship offers, and today we have several Fulbright Scholars with advice on the application process. One said that what helped her most was reading essays written by former Fulbright Scholars, so she and another scholar have graciously offered to share theirs, which are pasted at the bottom of this post. And now, four scholars tell how they got their Fulbrights:

Christina Durano—Philippines

Last year at this time, I had no idea where I would be. I was just finishing up my last semester at Texas Christian University where I was studying broadcast journalism and political science. The pressure of everyone asking “So, what are you going to do after graduation” got so intense that I actually made a necklace that said “Do NOT ask me what I’m doing after graduation.” Thankfully, I only had to wear that necklace for about a week – because on April 19, 2010, I found out that I received a Fulbright grant to the Philippines. The process of applying for the Fulbright was just that – a process. I spent about four months intensely writing and revising my application based on the comments of my advisor at my university, trusted friends, and individuals in the country to which I was applying. The country to which I applied played a big role in the way in which I structured the application. I wanted to ensure that I applied to a country that wasn’t incredibly competitive, yet which at the same time would provide adequate opportunities to study my research interests.

Furthermore, I wanted to provide personal reasons for wanting to study in that country (i.e. I am half Filipino and wanted to learn about my cultural heritage). Some countries tend to favor certain disciplines or choose a certain number of each per year (ex. one journalist, one medical student, one creative writing student, and five others), so it is important to look at a country’s record of selected scholars. As a recent undergraduate, I also had to demonstrate that I had the skills and initiative necessary to complete the project since I was not working toward a degree like some Fulbrighters. I did this by structuring my resume to show enterprise and creativity as well as discipline and excellence, and writing my statement of grant purpose in a way that conveyed how passionate I truly was about the topic. A common misconception is that “all Fulbrighters are a bunch of nerds with perfect GPAs and test scores.” This couldn’t be further from the truth. The Fulbright Commission isn’t looking for students with perfect GPAs and impeccable test scores. The Fulbright Commission isn’t looking for people with genius IQs and a long list of awards and honors. Everything I have seen shows that the Fulbright Commission is simply looking for people with a demonstrated passion for their projects, well-rounded interests, unique life experiences, and a desire to be a conduit for cultural exchange and social change. While grades do matter, they are certainly not the deciding factor. Instead they are a supplement to creative projects that can benefit the host country and further cultural exchange. To me, getting the Fulbright is all about communicating your passion for a topic and ability to complete it in a logical, well-structured essay, supplemented by well-rounded interests and a demonstrated desire to be an instrument for social change and cultural exchange.

To learn more about Christina, visit her website.


Laura Joyce Davis—Philippines

About a year before I applied for my Fulbright, I only had a vague sense of what it was: something that smart, ambitious people got if they were lucky. There’s some truth to that, but I think the best thing to know about getting a Fulbright is that it takes a lot of time, work, and focus. The application process is so involved that I would not recommend anyone apply unless they have about six months (or more)* to carefully plan and network. For those who are willing to go to those lengths, here’s the process and timeline that I went through:

1. Spend several hours on the Fulbright website. The website is extensive and not as user-friendly as one would hope. Read everything you can, get a sense of why the Fulbright exists, and pay special attention to information on your country of interest.

2. Decide what and where your research will be. Your answer to the question, “Why did you come to _______?” will need to be concise, articulate, thoughtful—and more compelling than 98% of the other applicants.

3. Write a first draft of your personal statement and statement of purpose. For your personal statement (1 page), you’ll need to show how your whole life has made you the ideal researcher in the country of your choice. For your statement of purpose (2 pages), you’ll need to outline exactly what you’ll be doing for the duration of your grant, why that research is so important, and what you hope to accomplish.

4. Talk to past or current Fulbrighters. Ask everyone you know if they’ve gotten one or know someone who has. (If you have friends who are Fulbright alums, they’re a great place to start.) I sat in on a handful of webinars (info about this on the website) and attended one informational meeting in person. Some undergraduate students have colleges who lead them through this entire process. If you attend one of those, take advantage of it and feel lucky. My undergrad was many years behind me, so most of what I learned happened through conversations with alums and every professor at my graduate institution who would talk to me about the application process. If past Fulbrighters or professors will let you read old, successful essays, read them all! You won’t get your research ideas from them, but you will begin to internalize the caliber of the competition.

5. As soon as you know what and where your research will be, get in touch with people in the host country. You must have at least one affiliation (i.e. someone who will write you a letter before ever meeting you saying that they’ll help you with your research and welcome you with open arms), so call, email, text—anything that will start to forge that relationship and convince the person on the other end that you’re worth their time. I cold-called and emailed dozens of NGOs before I found the one I ended up working for. Lots of Fulbrighters are sponsored by academic institutions, so I got an affiliation with the University of the Philippines as well.

6. Send your continually-evolving essays to everyone you know who is willing to help you. If you’ve got some Fulbright alums who will look at your essays, take them up on it. Revise, revise, revise! I wrote sixteen different versions of my essays before I ended up with the final product.

7. Make sure you allow plenty of time to get (unopened) transcripts, letters of recommendation, and all of the other basic stuff that the application requires. The deadline is in October, but you’ll do yourself a favor if you can complete most of the application by September so that all you have to do is upload your very best versions of your essays once they’re ready.

8. Once your application is submitted, you’ll have an interview, most likely with professors from your most recent academic institution. This is nothing to sweat, but you will do well if you have done your homework about the country you’re headed to and can humbly articulate why they should send you there.

9. Wait. You’ll be notified in January if you make the first cut, then in April or May (or perhaps earlier) if you make the final cut or are an alternate. If you’re an alternate, don’t despair. You may still get it (I did)!

*I was working about 60+ hours a week at a very stressful job when I applied, so I’m not suggesting that you need six months to do nothing but apply for the Fulbright, only that you will need to be very busy and focused during that time, not letting a single day go by without doing something to prepare your application. If you’ve ever done a graduate school application, think of that much work—and then triple it.

To read more about Laura’s project, visit Free Is A Verb.


Erika Martinez—Dominican Republic

I first heard of the Fulbright when I worked for a study abroad organization, but the former grantee was an anthropologist. I wrongly assumed that the fellowship was only available to scientists and historians. Then, right before I began my MFA at Mills College, I met a Fulbright scholar from Egypt who was in the Bay Area to study performance poetry. I also met a former Fulbrighter who’d gone to Mexico to do research for his novel. Realizing that the fellowship was available to writers, I decided to apply after obtaining my graduate degree. I was interested in going to Santo Domingo to do research for my memoir, but the list of previous Fulbrighters to the Dominican Republic showed that artist grants were never funded to that site. In order to increase my chances of success, with the help of my advisor, I developed a project that would be considered academic and prove to be beneficial for the host university. I proposed to edit an anthology of Dominican women writers. Conversing with former Fulbrighters, seeing sample essays and project proposals, attending teleconferencing information sessions sponsored by the Institute of International Education, getting the support of the Fulbright campus coordinator at Mills, and working closely with my advisor who had served on the Fulbright selection committee were all crucial to preparing a successful application.

