Undoing the Silence: Six Tools for Social Change Writing - Softcover

Dunlap, Louise

Softcover

ISBN 10: 097660549X ISBN 13: 9780976605492

Publisher: New Village Press, 2007

Synopsis

Undoing the Silence offers guidance to help both citizens and professionals influence democratic process through letters, articles, reports and public testimony.  
Louise Dunlap, PhD, began her career as an activist writing instructor during the Free Speech Movement of the 1960s. She learned that listening and gaining a feel for audience are just as important to social transformation as the outspoken words of student leaders atop police cars. "Free speech is a first step, but real communication matches speech with listening and understanding. That is when thinking shifts and change happens."
Dunlap felt compelled to go where the silences were deepest because her work aimed not just at teaching but also at healing both individual voices and an ailing collective voice. Her tales of those adventures and what she knows about the culture of silence -- how gender, race, education, class, and family work to quiet dissent -- are interwoven with practical methods for people to put their most challenging ideas into words.
Louise Dunlap gives writing workshops around the country for universities and social justice, environmental, and peace organizations that help reluctant writers get past their internal censors to find their powerful voice. Her insight strengthens strategic thinking and her "You can do it!" approach makes social-action writing achievable for everyone.

About this title

From the Back Cover

I don't know anyone who conveys more essential insights more clearly and briefly. I can't think of a better book to recommend to people who want to make a difference.
--Peter Elbow, Author, Writing With Power, Writing Without Teachers; Professor Emeritus, University of Massachusetts Amherst

A valuable, beautifully written resource, this book will certainly inspire and unleash critical thinking and writing for social change--both for activists who never imagined they could be writers and for seasoned writers in need of renewal.
--Shamin Meer, Activist Writer and Researcher, South Africa

Louise Dunlap brings us this elegant and moving book on how to find your powerful voice and understand your audience. Every professional grad school should require this book.
--Ann Markusen, Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota

With these tools, my ordinary words become a vehicle for change.
--Mary Leno, Eviction Free Zone, Cambridge Women's Commission

...having worked in medical and federal government jobs that required writing in a passive voice. I took Louise's writing course and realized that not only was I writing passively, I was thinking passively!
--Emma Featherman-Sam, Transit Coordinator, Oglala Sioux Tribe Department of Transportation

If fish had hands, Louise Dunlap could teach them to write! After attending her workshops and classes, hundreds of labor and community activists have used Dunlap's tested techniques to write clearly and passionately for social and economic justice.
--Susan Moir, Director, Labor Resource Center, University of Massachusetts Boston

The techniques in Undoing the Silence value the knowledge ad experience of emerging writers. The power of this work is "The Lifting of Every Voice"... the basis of building a real democracy in this country.
--Mel King, Community leader and former Massachusetts State Representative; Professor Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

Louise Dunlap began her career as an activist writing instructor during the Free Speech Movement of the 1960s. She learned that listening and gaining a feel for audience are as important to social transformation as the outspoken words of student leaders atop police cars. "Free speech is a first step, but real communication matches speech with listening and understanding. That is when thinking shifts and change happens."

About the Author

Louise Dunlap is currently a lecturer in urban and environmental policy and planning at Tufts University.

About this edition

• Publisher: New Village Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 097660549X
• ISBN 13: 9780976605492
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 240