Registration
Click on the workshop for which you’d like to register and you will be guided to its accompanying Eventbrite page.
Space is limited, so we recommend registering early. Workshops cost $15 (2.5 hour workshop); however, two free spots per workshop will be set aside for financial accessibility. (This includes sold-out workshops!) If you’d like to request free workshop registration, please email Meagan Joy Black at festival@roommagazine.com.
Visit our registration page for more information.
Growing Room 2020 takes place on the traditional, unceded, and ancestral territory of the Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh, and Squamish peoples (Vancouver, British Columbia) from March 11 – 15, 2020.
Writing from Memory: Poetry & Zine Making
The best writing is filled with details and hooks on which readers can latch. Where can you find specific details that are unique, compelling, and that fill your writing with a deep resonance? Your memory and your lived experiences are the most rife resources for extraordinary details to fill your pages. Francine Cunningham will walk you through some exercises to tap into these moments of time and guide you in crafting them into a poem. You will then take that work and transform it into a unique zine.
Instructor: Francine Cunningham
Event Code: NEC/FRI-1W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Friday, March 13, 2020, 6:30pm – 9:00pm
Cost: $15
BELOVED: Flower Crown Workshop
Inside of you there is a wild garden growing
sweet fruit of the seed buried deep and still
Blooming. Will you kneel at your own altar, lay flowers
at your own feet? Beloved, I invite you to gather,
adorn, stretch, rest, and rise again as we bloom,
build and meditate together on the beautiful
growth that comes from every stage of our knowing.
This workshop is a community care offering lovingly created for QTBIPOC folk.
Schedule:
1h – flower meditation/ writing/ conversation
1h – fresh flower crown building
1/2h – reflection
Instructor: Jillian Christmas
Event Code: NEC/SAT-1W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Saturday, March 14, 2020, 12:00pm – 2:30pm
Cost: All Beloved workshop spots have been lovingly sponsored by our community
Exploring the Spirit of Sound
Sounds are vessels of history, tradition, and adaptation. Through soundscapes and audio recordings, storytelling exists in its own space in our current world. In this workshop facilitated by Edzi’u, we will take sound recordings of the streets outside of Emily Carr Gallery, the people who happen by, and the natural environment. The act of recording requires a direct attention to the world around us, requiring intentional listening and an openness of our surroundings in an intentional way. After walking through our environments while listening and recording sounds, we will reconvene in the gallery and combine these sounds to name our own narrative through music, collectively creating a new soundscape together.
Instructor: Edzi’u
Event Code: (GAL/SAT-2W)
Venue: Gallery, Emily Carr University
Date: Saturday, March 14, 2020, 3:30pm – 6:00pm
Cost: $15
Genre Blending: Writing in Multiple Genres with Téa Mutonji
We may define creative non-fiction as “real stories disguised as fiction.” Conversely, we might define fiction as “true stories vividly told.” This workshop explores how both definitions may be combined as we negotiate a single story. Whether we tell real stories or true ones, our work uses the same muscle: we draw upon all senses to capture each idea as one would a memory. This workshop facilitated by Téa Mutonji will help us unpack true stories and develop them into real stories, scraping the line between fiction and non-fiction.
Instructor: Téa Mutonji
Event Code: NEC/SAT-2W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Saturday, March 14, 2020, 3:30pm – 6:00pm
Cost: $15
Desire as Craft in Short Fiction
Desire is the experience of possibility, the burn of anticipation. Longing is the singular vision of what you can’t have. We often conflate the two but only one creates room for a more radical imagination. This generative class facilitated by Corinne Manning will explore desire as a craft element to bring more intimacy, urgency, and possibility into your prose. Mentor texts will include Audre Lorde, Samantha Hunt, and Carmen Maria Machado.
Instructor: Corinne Manning
Event Code: NEC/SAT-3W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Saturday, March 14, 2020, 7:00pm – 9:30pm
Cost: $15
Why The F*ck Are We Doing This Again?: Refocus Your Memoir-Writing Practice
Why The F*ck Are We Doing This Again? is a freewriting and discussion-based workshop that invites participants to refocus and renew energy when writing from personal experience. Come break the isolation of writing through challenges alone. Amber Dawn will lead participants through a series of freewriting exercises, group discussion, and optional peer-to-peer sharing. This workshop is memoir-focused, although easily adapted for other artists who are using personal experiences as a foundation for their practice. 100% of the registration and facilitation fees for this workshop will be donated to the Unist’ot’en Legal Defence.
Instructor: Amber Dawn
Event Code: NEC/SUN-1W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Sunday, March 15, 2020, 12:00pm – 2:30pm
Cost: $15
Different Worlds and Different Bodies: Writing Disabled Characters
From Tiny Tim to the Seven Dwarfs, disability in literature very often falls into ableist tropes that perpetuate disabled exclusion. How, then, do we look to expand disability representation in literature? How can we work toward representing the vast richness of disability experience in thoughtful, inclusive ways? Join Amanda Leduc on a part-history adventure, all-round fabulous workshop on how to increase disability representation in your work in ways that centre and respect the disabled experience.
Instructor: Amanda Leduc
Event Code: NEC/SUN-3W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Sunday, March 15, 2020, 3:30pm – 6:00pm
Cost: $15
Intro to Burlesque
This introduction to burlesque workshop taught by Bee Appletini and Alexa Borealis will cover all the basics you need to know about burlesque! This class is open to all genders and bodies and will cover a brief history of burlesque, costuming and character development, music, light choreography, and how to stretch before and after dancing.
Instructor: Bee Appletini, Alexa Borealis
Event Code: NEC/SUN-4W
Venue: Native Education College, Classroom
Date: Sunday, March 15, 2020, 7:00pm – 9:30pm
Cost: $15