My suggestions to those interested in applying is to come up with a project proposal that makes a clear and convincing argument for why the nine months abroad are essential for completion—use grant headings. It is also extremely important to describe why the project is beneficial for the host country and how it fosters international understanding. I also remember my Fulbright campus advisor’s tip for the curriculum vitae: this is not a creative nonfiction piece describing the challenges you’ve faced, make sure that the prose demonstrates your achievements up to now because the committee wants to believe that the applicant will bring more success to the program.

To learn more about Erika, visit her website.


Patricia Justine Tumang—Philippines (Creative Writing, 2008-09)

A year after completing my MFA in English and Creative Writing from Mills College, I found myself unemployed and struggling. My dream was to write a novel about the Philippines, the country of my ancestry, but I felt I had limited options with no income and a rising stack of bills.

My MFA thesis advisor told me to consider applying for a fellowship through the Fulbright U.S. Student Program, a nine-month research grant funded by the U.S. State Department, so I could make my dream come true.

It took me three long months to prepare my application. I attended several Fulbright information sessions at the Institute of International Education (IIE) in San Francisco and networked with other Creative Writing applicants—a few of us formed a workshop group and gave each other feedback on our application essays.

I studied the Fulbright website meticulously. I took a Tagalog class at a community college. I downloaded Fulbright podcasts on my iPod and listened to them while washing the dishes or commuting.

I researched online for potential archives in Manila that would have the resources available to support my project. I emailed these institutions to ask them if they would consider writing me a letter of support. I bought calling cards and followed up with incessant calls. (Yes, I became that annoying, determined caller much akin to a telemarketer.)

I asked friends and colleagues who were former Fulbright scholars if they would share their essays with me. I examined these essays and noted their strengths. I met frequently with the Fulbright Program Advisor at my alma mater for feedback and support.

I wrote several drafts of my essays till I felt that they addressed the following in the most succinct manner: how my project exemplified cross cultural exchange and mutual understanding; that the resources I needed were only in the Philippines and not in the U.S.; why I was the best and only person who could do this specific research project; and, how my past experience (study abroad, independent research, published writing, etc.) and education had prepared for this opportunity. I included a nine-month timeline of my projected research and writing.

I submitted a 10-page writing sample that contained themes similar to what I wanted to research in the Philippines. I got grilled during my campus interview and the panel gave me invaluable feedback (and recommended me). I collected my three letters of recommendation and submitted them along with my application and essays.

I waited three months before hearing from IIE that I passed the first round of judging. Then, after another three months, an acceptance letter arrived in the mail. I was elated. The entire process took nine months, the same length as my grant.

If you’re considering applying for a Fulbright Fellowship, I offer no prescription; I can only say that these steps worked for me. In some cases, qualified scholars don’t make it to the final round because of limited funding. If you don’t get it, apply again. The process requires diligence and determination. I had to believe that this dream was attainable if I wrote it into being. I worked hard. I asked for help. And I waited.

Patricia Justine Tumang is an editor and freelance fiction and magazine writer. Co-editor of the Seal Press anthology entitled Homelands: Women’s Journeys Across Race, Place, and Time, she was awarded a 2008-09 Fulbright Fellowship to conduct research for her novel in the Philippines. The recipient of a 2007 Hedgebrook Residency for Women Authoring Change, she earned an MFA in English and Creative Writing from Mills College in 2006. Her writing has appeared in numerous publications and she was the former literature editor at Hyphen, a magazine about Asian America for the culturally and politically savvy. Originally from California, she has made Manila her home.

Alex Orquiza—Philippines

When I applied for the Fulbright, I really didn’t know what to expect beyond not expecting to receive it. I had just completed my first year of doctoral studies at the history department in Johns Hopkins and spent the summer trying to figure out how to make an historical anthropology study of food in the Philippines into a compelling proposal. And I was also a little masochistic since I was also applying for it in the middle of my comprehensive exams year, so it wasn’t exactly the most stress-free period in my life. Nevertheless, the grant’s mission of international academic exchange as well as the opportunity to conduct research for my dissertation in the country of my parents birth drew me in.

I rationalized the process by considering my entire Fulbright application as another five-unit graduate seminar class, with all of the work and time commitment that entails. I reached out to friends who had been awarded the grant before and asked for their advice. I watched IIE’s online videos and read their suggestions pages. And most importantly, I interviewed with the Fulbright administrators at Hopkins and incorporated their critiques and suggestions into my essays. After what must have been 20 drafts of the personal statement and project proposal, I dropped off a thick envelope in the mail and waited. I was on a two-week roadtrip with friends when I learned that I had indeed received the grant. It has changed my life in so many ways that thinking back to two years ago is almost like looking at a completely another person. I’ve had the opportunity to research in archives American have never been to, to make new friends and colleagues throughout Philippine academia, and speak to and learn from Filipino students in lecture halls throughout the country.

There is no magic bullet or perfect formula for getting the grant. Each proposal is different and each applicant comes with different qualifications and resumés. But the one commonality that I’ve observed in all the Fulbrighters I’ve met is the courage to pursue studies that are incredibly unique and seemingly impossible to conduct in the nine-month grant period. So my one piece of advice is really pretty simple: propose to do something that you love.

Alex Orquiza is a doctoral candidate in the Department of History at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. He was awarded the Fulbright fellowship for the 2008-2009 to conduct research for his doctoral dissertation on food and cultural exchange between the US and the Philippines from 1898-1946. He received his BA in history at UC Berkeley, his MA at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and has lectured at Kings College, Cambridge, the University of the Philippines, Diliman Center for International Studies, and has delivered public lectures at the Asian Culinary Forum of San Francisco and Food and Hospitality Manila. He is a native of the San Francisco Bay Area and watched the entire San Francisco Giants 2010 World Series championship run live, with most games beginning between three and five in the morning Manila time.



AND NOW … THE ESSAYS

PERSONAL STATEMENT
Laura Joyce Davis, Philippines, Creative Writing

I didn’t set out to write about slavery. I didn’t even want to know about slavery. It was simpler not to admit that it was all around me—in a Berkeley Indian restaurant, at a nearby Oakland strip mall, only a few clicks away on the computer screen. It was easier to believe that it could never be a part of my story.

From the first novel I penned in purple ink as a twelve-year-old, I’ve been searching for a story of my own. Growing up with siblings who wanted to be doctors like my dad, I was the melancholic middle child with a wandering internal compass. As a teenager, I went to Central America on three separate occasions to do volunteer work, and to see if Guatemalan tin shacks or an El Salvadorian girl’s smile would get me closer to knowing myself.

