Identity Narrative Assignment: How Writing About Students’ Identities Shapes Their Writerly Voice

Appendix 1

Identity Narrative Assignment

In this first assignment, you will explore your personal experiences and reflect on key moments that have shaped your identity. Through reading a diverse range of narratives, we will analyze how writers use storytelling to develop their unique voices. This assignment serves as a foundation for you to situate your identity within different writing contexts and discover your own distinct writerly voice.

Assignment Goals:

• Use self-assessment and reflection to identify the important experiences and influences of your own literacy development
• Use elements of narrative storytelling in your writing
• Both describe events, people, or experiences and reflect on or analyze the significance of those events, people, or experiences to your development as a writer, reader, and thinker
• Locate and assess implicit and explicit biases.
• Critically examine the biases and think of handling them with caution in the writing processes.

Relevant Readings:

• “Talking Back” by Bell Hooks
• “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” by Gloria Anzaldua
• “How Identity Shapes My Writing”
• TedTalks provided in the class 

Audience and Purpose

Every piece of writing has an audience—a specific reader the writer aims to reach. In academic settings, many papers are written for the classroom community of writers and readers. For this assignment, your primary audience is yourself and your instructor. You are encouraged to write openly and authentically about your identity, perspectives, and biases, knowing that this is a space for honest self-reflection.

Assignment Goals:

• Use self-assessment and reflection to identify the important experiences and influences of your own literacy development
• Use elements and techniques of narrative storytelling in your writing
• Both describe events, people, or experiences and reflect on or analyze the significance of those events, people, or experiences to your development as a writer, reader, and thinker
• Locate and assess implicit and explicit biases.

Learning Outcomes:

• Reflect on individual experiences and challenges related to identity by addressing insights about self-perception, beliefs, values, and how they evolve over time.
• Choose appropriate conventions, writing tone and style, and document design for a range of genres, situations, purposes, and audiences.
• Use evidence, some of which may be derived from personal experience and field research, to demonstrate an awareness of a larger conversation and multiple viewpoints surrounding an issue.
• Analyze the societal constructs, stereotypes, and biases that influence identity narratives.
• Enhance written communication skills by articulating complex identity-related concepts clearly, persuasively, and ethically.

Requirements:

• Students are encouraged to write at least 500 to 700 words.
• No work citation is required unless it is needed to clarify a context or situation.

Deadlines:

• Week 1: Submit the First Draft of Identity Narrative for peer review
• Week 2: Meet the instruction for a brief conversation and Discuss the Memo
• Week 2: Submit the Revised Identity Narrative after the conversation