Browse Exhibits (4 total)

Community Spotlight: The Everyday Writings of White Mouse Theatre Productions

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The goal of this exhibit is to showcase the everyday writing of a community, specifically, FSU's student lead theatre group, White Mouse Theatre Productions. The writing shown in this exhibit ranges from internal rehearsal reports, emails, and other miscellaneous writing created by the members of White Mouse.

White Mouse Theatre Productions is a theatre troupe with a focus on social change. Much of their work focuses on centering stories about minorities or discussing social issues through the art form of theatre. 

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Contextualizing Art Through Everyday Writing

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Most people are familiar with the saying “a picture is with a thousand words,” and while this may be true, sometimes a little more context is needed to evoke a complete understanding of a piece of art. Everyday writing can thus be used to provide this context, and this exhibit explores the ways in which people have used everyday writing in this manner. 

The importance of establishing context in both everyday writing and in art, lies in its ability to stimulate knowledge creation. In her article titled “Writing is a Knowledge-Making Activity,” Heidi Estrem uses a definition of writing which asserts that writing is “an activity undertaken to bring new understandings,” (Estrem 19). It is about “mulling over a problem, thinking with others, and exploring new ideas or bringing disparate ideas together,” (Estrem, 19). This concept of bringing new understandings and bringing disparate ideas together are seen within the interrelationship of art and everyday writing in this exhibit.

In the next few pages, a relationship between art, everyday writing, and materiality will also be established, as the materiality of a work is just as important to its context as any other component. In other words, I will be taking a scenic/contextual approach to analyzing these artifacts, where “writing is not only words on the page, but also concerns the mechanisms for production,” (Porter 386). The methods by which the creator of these artifacts composed both the artwork and writing of their piece attests to the purpose, audience, and overall meaning of the composition. The materiality also portrays the character of the creator while defining the composition’s intimacy and capacity for interaction, performing both as “an expression of the self and a social activity,” (Yancey, 164).  

The ontological view of writing maintains the “impossibility of ‘contextless’ writing,” (Lillis, 80), and this is a view I choose to uphold in this exhibit. The meaning of any composition is heavily dependent on its context, an idea I will further explore in the pages to come. 

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Turning a Dorm Into a Home

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Many college kids live in dorms each year. The transition from living at home to living in a new city/place can be shocking for many. However, dorms become a safe haven where students can express their individuality. Through this, college students make their dorms a home. When decorating a dorm, everyday writing becomes a way of turning a blank room into a safe space. Everyday writing is seen in almost every dorm; this type of writing is often overlooked. 

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Summer Camp Chronicles: Everyday Writing from Camper to Counselor

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This exhibit is an in depth anthology cataloguing the writing involved in summer camp; from being a camper to a counselor. In places where technology is almost nonexistent, the writing of summer camp forms the core bonds between the people there and functions as the main form of communication. Everyday writing is the crucial infrastructure for any summer camp to operate, whether it’s getting things done on site or keeping kids connected to their families and “the outside world” everyday writing is an everyday practice over the summer. This exhibit includes letters, notes, schedules, plane tickets, and much more. It serves to bring a sense of nostalgia to a digital age. In today’s world tweeting, texting, em ails, and the internet in general takes over daily life to a point where everyday writing has become something people don’t recognize because it’s turned into second nature. Taking thetime to disconnect by choice or by force brings everyday writing into the forefront of people’sminds because it’s turns the necessity to communicate back into a process that takes time ratherthan an instant message.

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