In high school, at an age ruled by insecurities, running fast helped me escape them. I ran to the state championship, to an athletic scholarship, through travels to Eastern Europe and beside future Olympians, but still couldn’t run from wondering who I was. I’d written front-page stories for the college paper and worked in a Senator’s office, but nothing made me feel as alive as running—until my first creative writing class. Those 45 minutes concluded a discussion I’d been having with myself a decade: I was going to be a writer. The only question was, what about?

I looked for the answer in Australia, where I worked with teenagers struggling with drug addictions, sexual abuse, and worse; in Thailand, where I taught English to Thai students; in my MFA program at Mills College, where the professors who inspired me most were Elmaz Abinader, an Arab-American activist, and Yiyun Li, who was dubbed “the Ernest Hemingway of our time.” My stories won the graduate school’s fiction award two years in a row, and a few were published—but my personal narrative was still untitled.

Questions of purpose were starting to chase me again, when instead of finding my story, a story found me: inspired by a friend’s real-life anecdote, I began a novel about Deaf culture. Through my research for The Sound of the Sun, I befriended Deaf scholar Robert Arnold, who encouraged me to bring the story of a forgotten minority to the larger world. I was humbled by the task, but also honored as I found a new way of seeing, stepped into a culture with its own beautiful language, and was given a new name.

I first heard about modern-day slavery from a friend taking a graduate course on the subject. I was troubled by what I learned, and for a year I steeped myself in research, ignoring the nagging voice inside that kept telling me I needed to write about it. I had taken a job coaching collegiate running at Mills, and was wondering why the threads of running and writing—which seemed unrelated—continued to weave through my life.

I finally understood their relationship when I began to write my second novel, Fear and Trembling, about modern-day slavery in the Philippines, a country notorious for human trafficking, but with abolitionists doing effective work to fight it. I was counseling one of my athletes to use running as a physical outlet for her grief, and at the same time reclaim a body she had been ashamed of since being raped in high school. Meanwhile, my husband and I had decided to fulfill a longstanding dream to move to the Philippines for a year to fight modern-day slavery and complete research on my novel. If running was an effective coping mechanism for my athletes, it could a powerful tool to help Filipina trafficking victims as well. With my pen in one hand and my running shoes in the other, I hope to learn from the women I meet, search for hope in the unexpected patter of feet on the ground, and tell the stories that, I have realized at last, are more important than my own.

STATEMENT OF PROPOSED STUDY OR RESEARCH
Laura Joyce Davis, Philippines, Creative Writing
Fitness, Fiction, and the Fight against Modern-Day Slavery

Proposal Summary
With a Fulbright fellowship for 2010-2011, I aim to research human trafficking in the Philippines, specifically prevention and rehabilitation efforts by non-governmental organizations (NGOs). My focus will be twofold: first, research will be essential in completing my novel about modern-day slavery, Fear and Trembling; second, I will found and manage a fitness group to help rescued women reclaim their bodies and spirits. These two activities will achieve one goal: to support and encourage victims of human trafficking, and to increase awareness and inspire action both in the United States and abroad.

Introduction
Free the Slaves, a Washington, D.C.-based NGO, states that slavery is nominally illegal in every country in the world—yet law enforcement is inconsistent, so slavery is practiced in some form almost universally. According to Kevin Bales, the world’s leading modern-day slavery expert, there are more slaves today (27 million) than ever before. Traffickers lure women and children with promises of jobs, but in the end victims’ freedom is sold in exchange for their bodies. As Charles Jacobs of the American Anti-Slavery Group puts it, many middle-class Westerners ignore modern-day slavery because it is not “their” story; most of us relate neither to traffickers (those with no value of human rights) nor to victims (those with no money or hope). By writing Fear and Trembling I hope to show that slavery touches us all, and it will take all of us to stop it; by starting a fitness group, I aim to help victims rediscover hope.

Site
In 2008, the National Bureau of Investigation cited the Philippines as one of the top five source countries for trafficking victims; 80% are females under 18 years old. Despite being a source, destination, and transit country for trafficking, the nation has largely escaped media attention. Fortunately, NGOs are doing exemplary work there, and part of my interest in the Philippines stems from wanting to work with those serving as models for NGOs and individuals worldwide. My nine-month stay will be divided into four stages: observation, research, outreach, and exploration; to prepare, I am taking Conversational Tagalog with Professor Leo Paz at City College of San Francisco, as well as reading Filipino books, newspapers, and blogs.

While continuing language study and auditing classes, I will work with Dr. Sylvia Estrada Claudio, a medical doctor, feminist counselor, and the Director of Women’s Studies at the University of the Philippines. She has agreed to mentor me through my research and writing, and her extensive activism in women’s reproductive rights will guide my work. I will also volunteer with three additional affiliations, all of whom have been enthusiastic and instrumental in my preparations: Samaritana in their outreach to prostituted women, Third World Movement Against the Exploitation of Women (TW-MAE-W), which partners with the U.N. Economic and Social Council to assist sexually exploited women and children, and Hope Christian Fellowship’s Cesar Vicente Punzalan, a political veteran and leader in church-state dialogues, who has served on the national presidential commission and has agreed to put me in touch with the cabinet secretary in charge of the government’s commission on human trafficking.

Project Plan
For many trafficking victims, their bodies have been degraded to vehicles of suffering; their self-esteem is as battered as their limbs. In this context, the physiological and emotional benefits of exercise—from endorphin release to cerebral blood flow to depression or anxiety treatment—can have a transformative power for former slaves robbed of any physical joys.

My years of coaching running have prepared me well to teach exercise’s benefits: during my time at Mills College, I taught women (half of whom had no prior experience exercising) to run not simply for physical betterment, but for holistic wellness and coping with trauma ranging from financial hardship to being disowned by family to rape. I also founded an after-school program for inner-city girls suffering from abuse and neglect. Drawing from these experiences, I aim to form a fitness group for trafficking victims, with weekly conversations about life skills such as goal-setting, healthy body image, and exercise as a means of healing.

Methodology
The observation stage will help me assemble the cultural backdrop for my novel: the attitudes toward womanhood, family and gender roles, the value of children, and other social mores that often contribute to the supply side of slavery. I have discussed the challenges of a fitness group with the Samaritana leaders, and foresee initial skepticism from women who view exercise as frivolous in the face of more basic needs like safety and food. I hope to show these women that exercise can empower them to achieve even basic needs, and will approach my project with the flexibility necessary for any beneficial cross-cultural experience.

