Getting an MFA and Memoir Writing

Getting an MFA and Memoir Writing

Welcome to The Academic Life. You are smart and capable, but you aren’t an island, and neither are we. So we reached across our mentor network to bring you podcasts on everything from how to finish that project, to how to take care of your beautiful mind. Wish we’d bring in an expert about something? Email us at cgessler@gmail.com or dr.danamalone@gmail.com. Find us on Twitter : The Academic Life @AcademicLifeNBN. In this episode you’ll hear: about putting your personal story onto the page, choosing between fiction and memoir to find your story’s true voice, getting an MFA, the importance of having a good mentor, navigating the stories of others that intersect yours, creating beauty out of trauma, grief, BLM, and a discussion of the book The Names of All the Flowers. Our guest is: Melissa Valentine, author of The Names of All the Flowers. She is a writer from Oakland, CA. She earned her BA from Sarah Lawrence College and her MFA in creative writing from Mills College. She has been a fellow at the San Francisco Writers' Grotto, and her work has appeared in Jezebel, Guernica, Apogee Journal, and others. Her writing has received honorable mention from Glimmer Train, and the Ardella Mills Non-fiction Award. She works as an editor, and currently lives in Brooklyn, NY. Your host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, a historian of women, gender, and sexuality. Listeners to this episode might be interested in: The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin Between the World and Me by Ta Nehisi Coates Create Dangerously by Edwidge Danticat The Purpose of Power by Alicia Garza Dust Tracks On a Road by Zora Neale Hurston Soldier by June Jordan Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde The Source of Self-Regard by Toni Morrison Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward "How Racism Makes Us Sick" [TedTalk] "How Childhood Trauma Affects Health Across A Lifetime" [TedTalk] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/academic-life

Episoder(321)

Empathy Takes Action: An Autistic Therapist on the Radical Work of Connection

Empathy Takes Action: An Autistic Therapist on the Radical Work of Connection

Mainstream psychology has long accepted that some people (like those with autism) are naturally more logical and unemotional, while others (like so-called empaths) intuitively experience the feelings ...

30 Apr 48min

Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King

Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King

Caroline Bicks became the first scholar granted extended access by Stephen King to his private archives, a treasure trove of manuscripts that document the legendary writerʼs creative process—most of t...

23 Apr 55min

The Case for Career Services

The Case for Career Services

What exactly is career services? If you don’t know, you aren’t alone. Most of us operate from a limited or outdated idea of what career services offers, why it’s necessary, and how soon you should sta...

16 Apr 47min

The Coroner’s Silence: Death Records and the Hidden Victims of Police Violence

The Coroner’s Silence: Death Records and the Hidden Victims of Police Violence

Each year, police officers kill over 1,000 people they’ve sworn to protect and serve. While some cases, like George Floyd’s and Sandra Bland’s, capture national attention, most victims remain nameles...

9 Apr 57min

 The Club: Where American Artists Found Refuge in Belle Epoque Paris

The Club: Where American Artists Found Refuge in Belle Epoque Paris

In Belle Époque Paris, the Eiffel Tower was newly built, France was experiencing remarkable political stability, and American women were painting the town and gathering at a female-only Residence know...

2 Apr 51min

The Criminal Record Complex: Risk, Race, and the Struggle for Work in America

The Criminal Record Complex: Risk, Race, and the Struggle for Work in America

Most employers in the United States routinely conduct criminal background checks on job applicants, weeding out those with criminal convictions—and thus denying opportunities to those who need them m...

26 Mar 54min

 ⁠The Collective Cure: Upstream Solutions for Better Public Health⁠

 ⁠The Collective Cure: Upstream Solutions for Better Public Health⁠

A powerful blend of deeply human stories and rigorous research, The Collective Cure: Upstream Solutions for Better Public Health (Beacon Press, 2026) reveals how social and structural factors like ...

19 Mar 54min

What’s on Her Mind: The Mental Workload of Family Life

What’s on Her Mind: The Mental Workload of Family Life

Mothers and fathers use their time differently, with women spending roughly twice as many hours on family labor as men. But what about the gendered differences in the ways women and men think? What’s ...

12 Mar 50min

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