Writers of Mason: Susan Lawrence

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“I love writing, but I need an outline. I want to sketch. I want structure. I don’t want to feel like I’m stepping off a cliff. I want my road map once I’m sitting down to officially [write]. And I think that’s part of a fear of the unknown, but if I have a road map, I know what I’m doing. Some people just write and write and write and then look at what they have and pick out the ideas, the claims, and the arguments that they think out and sort of start to completely restructure. But that’s how they get it out. I can’t do that. I need the road map. Trust that people [will] figure out what works for them. I think different writing tasks certainly call for different processes.”

Susan Lawrence is the Director of the Writing Center and an Associate Professor teaching writing and rhetoric.