The research stage will include revising my research questions, drawing from both the university library and prior research done by Dr. Claudio, and investigating the political response to trafficking with the help of Mr. Punzalan. I will begin interviews with trafficking victims, NGO workers, and politicians, and lay the groundwork for the fitness group. My research questions will include these: How do you view yourself and your ability to achieve? What options for work and education did you have as a youth? What benefit, if any, do you see in athletic exercise? The answers to these questions will shape my novel revisions, and help me to convey the reality of slavery in the Philippines.

During the outreach stage, I plan to launch the fitness group, which will include running and bodyweight exercises that require no equipment or gym, as well as conversations about the broader life benefits of exercise. Nike has agreed to donate shoes and clothing to make this project more feasible. The heart of this stage will be my work with Samaritana and TW-MAE-W, assisting them in efforts at prevention and rehabilitation.

The exploration stage will be devoted to assimilating both the fitness group and interviews into writing my novel (which includes the story of a former slave who finds healing through running). I will conduct evaluations through individual conversations and written feedback, and teach the women tools for personal and athletic growth to continue life-long progress.

Goals
My primary goal is to learn about successes in combating human trafficking and modern-day slavery, and to promote those ideas through publishing my novel so others know how to join the fight. My desire to assist trafficking victims in the healing process will support and aid my research, and my hope is that my work will assist current efforts to move toward a world where everyone is free.


* * *

PERSONAL STATEMENT
Christina Durano, Philippines, Journalism
A hot dry wind whipped through my hair as I stood at the entrance to Amani Baby Cottage in Jinja, Uganda. The scorching African sun beat down on my back and the sound of children screaming reverberated in my ears. As I stepped through the gate, a boy, no older than four or five, ran toward me and clasped my shirt, begging to be held. I set down my camera and lifted the emaciated child into my arms. From the bruises on his body, I could tell he had been abused until his arrival at this haven. To think that he was one of the “luckier” children bewildered me. At least he had not been taken as a child soldier for the Lord’s Resistance Army. Documenting the stories of Francis and other orphans in an AIDS-stricken Ugandan village was not what most college students would have envisioned as their ideal summer, but it was mine. What started as a 10-day family safari quickly evolved into a lifelong quest to end social injustice by telling the stories of the socially exploited to a culture incognizant of such issues.

I didn’t always want to be a journalist. When I was younger, I dreamed of stardom. I considered being an actress on Broadway, an internationally-known politician, and a Nobel Prize-winning doctor. The cardinal elements of curiosity and a desire to learn the truth were always there, but it was not until 7th grade that I found my fit in broadcast journalism.

Five months after the 9/11 disaster, I toured Israel for three weeks. One afternoon while my family and I peacefully enjoyed tea in the West Bank, my grandmother called from Oklahoma. The coverage of Israeli violence she had just seen alarmed her, and she wanted to make sure we were safe. At that time, however, more murders were occurring per capita in New Orleans than in Israel, yet the media sensationalized each of Israel’s disturbances while not even mentioning more intense episodes in our own nation. This was my first encounter with “broadcast bias.” Ever since, I have desired to present people with unbiased news and give them all sides of the story so they can make their own decisions about what to believe.

A series of broadcasting opportunities confirmed that journalism was the discipline I should pursue. The CBS News-London Bureau internship particularly shaped my career goals by giving me the opportunity to see how international journalism worked. I’ll never forget when the riots in Greece broke out. It was a relatively slow December day in the newsroom, but as soon as we heard about the uprisings, the office flew into action. Within a period of two hours, we had conducted interviews with witnesses, booked a correspondent’s flight to Athens, written a web story on the incident, and done a live feed to The Early Show. Following that experience, I dedicated myself to exploring the discipline of international affairs as it relates to journalism.

Each of these experiences has shaped me and given me unique insight into my future, ultimately confirming that my life goal is to be an agent of social change. Undoubtedly a Fulbright to the Philippines would do the same. Researching the role of media in the People’s Power Revolution will enlighten me as to exactly how I can affect societal transformation through my profession as Filipino broadcasters did in 1986. By interacting with Filipino journalists and politicians from the martial law era, seeing revolution-day broadcasts, and studying primary sources under the purview of a Fulbright, I will be able to better understand media’s historical role in social change and thus fulfill my personal and professional goal of changing the world through political reporting.

I am more than a journalist. I am not merely curious, persistent, and passionate about learning the truth. I don’t just have an insatiable desire to present information in the most efficacious and perspicuous way available. I am different. I refuse to turn a blind eye to societal ills. I am dedicated to bettering society by shedding light upon mankind’s atrocities, whether they be in Africa, Asia, or America. I am a voice for those who cannot speak.

STATEMENT OF GRANT PURPOSE
Christina Durano, Philippines, Journalism
Filipino Broadcasters in EDSA 1: An Analysis of Media as a Conduit for Social Change
With a Fulbright grant to the Philippines, I hope to study journalism at the University of the Philippines-Diliman. While in the Philippines, I will examine media as a conduit for social change, using the 1986 People’s Power Revolution as a case study. Although Ferdinand Marcos was legitimately elected president of the Philippines in 1965, he declared martial law in 1972, suppressing freedom of speech and the press, dissolving congress, and shutting down media outlets critical of the government. In February 1986, over 2 million Filipinos gathered at Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA) in Manila, to protest Marcos’s authoritarian regime.

Many believe the 1986 government overthrow would not have been possible without the Filipino broadcast media. As former University of the Philippines president Francisco Nemenzo stated, “Without Radio Veritas, it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to mobilize millions of people in a matter of hours.” Immediate government destruction of the primary radio transmitter during the revolution indicates the authority of this statement. Marcos’s use of government-controlled MBS Channel 4 and the ensuing rebel overthrow of the station further supplement the claim that the media played a crucial role in EDSA 1.

Although researchers have studied the People’s Power Revolution and media’s role in social change independently, few have conducted studies about the role of the media in this specific event. Furthermore, since most research about media in civic transformation deals with change over a long period of time, the People’s Power Revolution offers a unique opportunity to examine the role of broadcast media in a complete social upheaval in a short time span.

This project will not only provide insight into how media affects social change in the Philippines, but also reveal how media in countries currently under authoritarian rule can affect rapid social change. In this way, it will help journalists across the world understand how they can personally impact their communities and promote civic justice. I hope that by providing an in-depth look at media’s role in the EDSA 1, I can spark an international movement to promote social justice within the field of journalism and thus promote cross-cultural understanding.

If selected for the Fulbright, I will analyze the role of media in EDSA 1 and answer five central questions: 1) What was the role of the media in the People’s Power Revolution and overthrow of Ferdinand Marcos? 2) How did the government lose control of the media? 3) Would the revolt have played out in the same way without broadcast media? 4) How did the people use media to promote their coup? 5) Considering the results of the previous questions, how can journalists today use media to promote social change?

