{"id":11851,"date":"2021-02-23T22:03:56","date_gmt":"2021-02-24T03:03:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dept.writing.wisc.edu\/blog\/?p=11851"},"modified":"2025-04-14T02:32:22","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T07:32:22","slug":"when-a-dean-writes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dept.writing.wisc.edu\/blog\/when-a-dean-writes\/","title":{"rendered":"When a Dean Writes: Celebrating Black & African American Campus Writers for Black History Month"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Gabrielle Isabel Kelenyi, on behalf of the Writing Center\u2019s Antiracism Standing Committee<\/strong><\/em>, and featuring Dean Eric Wilcots<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Writing happens. It happens everywhere<\/em> and all the time<\/em>, even when we\u2019re not writing an essay. Furthermore, writing is important<\/em> because we use it to communicate important ideas and information, to express ourselves, to make the particular more universal, to reach out and connect with one another. Especially in these socially distant times, writing is an important way for us all to teach, to exchange ideas, to accomplish our tasks and goals, to metaphorically touch<\/em> one another. Whether we\u2019re conscious of it or not, we spend a lot of time writing for various audiences and various purposes, and the Writing Center wants to celebrate all the writing we do as worthy and important. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the ways we\u2019ve sought to do this is by sharing more ways of writing and more reasons for writing with the wider campus community. And upon learning about writers writing from departments across campus, it is our hope that more people will be able to see themselves as writers, too. Through gathering faculty writing profiles for cultural heritage months and developing them into social media posts<\/a>, the Writing Center has aimed to showcase the wide range of writing processes and strategies that work for writers and normalize the idea that everyone\u2019s process is unique. Shining a light on specific communities of writers and writing can help other members of those communities see themselves as writers more clearly and help elucidate the value of writing in their lives and aspirations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Black History Month, in addition to faculty members, we also featured university administrators<\/a> who use writing in unique ways to communicate information, connect with campus stakeholders, and write for large, diverse audiences (see gallery below for some recent posts). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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