BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND! : SHIFTING FOCUS: Changing Your Brain, Changing Your Poetic Practice with Pireeni Sundaralingam August 1, 2009

This workshop is split over two consecutive Saturdays and is dedicated to helping you develop a sustainable and effective practice as a poet. Incorporating ideas from neuroscience, the workshop’s aim is to challenge the way that we, as writers, engage with the world around us. In particular, the two-day workshop will explore how innovative metaphors can be used to shift our focus.

The workshop involves assignments, designed to enrich your out-of-class writing practice, that need to be completed between workshop sessions.

About the instructor: Pireeni Sundaralingam's poetry has appeared in national newspapers and political journals such as The Guardian (UK) and The Progressive (USA), as well as literary journals such as World Literature Today and Ploughshares. Pireeni is also co-editor of the forthcoming collection Writing the Lines of Our Hands, the first anthology of South Asian American poetry. Pireeni's recent poetry honors include the Rosenthal Fellowship from PEN USA andbeing featured in the International Museum of Women and the United Nations headquarters.

Educated at Oxford, Pireeni has held research posts at MIT and UCLA and is a former professor of cognitive development. She has held national fellowships both in cognitive science and in poetry. www.wordandviolin.com

Registration fee is $80. To register by check, please send check or money order to: Kearny Street Workshop, PO Box 14545, San Francisco, CA 94114-0545. Or pay online at www.kearnystreet.org. Please include your full name and contact info.

Official Website: http://www.kearnystreet.org