For the first two months of my tenure as a Fulbright scholar, I will study books and documentaries from and about the Marcos regime and People’s Power Revolution, as well as establish connections with potential interviewees through university sources, station employment records, and political office data. My next two months will be spent interviewing political authorities, civic activists, news reporters, news producer and directors, and media analysts from the era and examining broadcast news reports from Radio Veritas, MBS Channel 4, GMA Channel 7, BBC Channel 2 (subsequently ABS-CBN), RPN Channel 9, and IBC Channel 13. To accentuate project feasibility, the scope of radio and television reports to be examined will be limited from August 21, 1983 (the day opposition leader Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino was shot by the Marcos militia on the tarmac after returning to the Philippines from exile) to December 1986 (10 months after Marcos was overthrown). I will spend my fifth and sixth months as a Fulbright scholar analyzing my information. Broadcast reports can be quantified by the types of television shots (from below/above, “unflattering,” wide shots, close ups, etc.), types of sound bytes (amount/type of sound bytes from each side), editing style (cutaways, amount of tracks vs. sound bytes, cover video for sound bytes, etc.), writing style, reporter inflections, and story length. After compiling data, I will spend the last three months of my stay at UP producing a comprehensive report that answers each of my five questions. Considering my experience as the primary researcher for an extensive interview-based journalism thesis and research assistant for a political science study, I am confident my skills will be sufficient to conduct this study.

For this project, I will work with Dr. Elizabeth Enriquez, vice chancellor and broadcast journalism professor at University of the Philippines-Diliman. When I visited UP last May, I talked to Dr. Enriquez about my project and she agreed to help in any way possible. As a former Fulbright scholar to the US herself and Filipina journalist, Dr. Enriquez agreed to help me find interviewees for my project, gain access to primary and secondary sources, and select relevant classes about Filipino broadcast history, culture, and politics to audit. Furthermore, Dr. Enriquez has already published books and scholarly articles about the history of broadcasting in the Philippines and hopes to write her next book about broadcast media in the Marcos regime, providing a unique opportunity for our collaboration. Additionally, UP has formally offered to sponsor my project and provide me with access to all university libraries and resources necessary for the project.

Conducting research in the Philippines, particularly Manila, is crucial to the success of this project since the majority of Filipino politicians and journalists from the People’s Power Revolution still reside in the country. Conversing with these individuals and learning about their experiences in EDSA 1 will give me an unparalleled chance to interact with the local community. Not only can I glean information from their experiences, but I can also share with them my knowledge of American journalism. Furthermore, broadcast reports and other primary sources that I seek to examine are archived in the Manila metroplex and essentially inaccessible from the US. Without access to these primary sources, I would not be able complete a thorough analysis of media in EDSA 1.

This project is particularly significant to me because of my Filipino heritage. My father emigrated from the Philippines to the U.S. during martial law in hopes of finding a better life. Returning to his homeland to conduct research about media as a conduit for social change will give me a fuller understanding of my cultural heritage. If selected as a Fulbright scholar, I will make every effort to promote cultural understanding by participating in local functions, actively contributing to the university community, seeking opportunities to work with journalists and politicians in the Philippines, and writing daily blogs and producing weekly video blogs about my experiences. Additionally, my solid journalism background will allow me to produce a series of documentaries about the cultural exchange I witness. Although I already have a working knowledge of the Tagalog language, researching in the Philippines would accentuate my efforts to become fluent in my father’s native tongue.

Professionally, a Fulbright grant will be invaluable to my future. Since I aspire to be an international correspondent, ideally in the Asian region, forging connections with Filipino journalists and learning how they work will undoubtedly set me ahead of the curve. Living in the Philippines for a year will give me the opportunity to establish my regional niche and researching how media in the Philippines contributed to social change will give me a clearer understanding of how I personally can affect civic justice abroad. Ultimately however, I hope that by illuminating the role that Filipino media played in the People’s Power Revolution, I can inspire journalists across the world to dedicate themselves to becoming agents of social change.


* * *
PERSONAL STATEMENT
René Alexander Orquiza, Philippines, History Cultural and Intellectual Immigration, Empire and Identity: A Comparative Study of American Cuisine

“If you don’t mind me asking, what are you going to make with that?” asked the man behind the butcher counter. It was, admittedly, a fair question to ask since there are not many Asian kids with American accents buying tripe from Pakistani Halal butchers in Edinburgh.

“I’m going to slice it up for a soup,” I replied. “A Vietnamese soup. Do you have any oxtails, too?”

And luckily, he did. I picked up limes and cilantro, raced back to my tiny dormitory kitchen, and started making pho bo – Vietnamese beef soup with rice noodles. I dropped the oxtails and some charred garlic and onions into a pot of slowly simmering water. I then wrapped star anise, fennel seeds, cinnamon sticks, and cloves inside of a cheesecloth and added them to the stock. After finely slicing filet mignon and the infamous tripe, I finally sat down at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, a blue pen , and a paper for my historical methodology class. Enveloped by the smells of fresh beef stock and herbs, I sipped my coffee and smiled.

Looking back on this day three years later, it now seems overdetermined that I would one day be applying for a Fulbright to study American immigration history and Filipino cuisine. Food has always been my passion. My first word in Tagalog was the verb kain, which means “to eat.” Unsurprisingly, my first word in English was eat. And I’m willing to bet that I’m the only person in Baltimore who ties his chickens with a foot-long trussing needle before roasting.

But my road to American immigration history and Filipino food has not been direct. This is because I have approached everything – food, history and culture – by simply being curious and this has led me to unconventional approaches to answering conventional historical questions. During college at the University of California at Berkeley, curiosity inspired me to ask questions about the underrepresented minorities in American history. How could I not have learned about American atrocities against Filipinos during the Spanish-American War? Why were Chinese and Japanese immigrants generally wealthier than other immigrants in the United States? And what defined “assimilation” for earlier European immigrant communities in the past? But curiosity also led me to the taco trucks, pakora stands and noodle shops that line Berkeley’s streets. As I ate my way through the city, I realized these questions of ethnic history were related to these foods. I grasped that food is the most tangible way of examining change over time.

Since then, food has been my compass for understanding history and cultural exchange. Especially on that cold winter day in Edinburgh. As I travelled through western Europe after college and during my masters degree, I continually saw examples of cultural exchange in Turkish doner in London, Israeli falafel in Paris and Ethiopian lentils in Rome. Returning to San Francisco afterwards, I relished my weekly visits with my neighborhood Taiwanese grocers, Armenian tea shop owners, and Russian produce sellers. These have not been simple passing interests but signs of joining my love of history with my passion for food.

It is because of these experiences and passion that I am the perfect candidate to study Filipino food and American immigration with the Fulbright. I have food world ties in Manila through chefs and home economics professors in my family. For two years, I moonlighted as a line in San Francisco. The size of my cookbook collection rivals my history book collection. And most importantly, I have an honest desire to write about the richness of Filipino culture and its impact in the United States. For far too few people know that the Philippines has one of the most diverse cuisines and one of the richest histories in the world.

