RADICAL REVERSAL
A Multi-Disciplinary Workshop
Currently taking place within correctional facilities and NOT open to the public.
We’re collaborating with acclaimed poet and musician, Randall Horton, to bring music, poetry, and performance to correctional facilities, demonstrating how art can play a pivotal role in social justice and provide pathways for artists to give back. Writers Without Margins has been selected to participate in this Creative Capital national program, which is also being offered in Alabama and Minnesota.
THE
STEP BY STEP WRITERS’ WORKSHOP
at
Step by Step Supportive Services
Step by Step Supportive Services, 1330 Beacon St., Brookline, MA
The Step by Step Writers’ Workshop aims to engage adults with psychiatric, cognitive, and social disabilities through the healing power of creative writing. Through guided exercises, art, guest speakers and discussion, we explore the ways in which language, poetry, literature, storytelling, and other expressive modalities can promote healing, recovery, and authority.
INSIDE EXPRESSION
at the
Suffolk County House of Correction
In 2020, we piloted our first workshop for sentenced individuals at the South Bay House of Corrections at 20 Bradston Street, Boston. This workshop series is intended to be the first of several “behind the wall.”
This program is modeled after the workshop showcased in the documentary, In Their Shoes: Unheard Stories of Reentry & Recovery. This group, which takes place twice a week, uses the techniques of literary discussion, guided prompts, and expressive writing. Utilizing the philosophy of “credible messengers,” which espouses the belief that communities have within them transformative resources to lift up justice-involved people in a comprehensive and positive way, this workshop will be co-facilitated by at least one returning citizen who exemplifies the possibility of sustainable change from within.
THE
INTENSIVE CAREGIVERS WORKSHOP
~available to partner organizations~
For more information or to see if you or your organization is eligible to host a workshop (either in-person or online), please send us a message via our contact us page, and someone from our team will respond at their earliest convenience.
This workshop is designed for those who self-identify as “caregivers,” whether by traditional or less conventional definitions, or both. Participants will utilize expressive writing as an artistic and therapeutic outlet for their own self-care, clarity, and connection. As the Covid-19 pandemic has increased pressure on many, if not most, people to care for others in new and challenging ways, this workshop will illuminate helpful tools and techniques. Our first workshop was offered with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Sexual Assault Response Unit’s Disabled Person’s Protection Commission.
THE LYRIC & THE LINE
at
Bridge Over Troubled Waters
(Temporarily on Hiatus)
Bridge Over Troubled Waters, 47 West Street, Boston, MA
We’ve teamed up with students from Emerson College, Berklee School of Music and Harvard University and added a multi-modal arts component to the education programs at Bridge Over Troubled Waters where the mission, since 1970, has been “transforming the lives of runaway, homeless and high-risk youth through safe, supportive, and encouraging relationships and effective and innovative services that guide them toward self-sufficiency.” This is a workshop series offered for artists, musicians, storytellers and poets interested in using writing to confront the many challenges faced by young adults making their way to be a better place. Classes will focus on interpretive reading, expressive writing, the process(es) of revision, and the purpose and power of sharing work. This workshop is intended for 14-24 year olds.
THE WYMAN WRITERS’ WORKSHOP
at
Wyman Recovery Home
Wyman Re-Entry Program, 201 River Street, Mattapan, MA
This writing, reading, discussion and speaker series aims to engage men in a post-incarceration and addiction recovery program with additional tools for a stronger sense of authority and engagement, through literature. Utilizing a broad range of styles, aesthetics, and forms, we encourage experimenting with new ideas, acknowledging and practicing the power of language through the four poetic temperaments of: story, structure, music and imagination.
THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY
“Repairing America” SERIES
~ open to the public ~
Check the Boston Public Library calendar or Writers Without Margins, Inc on Facebook for listings. (Operating both virtually and live starting in the Summer of 2022)
Boston Public Library – Branch locations throughout Greater Boston
We’ve teamed up with the Boston Public Library and its local branches to provide a variety of free, expressive writing groups matching the interests and energies of library patrons and the specializations and backgrounds of our facilitators who come from the surrounding neighborhoods and communities we share. Since 2020, we’ve offered workshops facilitated by freestyle artists, therapists, and professors on everything from relating to ourselves and each other, and managing our emotions in times of isolation and upheaval, to embodying and articulating the elements of literary performance art. This virtual series includes programs offered to both teens and adults.
THE TAKING AUTHORSHIP
PROGRAM
~available to partner organizations~
For more information or to see if you or your organization is eligible to host a workshop (either in-person or online), please send us a message via our contact us page, and someone from our team will respond at their earliest convenience.
Our lives are full of stories, and we are the authors of the chapters yet to be written. So, how can we use the lessons within literature and the craft of creative writing to increase empowerment and empathy while building the skills within us? This flexible program is offered to organizations, allies, groups, and clubs seeking to expand and hone the crafts of language for personal insight and public advocacy through themed workshops or intensive seminars. Our first collaboration took place with Brockton’s Family Center with Providence’s College Unbound. Contact us to learn more about becoming a partner organization for a one-time workshop or an ongoing program.
