AAWP colleagues co-wrote a critical review of the Stella Prize shortlist for The Conversation.

The outcome of that prize will be announced later today.

Read the full review (and maybe get your next reading recommendations) here.

In partnership:
Central Queensland University and University of the Sunshine Coast
USC Sunshine Coast Campus, Sippy Downs

24-26 November 2021

THEME: Fire Country

We invite presentations – 15 minutes in duration – from practice, research, industry and pedagogy – and pre-formed collaborative discussion panels (three panellists only) that reflect consideration of a ‘fire country’ and the ways we enable and disseminate those marginal and mainstream voices that contribute to its discourse.

See the full CFP here for more on this year’s theme.

Deadline for abstract submissions is 16 April 2021. This deadline is final.

These should include your name, abstract (200 – 250 words max), university affiliation, e-mail address, the title of your proposed paper, and a short bio (100 words max). Only AAWP members are eligible to present.

You can find membership details, prices, and online sign-up options here.

Professional development sessions for postgraduate candidates and ECR colleagues will be offered in association with the main conference program.

Queries to: AAWP Conference aawpconf2021@gmail.com. The 2021 conference website to submit abstracts and proposals (200-250 words max) can be found here

Conference Committee:
Dr Elizabeth Ellison; Dr Lee McGowan; Dr Nicole Anae; Dr Ross Watkins; Dr Eileen HerbertGoodall; Tash Turgoose; Ali Hickling; Amanda Fiedler; and Lonnie Gilroy

The Incompleteness Book II—Writing Back and Thinking Forward

Deadline: Wednesday 15 April 11.59pm 2021 (EST)

Dear all,

In April 2020, amidst the global pandemic of Covid-19, the Australasian Association of Writing Programs (AAWP), the peak academic body representing the discipline of Creative Writing in Australasia, sent a call for contributions to a Special Issue of TEXT—Journal of Writing and Writing Courses. The theme of the Special Issue was: The in/completeness of human experience. The collection was subsequently published as The Incompleteness Book (2020: Recent Work Press).

We are delighted to announce that Shane Strange, Publisher at Recent Work Press, will publish a follow-up collection: The Incompleteness Book II—Writing Back and Thinking Forward (eds. Eileen Herbert Goodall, Julia Prendergast and Jen Webb).

We invite contributions to this theme, broadly interpreted. We are deeply interested in capturing a composite “picture” of what people make of the prompt: the incompleteness of human experience, one year on. Writing back and thinking forward, we encourage you to consider: What have you discarded? What do you covet more closely than ever? Have we learned something about ourselves or more broadly? Where to, from here?

Please send creative work—short-short fiction, “sudden” fiction, “sketchy” stories, creative nonfiction, poetry, short pithy scripts, as well as hybrid forms. We are accepting submissions on the following scale: up to 400 words prose (including submissions in script format), 40 lines for poetry (approximately 200 words for prose poems), and the equivalent for hybrid forms. Submissions must be previously unpublished. We will accept a maximum of two submissions, per author. Please send your most polished work, without delay. The aim is to capture the immediacy of people’s “thinking positions” in the form of “sudden” writing. The call closes on Wednesday 15 April 2021, 11.59pm (EST).

Please note that this opportunity is open only to current AAWP members. You will be prompted to provide membership details, when you submit:

https://meniscusliteraryjournal.submittable.com/submit/164256/the-in-completeness-book-v2-0

• For inquiries re. the status of your membership please contact: memberships@aawp.org.au
• If the membership fee presents an issue, please contact Julia: jprendergast@swin.edu.au
• Please note that international contributors should pay the international affiliate membership fee (a reduced fee for international colleagues who would like to participate in AAWP initiatives but are less likely to attend AAWP conferences, regularly).

Write boldly. Go gently. In solidarity.

Julia.

CONGRATULATIONS to the winner of the 2020 Sudden Writing Prize, Raphail Spartalis!

The prize was co-judged by AAWP and Voiceworks, and the judges noted:

‘Little Apocalypse’ by Raphail Spartalis takes the image of children exploring rockpools, and inspects it at a scale and perspective that makes it strange. The imagery and tone in the piece are impressively memorably rendered—a tranquillity viscerally interrupted.

But like all writing, there are multiple readings, which makes this creation even more deeply interesting. Analogous perhaps; metaphorical. Perceptively fluid.

What we both agree on is that this is a piece we will think about in the future, observing the small chaoses our bodies create with a penetrating oddness.

CONGRATULATIONS also to our shortlisted authors (in alphabetical order): Amelia Bussing, Dominique Byrne, Grace Cassidy, Natasha Durney-Steel, Isabella Garrido, Jessica Hudson, Christina Tungate, Arun Wilfred Sam Than, Lorelei Williams.

You can read the winning piece right now, up on the Express Media website, here.