STATEMENT OF GRANT PURPOSE
René Alexander Orquiza, Philippines, History Cultural and Intellectual Immigration, Empire and Identity: A Comparative Study of American Cuisine

I would like to examine the Filipino-American immigrant experience by going to Manila and studying Filipino food. While these two topics may initially seem unrelated, I believe that examining the transfer of Filipino cuisine across the Pacific is a window into the larger experience of Filipino immigration to the United States. Thus for my Fulbright year, I would like to research both the Filipino immigrant experience and Filipino culinary history to see how economics and labor policy effect the American popular perception of Filipinos and their cuisine.

I believe that this question of popular perception is key to understanding the American immigrant experience and the acceptance of ethnic cuisine, and nothing proves this more than the popularity of Thai cuisine. Thai restaurants dot the map while Filipino food remains unknown in the United States. Thai and Filipino are two unique cuisines, yet they share preparation techniques, ingredients and flavors and are thus closely related. This suggests that it is not Filipino food per se that American society fails to embrace; it is actually the larger question of Filipino-American immigration. For Filipino-American immigration been a story of American post-colonial indifference and lack of economic opportunity. Most importantly, it has been the story of selective labor policies that favored only highly-skilled immigrants who never had plans of starting restaurants in America. So despite being the nation’s largest Asian immigrant group since the Hart-Cellar Immigration Act of 1965, Filipino cuisine has not entered the mainstream. This is in spite of the fact that there are 2.4 million people of Filipino descent in the United States, concentrated not only on the West Coast, but in heartland states like Illinois, Texas, and Nevada.

While Filipino cuisine’s lack of popularity may initially seem trivial, this absence raises larger questions about the nation’s commodification, acceptance and unwillingness to engage with Filipino culture. The ethnic foods that we choose to consume are the material expression of our familiarity, knowledge and comfort with foreign people and culture. Indeed, the simple act of eating is a tacit acceptance of the values, processes and origins of the food on the table. Thus, the fact that American society still chooses not to eat the cuisine of its largest contemporary Asian immigrant group is not just a culinary matter. It is a sign that the acceptance of Filipino culture and the preference for Filipino immigrants has not allowed for entrepreneurs, loan societies and economic support that is key to achieving popularity for ethnic cuisines in America.

While in Manila, I will research Filipino food and immigration in a variety of ways. Using the flavor principle analysis established by food scientist Elizabeth Rozin, and regional food culture theories developed by anthropologist Akira Matsuyama, I will conduct a flavor and ingredient study of domestic Filipino cookbooks and Manila public markets by tasting and noting the key materials and characteristics of Filipino food. I will also relate food to culture using the theories of food ethicist Peter Singer and the works of the late doyenne of Filipino food writing, Doreen Fernandez.

I will focus on the regional cuisines of Ilocos and Mindanao – the two areas from which the highest numbers of Filipino immigrants to the United States come. The foods of these regions are theoretically comparable to Thai cuisine since they appeal to the American palate’s preference for sourness and spiciness. All these cuisines could potentially gain popularity in the United States yet only Thai cuisine is well known. This difference in reception is even more puzzling considering that Thai immigration is not even in the top five largest Asian populations in the United States. My research so far suggests that Filipino cuisine’s unpopularity is because of the tedious historical relationship between the United States and the Philippines.

A Fulbright year will allow me to contextualize the exchange of food within this complicated history of Filipino-American relations. For the Filipino-American immigrant experience has not always been the story of success and settlement of the Oscar Handlin School of American Exceptionalism. More often than not, it has been a story of hardship, struggle and American political indifference. It has been the denial of benefits for Filipinos military veterans who fought alongside Americans in World War II, the reduction of quota numbers during the political oppression of the Marcos Regime, and the use of high-skilled labor quotas to limit the number of Filipino immigrants.

I hope to bring this intricate history of contention and economic limitation to the greater historiography of American immigration history. For this reason, the regions of Ilocos and Mindanao again take center stage for I will focus on immigrants from these two regions. I will work with Professor Fernando Zialcita of Ateneo de Manila, the national expert on Filipino immigrant identity, to examine the different economic and social motivations for Filipino immigration. While at Ateneo, I will use the university’s numerous archives and collections on immigration – resources that simply are not available in the United States. The Institute of Philippine Culture has studies of Filipino demography, geography and economics on Ilocos and Mindanao. The Center for Social Policy and Public Affairs has thirty years of domestic Filipino immigration policy literature. Finally, the Center for Asian Studies has resources on Southeast Asian regional history that for my comparison of Filipino immigration to its Thai equivalents.

The diversity of my past scholarship and my apprenticeship with my academic mentors have more than fully prepared me for the intellectual intensity of a Fulbright year. As an undergraduate at the University of California, Berkeley, I wrote my senior honors thesis with Professor Dawn Mabalon on Filipino immigration to the Bay Area using immigration pamphlets, census statistics and oral interviews in Tagalog. At the Master’s level at the University of Edinburgh, I used comparative cultural history to study British wartime propaganda in the United States. Finally, at The Johns Hopkins University, I presented a graduate seminar paper last year that explored the historical coverage of Southeast Asian cuisine by American newspapers and magazines. I am currently continuing to build my knowledge of food history, social and cultural history, immigration history and transnational history with Professors Sidney W. Mintz, Ronald G. Walters, Melanie Shell-Weiss and Paul A. Kramer.

Ultimately, at the dissertation level, I want to apply this approach of studying immigration through food to other ethnic cuisines in the United States. Scholars have examined the history of Italian, Jewish and Mexican cuisines in America, but there still is not much work on the cuisines and history of the more recent immigrant groups. I believe that researching, working and studying in the Philippines will allow me to one day write this larger history of food and ethnic cuisine in the United States.

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2011/02/15/how-to-get-a-fulbright/feed/ 12 Memoir Monday: The Metaphor http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/06/04/metaphorically-speaking/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/06/04/metaphorically-speaking/#comments Fri, 04 Jun 2010 15:00:03 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=1140 A hallmark of literary fiction and memoir that distinguishes them from genre fiction is figurative language. While genre fiction (mystery, sci-fi, chick lit, fantasy) focuses mostly on plot and narrative, literary fiction focuses more on character and style, and style is often achieved through the use of fancypants language like metaphors and similes. I am [...]]]> A hallmark of literary fiction and memoir that distinguishes them from genre fiction is figurative language. While genre fiction (mystery, sci-fi, chick lit, fantasy) focuses mostly on plot and narrative, literary fiction focuses more on character and style, and style is often achieved through the use of fancypants language like metaphors and similes. I am a huge fan of literary fiction and an even bigger fan of a great metaphor or simile. In fact, right now I’m reading Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina for the first time, and the lack of figurative language is making it a very dry read.

