My lack of updates have been due to the mayhem of ISP. All SIT programs conclude with an independent study project--essentially every student designs their own research project to reflect their academic interests and then carries it out. I went through a few potential ISP subjects before I found the perfect fit, and I landed on researching the role of the young writer in an emerging Pacific literature with a focus on encouraging creative expression.
Basically what that all means is that I'm planning on teaching creative writing workshops in a few local universities and exposing students to creative outlets that they might be normally be discouraged from pursuing, as in a communal society, individual expression is oftentimes viewed as selfish or arrogant. Whereas most American students have experienced some degree of creative writing somewhere in their curriculum, it's something that most young Samoans have never been exposed to. I'm excited to do the workshops, but I haven't yet been able to get contact of any of the professors I'd hoped to--emails and phone numbers don't have the same consistent success rates here that they do in America. So my plan for the day is to go camp outside of their offices and beg them to let me into their classrooms, and then talk to some publishers and similarly beg the youth librarian in Apia to let me run a voluntary workshop with students there. Let's hope most of the people I need to beg speak English!
Also my advisor, Marj Moore, is an editor for the Samoa Observer, meaning that she was able to land me some great interviews, and also meaning that she forced me to agree to be in the paper. Check it out, Samoa celeb status. http://www.samoaobserver.ws/authors-a-books/4562-us-student-researches-writing
Everyone keep your fingers firmly crossed for me, hopefully I can make some big moves today!
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