*Enrollment for this class opens August 22, 2016. Please register then at this link.

Class meetings: Six consecutive Monday evenings, November 7 to December 12, from 6 to 8pm, in the University of Arizona Poetry Center Conference Room 207.

What if, at a border, we can displace the notion of separation and acknowledge the multivocal and connective potential that the line of demarcation holds?

In this generative writing studio, we will explore the spatial, symbolic, and literary connotations of the border/la frontera. “Writing at the threshold” acknowledges the interplay between a boundary and its potential for opening and passage. Throughout the course we will write from encounter-based and relational writing prompts, involving dream work, walks, documentary practices, and deep listening, to explore what lies beyond our safe knowing, on the "other side," beyond the line drawn. We will borrow concepts from cultural cartography and border studies, such as "chorography," "third space" and "assemblage," to investigate how divergent voices and genre forms can meet and, perhaps, even belong to each other. While generating new work, we will also take inventory of our own boundary lines and limitations---be it formally, within an existing project, or in a writing practice still developing---and exercise strategies of trespass and crossing. Each class meeting will incorporate work by creative practitioners, like Gloria Anzaldúa, C.D. Wright, Pauline Oliveros, Richard Long, Cecilia Vicuña and others, for our ongoing conversation on the poetic practices of encounter.