I’m not gifted at writing metaphors. They don’t come naturally; I have to think long and hard to come up with a good one. But I love reading them. And I’m always impressed by readers who are good at writing them. Here are a few that I’ve come across recently:

From Laura Fraser’s travel memoir, All Over The Map: “From the air, Savai’i seems much bigger and wilder than Upolu, matted with rain forests, its jagged ridge of volcanic craters raised like the backbone of a dark and ancient sea monster.” And another: “He helps me off with my jacket and his sure, gentlemanly touch makes popcorn explode under my skin.” I love both of these images—the dark and ancient sea monster and the popcorn exploding under the skin—because they’re both so perfect and because I never would have come up with them on my own.

What makes a good metaphor is that it not only conjures an image, but that it is unique. If we’ve heard it before, or something similar, it’s not unique. Sometimes metaphors are so tenuously related to the noun they describe that I never would have made the association on my own. And yet that is what makes them unique. For example, in How Fiction Works, James Wood quotes Virigina Woolf’s The Waves: “The day waves yellow with all its crops.” The day waves yellow! I think it takes a poet’s sensibility to come up with something like that. As Wood puts it, “The secret lies in the decision to avoid the usual images of crops waving.”

From Gretel Erlich’s Solace: “Leaves are verbs that conjugate the seasons.” I love that line, although it’s a bit more difficult to get my head around than “the day waves yellow” or “popcorn exploding under the skin” because, well, verbs don’t conjugate, do they? People conjugate verbs. So I get caught up in trying to understand the exact meaning of the sentence. But I still love it.

And from the first page of Dave Eggers’ A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius: “The December yard is gray and scratchy, the trees calligraphic”—the scratchy yard! The calligraphic trees! Fabulous! And can’t you just see them? Both of them? And on page four, Eggers describes his mother’s cancer: “It was staring out at them, at the doctors, like a thousand writhing worms under a rock, swarming, shimmering, wet and oil—Good God!” More than a physical description, an emotion is conveyed—the horror of this thing growing inside his mother, like a thousand slimy worms.

From Augusten Burroughs’ Running With Scissors: “He had the loving, affectionate, outgoing personality of petrified wood” and “This makes everything she says sounds like it went through a curling iron.” Both brilliant descriptions!

I could go on and on, but you get the picture. The trick is to come up with metaphors that are original, that the reader hasn’t heard before, and that convey either an image, a feeling, or both. The metaphor has to compare the noun to something ordinary, something that we’re all familiar with and can picture (like a curling iron), not something obscure or abstract.

So how does one learn to write great metaphors? You go to metaphor school, of course. No, really, I don’t know. You practice, like you practice any writing skill. You take an ordinary description, like snow hanging heavy on a branch or the ruler-straight bangs of your first grade teacher, and you practice writing it more originally. And you practice and practice until you develop a “knack” for writing metaphors. Listen to me, I sound like I know what I’m talking about!

What about you? How do you come up with original metaphors/similes? Do you have any favorites from other books? Or authors who are particularly good at writing them?

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/06/04/metaphorically-speaking/feed/ 4 Link Love http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/31/link-love-18/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/31/link-love-18/#comments Mon, 31 May 2010 08:24:52 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=1106 It’s been three weeks since I posted links! So here we go …

In random tech/social media news: Here are 10 Tips for being awesome online, a post on how to get more Twitter followers, and the best book editors on Twitter.

In all things iPad: From the New York Review of books, the iPad [...]]]> It’s been three weeks since I posted links! So here we go …

In random tech/social media news: Here are 10 Tips for being awesome online, a post on how to get more Twitter followers, and the best book editors on Twitter.

In all things iPad: From the New York Review of books, the iPad vs the Kindle. From Fast Company,10 essential iPad tips. For people who have an iPad and use Dropbox (like moi), DropBox has come to iPad. And from this past weekend’s Hacks/Hackers Unite Conference, a list of iPad media app ideas.

From SF Gate, three Bay Area authors use the Internet to get their books out.

In other news, agent Janet Reid foresees a publishing revolution in the arrival of the enhanced e-book.

Alan Rinzler hypes the benefits of creating an iPad app for your book.

Nathan Bransford had a great post on voice a while back and another on how to write a one-sentence pitch. Also, if you missed it, the one sentence, one paragraph, and two paragraph pitch.

Samuel Park sings the praises of wrieaders and answers the question we blogger writers ask ourselves every day: Does blogging help?

Intern deconstructs the novel.

Eric at Pimp My Novel says you don’t need an MFA to write literary fiction.

Agent Kristen Nelson answers the question, does age matter when you’re trying to get published?

Guest blogger for Rants & Ramblings, Mary DeMuth says writers must be three Ts in order to succeed: tenacious, talkative, teachable.

And in case you missed Betty White on SNL on May 8, you can see
here.

Happy Memorial Day to everyone!

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/31/link-love-18/feed/ 4 Are You Blogging Too Much? http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/19/are-you-blogging-too-much/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/19/are-you-blogging-too-much/#comments Thu, 20 May 2010 05:52:59 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=1074

Kristen Tracy describes herself as a “poet who also writes young adult and middle-grade novels,” but that’s an understatement. Her first two teen novels, Lost It and Crimes of the Sarahs, were published by Simon & Schuster, and she has three more forthcoming from Disney-Hyperion, including A Field Guide For Heartbreakers, due out June [...]]]> Kristen Tracy

Kristen Tracy describes herself as a “poet who also writes young adult and middle-grade novels,” but that’s an understatement. Her first two teen novels, Lost It and Crimes of the Sarahs, were published by Simon & Schuster, and she has three more forthcoming from Disney-Hyperion, including A Field Guide For Heartbreakers, due out June 1. She also published her first middle-grade novel with Random House, Camille McPhee Fell Under the Bus, which was selected by School Library Journal as one of the Best Children’s Books of 2009. She has three more middle-grade novels forthcoming from Random House, including The Reinvention of Bessica Lefter, due out in January 2011. Her poems have appeared in Threepenny Review, AGNI, TriQuarterly, Prairie Schooner, and Southern Review. In 2009, she was selected by Tom Sleigh as the poetry fellow for the Writers@Work Conference in Park City. She has an MA in American Literature, an MFA in Poetry, and a PhD in Poetry. She lives in San Francisco where she tutors at 826 Valencia and is a volunteer gardener on Alcatraz.

You may remember Kristen from her interview with Alan Rinzler. What intrigued me most about Kristen’s interview with Alan was that one of the mistakes she admitted to was not blogging or social networking, and yet, when I talked to Kristen, she wasn’t apologetic at all:

Your first book was published in January 2007, but you didn’t put a website up until nearly a year later. Why the wait?

