Where World and Skin Meet: The Embodied Lyric Essay

This generative writing workshop invites participants to explore what it means to put body to words in the beautifully expansive hybrid form of the lyric essay. The workshop will provide participants with examples of embodied lyric essays, discussions around craft, original writing prompts, and time to write.  “Where World and Skin Meet: The Embodied Lyric Essay” will examine multiple forms of embodiment through writing, whether that be writing that centers our bodyminds or writing that weaves in our bodyminds as touchstones of description. 

Authors we will read in the workshop may include but are not limited to Toni Jensen, Claudia Rankine, Jan Grue, Therese Marie Mailhot, Harrison Cook, and Chloé Cooper Jones. All readings will be provided ahead of time to participants.

Closed Captioning will be available. Requests for ASL interpretation must be made by July 7.  Please let us know particular access needs you may have when registering so we can do our best to accommodate! 

Instructor

Hannah Soyer (she/her) is a queer disabled writer born and living in the Midwest. Her work explores the representation of “Othered” bodies, and how the arts–in particular storytelling–can be beautiful acts of survival, resistance, and community building. She is the founder of This Body is Worthy, a project aimed at celebrating bodies outside of mainstream societal ideals, and Words of Reclamation, a space for disabled writers. She also happens to be a cat and chocolate enthusiast.

She has written for nationally-acclaimed publications such as Cosmopolitan Magazine, and her creative work has been nominated for Pushcart Prizes and featured in places such as The Rumpus, Entropy, and Disability Visibility Project. She has worked at various newspapers as an opinions columnist, editor, or freelance reporter. Her 2016 investigative piece, “Most Iowa School Districts Don’t Comply With Americans With Disabilities Act” was published in all major Iowa newspapers and spurred a Department of Justice investigation into the accessibility of Iowa schools. She also has worked as managing editor for literary magazines and as an editorial assistant for Sundress Publications. In addition, she is the editor of The Ending Hasn’t Happened Yet: An Anthology of Disability Poetics from Sable Books. Her chapbook, For When the Shapes Keep Changing, won the 2021 OutWrite Chapbook Competition in the creative nonfiction category.

Hannah has presented at various conferences on topics related to disability, language, and embodiment. She is also heavily involved in local disability rights movements and various Disability Justice projects (learn more on her “Resources” page).

An accomplished English and Creative Writing instructor, workshop facilitator, communicator, and freelance writer/editor, Hannah believes in the power of story. She is an experienced writing coach–both creative and academic–and loves helping individuals realize their ideas and translate them to the page.