For all AAWP prizes, keep an eye on AAWP.org.au/news/opportunities

Across the ages, critics and poets have made pronouncements about the role and function of poetry in the world. Plato banished poetry from the ideal society, though was open to its value if defenders could prove it; Coleridge said that poetry is for ‘pleasure, not truth’. Auden said that ‘poetry makes nothing happen’; Anne Carson says that a poem ‘is an action of the mind captured on a page’. Alison Whittaker says that poetry can be a ‘great tool for organising and for mobilising people’. 

What is poetry now? What purposes does it serve, and for whom? How are poets harnessing poetry’s power globally to address urgent contemporary issues? How is poetry experienced and received among different communities of readers and listeners? And what are the new frontiers for poetry? How does it intersect with other domains, and what are the fruits of these intersections? What are its emerging contexts? How will poetry function in the future? 

This special issue of TEXT seeks to publish scholarly papers and poetry that investigate poetry’s evolving place in the contemporary moment. Papers and poetry are encouraged to explore, but are not limited to the following:

• Poetry and activism
• Poetry and aesthetics
• Poetry and ageing
• Poetry and the body
• Poetry and collaboration
• Poetry and community
• Poetry as confession
• Poetry as conversation
• Poetry and design
• Poetry and ecologies
• Poetry and elders 
• Poetry and the environment
• Poetry as experiment
• Poetry and genre
• Poetry and humour
• Poetry and identity
• Poetry as instruction
• Poetry as manifesto
• Poetry and medicine
• Poetry and memory
• Poetry and music
• Poetry and the non-human
• Poetry and older Australians
• Poetry and politics
• Poetry as protest
• Poetry and practice
• Poetry as process
• Poetry in public spaces
• Poetry as record/history
• Poetry as research
• Poetry and science
• Poetry and technology
• The role of the poet
• Poetry as witness
• Poetry and writing lives

Scholarly papers should be between 5,000 and 6,000 words, including references. Up to three poems and/or one poetry sequence of any length per poet, will be considered. Please note, all poetry submissions must be accompanied by an ERA research statement that clearly explains the submission’s aims and significance. 

How to submit your Expression of Interest: 

• Please submit a 250 word Expression of Interest for scholarly essays (by email to Jessica Wilkinson: jessica.wilkinson@rmit.edu.au with ‘Poetry Now EOI’ as the subject line. In your EOI please outline how your paper or poems explore(s) the theme of ‘Poetry Now’. Also, make sure you include the following information: your full name, institutional affiliation (if any), email address, title of paper/poem, brief biography (50–100 words), and 3 to 5 keywords (at least two of which should clearly relate to the issue’s title). Deadline: October 31^st2020.
• Poetry submissions should be sent in full, accompanied by an ERA research statement, by February 28^th 2021.

Enquiries: Jessica Wilkinson, RMIT jessica.wilkinson@rmit.edu.au or Cassandra Atherton, Deakin University cassandra.atherton@deakin.edu.au or Sarah Holland-Batt, QUT, sarah.hollandbatt@qut.edu.au

The Arts Law Centre of Australia recently reviewed the AAWP’s Prizes terms and conditions for best practice.

Arts Law was very impressed with AAWP’s attitude, saying it clearly demonstrates respect for writers.

You can read the full review on the Arts Law website here, and don’t forget to send in your entry by July 31 for one of our five annual prizes for writers and translators.

More information on all of our prizes is available on our Prizes page.

Dear members and friends of the Australasian Association of Writing Programs (AAWP),

The AAWP is developing a list of recent publications by members of the association in recognition of our work as writers and scholars. 

This initiative was inspired by the entirely excellent Dr Stephanie Green and the 2020 conference team at Griffith University, who have been considering best practice for conference book sales in the face of Covid-19. 

The AAWP Committee of Management has decided to support this initiative by facilitating member book sales via the AAWP website as an ongoing venture.

We see this is a way of supporting our (ace) members as well as commemorating twenty-five years of successful advocacy by AAWP for creative writing in Australian higher education. 

We invite you to send a list of your major creative and scholarly works, published since 2012. 

Details should be sent to Eileen Herbert-Goodall (AAWP memberships portfolio holder): memberships@aawp.org.au

Please use the following format:
Author:
Title:
Publisher and year of publication:
ISSN:

We would be grateful to receive these details as soon as possible but, at the latest, before 30 September 2020.

Please note that your AAWP membership must be current in order for your books to be listed on the website. 

If you’d like to become an AAWP member, or re-new your membership, head to the membership page on our website here.

Write boldly. Go gently. In solidarity. 

Dr Julia Prendergast
AAWP Executive Committee Chair

Deadline: Wednesday 15 April 11.59pm (EST)

The in/completeness of human experience…

We invite you to contribute to a Special Issue of TEXT, to be released alongside the standard issue, in April—The in/completeness of human experience. The Special Issue will consist of AAWP members’ creative responses to the current health crisis and its impacts—it is an opportunity for us to come together as writers.

See the Prizes page for full details in a letter from AAWP President Julia Prendergast.