I am a private and shy person. The idea of having a web presence didn’t appeal to me at all. I didn’t want to have any photographs of myself online, and I didn’t want to have biographical information about myself floating around the electronic world either. I just wanted to write books. I really like being anonymous. I sort of get bummed out when I run in to people I know at the grocery store and stuff like that. Being a more public person has been a big shift for me. I’m not totally comfortable with it, but I’m getting there. (And I think my website, which includes four photos of me, is proof of that.)

You don’t have a blog, and you’re not on Facebook or Twitter. Why not?

Well, I don’t do those things for several reasons. First, Facebook, blogs, and Twitter appear to be a total time suck. I am not at a point in my life where I can afford to have my time sucked. Maybe after I’m retired I will become the world’s most active Twitter person. Today, not so much. Also, for me, writing is something that I have a physical and emotional urge to do. If I wrote a blog and wrote on my Facebook wall or other people’s Facebook walls (That’s how it works, right? You go around writing on everybody’s walls?) I think it would lessen that urge. I want to harness that motivation and use it to complete my books. If I spent writing energy on social media, I’d feel like I was wasting it. And then I’d feel bad about myself. I see the use in social media for building an audience, but I also think you can build an audience by writing the best books you can, while maintaining a small web presence. My agent, Sara Crowe, has a blog and she asks all of her writers to contribute to it a couple of times a year. I do that. But it is not my favorite, and it feels like work and those infrequent semiannual blog entries are one of the few things that I actually procrastinate writing. I don’t like it. If you like it and it helps you write, and it helps you connect to your readers, then that’s great. But that stuff isn’t for me. (I should say that in June my publisher is sending me on a book tour with two other writers and apparently we will be blogging and tweeting our way across the nation. My plan is to do this. Then pretend like it never happened. And then go back to living my social media-less life.)

Do you think having a small online presence has hurt your career in any way?

A small online presence has probably cost me book sales, but I don’t feel like it’s hurt my career. Maybe I’m being naive. Not blogging hasn’t weakened the actual books I’ve written. On the contrary, by not expending my creative energy on anything but my actual writing, I think I’ve gotten further faster. For me, it’s really about the writing. That’s where I put everything. I think I’m growing my audience book by book. After I sold my first novel, I had the choice to either become a promotion machine or write the next book. I chose the latter and it’s always felt like the right choice. My next teen novel, A Field Guide for Heartbreakers, comes out in a couple of weeks. I have a middle-grade novel, The Reinvention of Bessica Lefter, coming out in January. And I’ve got another teen novel about a group of twins who end up adrift at sea and get attacked by sharks due out from Disney next summer. I am ferociously busy. The whole debate on whether or not I should do more online to promote myself sort of seems like a moot point. I’m too busy to do much else besides write, garden on Alcatraz, hang with my cat, and live a little.

What advice do you have for an unpublished author who is told to “build an author platform”?

I have no idea how to build a platform. Instead of worrying about this, I focused on my own strengths and interests—funny and event-driven fiction set in Idaho and other places I’ve lived. The first short story I ever wrote (spoiler alert) was about a girl who digs up her dead cat in order to reassemble its bones for a fourth-grade science fair. It turned out to be a chapter in my first middle-grade novel, Camille McPhee Fell Under the Bus. I paid attention to what I wanted to write, and I realized that I’m drawn toward humorous fiction for a younger audience. So that’s what I pursued. But I was reading teen stuff at that time, too. And the idea hit me that I should write a funny story about a girl who loses her virginity, because so much of what I was reading was dark and dangerous, sex with consequences stuff. So I wrote Lost It about a girl who loses her virginity underneath a canoe. And I’m really happy with that book. Thinking about platform doesn’t help me generate a story, so I don’t think about it. I write the books I want to write. And I also think about entertaining my audience.

What advice do you have for an unpublished author looking for an agent?

When I was an unpublished author looking for an agent, I read a lot of books that were similar to the books I was writing and when I really connected with a book, I looked in the acknowledgments and saw who they thanked and looked for their agent and editor. I kept a list. I learned a lot about children’s publishing this way. Some people get a subscription to Publishers Marketplace and Publishers Lunch. I didn’t do that. Using the Internet, I Googled people from my list, and I tried to figure out who were the younger agents at the bigger agencies. That’s how I found my agent. She was at Trident Media, just getting ready to move to a smaller agency, and she liked my query and my first three chapters and my manuscript, and now she’s my agent. It’s about the fit. You want somebody who really likes your writing.

Why do you think it’s important to maintain some privacy online?

Sometimes my readers email me and that’s great. I really like hearing from them. But I also get nervous that they approach me with the expectation that we will have repeated electronic correspondence. I don’t have time for that. And I hate disappointing people. Maybe this all boils down to the fact that I have boundary issues. I’m not sure. But I know I like having a limited online presence. It feels right to me.

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/19/are-you-blogging-too-much/feed/ 14 Link Love http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/08/link-love-17/ http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/08/link-love-17/#comments Sat, 08 May 2010 23:37:37 +0000 Meghan Ward http://meghanward.com/blog/?p=1035 It’s been two weeks already since I posted links! Here we go:

Agent Nathan Bransford has a post on creating a Series Bible. A Series Bible is to a book (or series of books) what a script supervisor is to a movie—the person who makes sure a character’s hair looks the same in each scene [...]]]> It’s been two weeks already since I posted links! Here we go:

Agent Nathan Bransford has a post on creating a Series Bible. A Series Bible is to a book (or series of books) what a script supervisor is to a movie—the person who makes sure a character’s hair looks the same in each scene and that they’re wearing the correct blouse, etc. to give the illusion of continuity.

And via Nathan, a post from the Gatekeeper on whom to thank in your acknowledgments.

Agent Rachelle Gardner asks what do you give up in order to write? And she has another great post about what goes into a publishing contract.

As usual, editor Alan Rinzler has a great post on eavedropping on conversations to help you write authentic dialogue, a practice I highly recommend. And another on building courage as a writer. His advice? Go skydiving!

Intern gives her thoughts on book trailers for unpublished books, which I found intriguing since I was considering making one myself.

Samuel Park writes about the future of books and why he thinks they’re around to stay. And he has another great post about the power of coincidence, or, how much luck plays a role in your getting published. I love Samuel’s blog. If you haven’t yet subscribed to it, go do it right now!

Roni at Fiction Groupie has a post on e-publishing and whether you should go that route.

Jane Friedman at No Rules talks about managing multiple identities online.

Last but not least, from Literary Agency Upstart Crow, can you boil your book down to 25 words or less? These people did.

Happy Mother’s Day to all you writing moms out there! I hope they serve you breakfast in bed!

]]> http://meghanward.com/blog/2010/05/08/link-love-17/feed/ 5