What does hybrid writing mean? Are you looking for definitions, for labels? Sorry, we have none of those here. Here, “hybrid” means uncategorizable. Here, “hybrid” means possibility, potential, mixing it up, collision, combination. Perhaps you’ve written something and you’ve been wondering what it is. Is it a short story? A poem? Some sort of essay, perhaps? Let go of needing to know and let’s get hybrid.
“Hybrid” might refer to the form of the final piece, the process of creating it, or the content – or all three. Hybrid writing isn’t a genre, it doesn’t have its own “rules” or traditions.
We will be looking at some well-known hybrid forms before stepping right out of our comfortable enclosures. There is the prose poem, that slippery creature that dances in the space between prose and poetry, never stopping long enough to settle. How about the lyric essay, which takes the essay and jazzes it up with poetry’s tools? And then there’s autofiction, the blending – sometimes seamless, sometimes not – of autobiography and the elements of the imagined, the made-up. We will be starting here, reading examples of these and writing our own before striding further out, colliding genres, playing with mash-ups, and taking the concept of “hybrid” in science and nature – even within our own bodies – as inspiration. Be warned: we will be sitting in zones of uncertainty, in the blurriest of places, where there are no guardrails; we create our own. Bring yourselves, all of them, and let’s experiment.
Please note: this course covers the same material as in Tania’s previous course Hybrid Writing: Unbox your Words, but in a different format (live Zoom classes as opposed to asynchronous learning).
Course outline
- Four two-hour live zoom workshops with Tania Hershman including a combination of reading, discussion and writing exercises
- Reading material and writing prompts provided outside of the Zoom sessions
- Encouragement to share your work but no formal feedback requirement
- Detailed written feedback from Tania on a final submission of up to 1,000 words
This course is six weeks long, with four live Zoom classes in weeks 1, 2, 4 and 5, a reading and writing week, and a submission week. Zoom classes will take place 7-9pm on the dates below. You will be able to submit a piece at the end of the course for detailed written feedback from the course tutor, Tania, who will send you her notes within two weeks of the course finishing.
Course timetable and content
Across the four zoom sessions, we will move from the more charted hybrid territories into uncharted waters, from reading and writing known hybrid forms to creating our own, finding the unique and wonderful ways we want to tell our stories. We will be using many different sources of inspiration, too, finding new and fertile methods for unlocking our imaginations and giving ourselves permission to try anything and everything.
Week 1 (19th February): Zoom class – what might “hybrid” mean & what is genre anyway?
Week 2 (26th February): Zoom class – Hybrid as subject matter
Week 3 (4th March): break week for reading and writing (with material and prompts provided)
Week 4 (11th March): Zoom class – Hybrid as process
Week 5 (18th March): Zoom class – Hybrid as end-product
Week 6 (25th March): submit a final piece for written feedback from Tania
Time commitment
To help with your planning, we suggest you allow about three hours per week outside of the zoom workshops for reading and writing during the course.
Learning online
This course will take place on Zoom, so you will need to have access to the internet at the times given above. Zoom sessions will be recorded and available for the duration of the course for you to watch if you miss a session. The course tutor will share Zoom links and material to read for each session via email/Google docs.
