I have been busy finishing a few writing projects recently. I pitched three short articles exploring adaptations in 21st century poetry to Alluvium: 21st Century Writing | 21st Century Approaches. The first of these, “The Beautiful Game” in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric” was published in April of this year. I analyse a section of Rankine’s Citizen in which she adapts the Zidane headbutt during the 2006 Football World Cup Final.
Yesterday I submitted the second of this series, an article titled “AfroFuturism in Danez Smith’s Black Movie. Smith is one of my favourite poets and I have wanted to spend some more time with their work for a while! Once it gets past review, the article should appear later this year.
I wanted to write for Alluvium for a while because I really value their approach in making complex ideas accessible through shorter-than-usual articles, and ideally a series of two or three articles. I am also intrigued by their post-publication review system which takes place in the sites message boards. I enjoy open peer-review methods. I think it’s more productive to have authors, readers and reviewers in direct dialogue. I had an excellent experience a couple of years ago with Hybrid Pedagogy’s collaborative peer-review style resulting in the publication of “Twessays and Composition in the Digital Age.” I am always on the lookout for more journals with new approaches to peer-review.
I’m also working on a short piece for RTE Brainstorm about eco-friendly approaches to teaching and learning. More on that soon. . .