The Writer’s Center presents an informative and inspiring symposium addressing the subject of family in literature and popular culture, offering free creative writing workshops followed by a panel discussion. Featured writers include Tope Folarin, Hannah Grieco, GG Renee Hill, and Meera Trehan, moderated by Joanne Hyppolite. The symposium concludes with a reception for all attendees.
All events are FREE and open to the public. Limited space, registration required. The workshops are simultaneous, so please only sign up for ONE. Scroll down to register!
The Workshops | 1:30-3:00pm
Please register for ONE workshop using the form below. Workshop registration includes admission to the panel discussion and reception.
- Rendering Your Life on the Page | Workshop Leader: Tope Folarin
In this workshop we will examine the challenges and joys of autobiographical writing, and the ethics of including your family in your work. We will read passages from autobiographical novels featuring the authors’ family members, discuss methods of transforming memory into art, and conclude with a writing exercise. - Speculative Nonfiction: Approaching memoir and creative nonfiction with a new lens | Workshop Leader: Hannah Grieco
You’ve written about your family experiences through a variety of forms: personal essays, lyrical essays, and maybe even hermit crab essays! Now it’s time to look at your truth from the lens of “What if?” This generative workshop will help you explore these stories you know so well from new angles and perspectives! We’ll walk that line between nonfiction and fiction, using prompts and exercises to begin two new drafts of speculative literary nonfiction. Be ready to try prompts and exercises you’ve never tried before, to stretch in new ways, and to examine what it means for a story to be *true.* Please bring a laptop in order to access the readings, which will be provided as links! - Writing About Family: Idea Generation for the Personal Essay | Workshop Leader: GG Renee Hill
In this session, participants will be prompted to reflect on family relationships, dynamics, and experiences to start drafting stories that can be developed into personal essays. We’ll explore the emotional and ethical complexities of writing about family, the importance of distinguishing between examination and exposure, and key elements to include in the personal essay format. Participants will do two writing exercises, share their work if they choose, and come away with themes for future writing. - Family in Writing for Children and YA | Workshop Leader: Meera Trehan
Few, if any, forces shape a child’s life as much as family. In this workshop, Meera will use examples and exercises to explore how the presence and absence of family members shape stories in young adult, middle grade, and picture books, and to offer ways to develop your characters’ families both off and on the page to add nuance and depth to your own work.
Please register for ONE workshop using the form below. Workshop registration includes admission to the panel discussion and reception.
The Panel | 3:15-4:15pm
To attend the panel and reception, please register for one of the workshops listed above.
- Our workshop leaders are joined by moderator Joanne Hyppolite for a discussion on how the literary community addresses family, how we get it right, and where we might do better. Reception to follow.
The Participants
Tope Folarin is a Nigerian-American writer based in Washington DC. He serves as Executive Director of the Institute for Policy Studies and the Lannan Visiting Lecturer in Creative Writing at Georgetown University. He has garnered many awards for his writing, including the Caine Prize for African Writing, the Whiting Award for Fiction, and a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. His debut novel, A Particular Kind of Black Man, was published by Simon & Schuster.
Hannah Grieco is a writer, editor, and teacher in Washington DC. Her work can be found in a variety of literary and freelance publications, including The Washington Post, Al Jazeera, Huffington Post, Brevity, The Rumpus, Passages North, and more. Her writing has been nominated for The Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net, Best Small Fictions, and Best Microfiction, and has been selected for the Wigleaf Top 50. She teaches writing at American University and Catapult, is an editor at Alan Squire Publishing, and is the editor of the anthology And If That Mockingbird Don’t Sing: Parenting Stories Gone Speculative from Alternating Current Press (January 2022). Her next anthology Already Gone is forthcoming from Alan Squire Publishing in September of 2023.
GG Renee Hill is an author, creative coach, and workshop facilitator who helps others discover and express their truths through writing. She facilitates transformative workshops that show individuals, groups, and organizations how to overcome creative blocks and reframe their stories. Through her offerings, she centers writing as a tool for all forms of creative expression, as she creates safe spaces for others to own their voices and callings. Past and present clients include a diverse list of organizations including The Writer’s Center, The Recording Academy, University of Maryland, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, and BAE Systems, Inc. to name a few. Her recent published works include two guided journals through Rockridge Press, Self-Care Check-In (2020) and A Year of Self-Reflection (2021). Her essays about mental health and personal transformation have been featured by Shondaland.com and Thrive Global. She lives in Maryland with her partner and three children.
Meera Trehan grew up in the Washington DC suburbs where she read as much as she could, memorized poems, and ate enough cookies to earn the nickname “Monster” after the Cookie Monster. After attending the University of Virginia and Stanford Law School, she practiced public interest law for over a decade before turning to writing for children—first taking classes at The Writer’s Center. Her debut, The View from the Very Best House in Town, released from Walker US/Candlewick in February 2022 and has been named a Junior Library Guild Gold Selection (print book and audio book) and an Amazon Editor’s Pick.
Joanne Hyppolite is an author, a curator and a mother. As an author she writes children’s books and adult fiction. Two of her popular middle grade novels include Seth and Samona, which won the 1994 Marguerite DeAngeli prize for New Children’s Fiction and Ola Shakes It Up – both of which explore African American and Haitian American intersections. Her short stories have also been published in the Caribbean Writer and The Butterfly’s Way: Voice from the Haitian Dyaspora. As a curator, she is best known for the Cultural Expressions inaugural exhibition at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, where the position she holds is Supervisory Museum Curator of the African Diaspora. She is the mother of Charles, now a teenager and who long ago—with good reason—asked why he is never included as an accomplishment in her bios. She holds a PhD in literature from the University of Miami and an MA in Afro-American Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles. An experienced public speaker, she lectures widely at schools, libraries, and conferences on African American and Caribbean culture.
If you need an accommodation for this event, please contact us at access@{{{{homeurl_non_www}}}}. We will attempt to fulfill all requests, but advance notice is necessary to arrange for some accessibility services.
Please register for ONE workshop using the form below. Workshop registration includes admission to the panel discussion and reception.
If a workshop is full, you can join the waitlist by sending an email to amy.freeman@{{{{homeurl_non_www}}}} specifying the workshop you’re interested in attending.