Academic Writing Samples
I chose to include the excerpts below as samples because in addition to being a hybrid of academic writing and blogging, they represent my expertise and research interests as well as my approach to teaching.
The bulk of my writing for the past five years has been academic. In addition to conference papers and presentations, I regularly contributed to DePaul University School for New Learning (SNL) Writing News Blog. As a senior professional lecturer in the writing program I was required to write three to four blog articles annually. The blogs were intended to assist faculty across disciplines in supporting student writing as well as to keep faculty informed of current research, innovations, and best practices in this area.
Sisters in the Shadows: an Examination of Prince’s “Strange Relationship” with Black Women
by Kamilah Cummings
Pages 144-163 | Published online: 25 Dec 2018
Howard Journal of Communication
Excerpt
The public has had a near obsession with the women in Prince’s life since his purple reign began in the early 1980s. Following his shocking passing, nearly every special tribute publication that hit the newsstands and countless websites featured articles on the women in Prince’s life. These mainstream media presentations of “Prince’s women” often included such women as Wendy & Lisa, Apollonia, Kim Basinger, Susannah Melvoin, Sheena Easton, Mayte Garcia, Carmen Electra, and even Madonna. Denise Matthews, who was known as Vanity, and Sheila E., both mixed-race Black women who were introduced to the world via their storied relationships with Prince, have surprisingly only received honorable mentions in some publications. However, almost completely absent from these publications have been women such as Catherine “Cat” Glover, Shelby J., Nona Gaye, Cora Coleman-Dunham, Tamar Davis, and Damaris Lewis. The latter represent some of Prince’s professional and personal relationships with women who are neither White nor mixed-race. The exclusion of these women from the discourse on Prince’s legacy has served to perpetuate hegemonic notions of feminine beauty while also contributing to the misconception that Prince practiced colorism in selecting the women with whom he associated.
This narrative of colorism dogged Prince for most of his life and has persisted since his passing. For example, the esthetics of Prince’s women was a topic of discussion during tribute panels presented by both The Green Space and New York University (Billboard, 2016 Billboard. (2016). Prince reflection: Spike lee, quest love, and more remember Prince|Panel 2016 [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6dIxuQHb-g [Google Scholar]; The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR, 2016 The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR. (2016, May 19). Prince so cool, Ain't nobody bad like him [Video file]. Retrieved from YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=PCpE3wRC0Dk [Google Scholar]). At The Green Space panel, writer and image activist Michaela Angela Davis remarked, “[h]e had a type. We all saw it. If a Black girl was in the room, it was that type generally. Their proximity to whiteness made them safer” (The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR, 2016). Her observation was shared by writer and musician Greg Tate who described Prince as a “Pop music tactician and strategist” who “had to play shade games” to appear on MTV and crossover to a mainstream audience during the 1980s (The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR, 2016). It is important to note that all the panelists agreed that as his career progressed, Prince “got blacker and blacker” (The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR, 2016).
Viewed through the narrow lens of his most publicized relationships, Prince’s relationship with Black women appears precarious. However, when the lens is widened to provide a more complete view of Prince’s relationships with Black women over the course of a career that spanned nearly 40 years, it reveals that Prince was ultimately a champion who loved and supported women of all hues, including Black women. Because most media have opted to eschew these women however, rendering them nameless and faceless, this article seeks to add them to the ongoing discourse on Prince’s legacy. In doing so, it seeks to challenge widely held assumptions regarding his relationship with Black women as well as to interrogate why these assumptions are so readily accepted. Finally, in dismantling the narrative of colorism that has plagued Prince’s life and work, I intend to situate Prince’s support of Black women as an indisputable example of his love of not only Black women but of his own Blackness and the Black community as a whole. . .
Kamilah Cummings (2019) Sisters in the Shadows: an Examination of Prince’s “Strange Relationship” with Black Women, Howard Journal of Communications, 30:2, 144-163, DOI: 10.1080/10646175.2018.1541768
Designing a Writing Program for non-traditional adult students: a case study (HETL Scotland 2017)
Nicholas Alexander Hayes, Steffanie Triller Fry, Kamilah Cummings
Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education
ISSN: 2050-7003
Publication date: 9 April 2018
Excerpt
Another central aspect of this course that is particularly helpful to adult students is the use of peer review. Schneider (1989) tells us “no matter how approachable or inclusive instructors may be, they are poor substitutes for the adult students as directors of the learning process.” Through peer review, our adult students learn to not only trust themselves to critique the work of other writers within the conventions of academic writing, but they also learn to trust themselves to critique their own work in the same manner. Schneider (1989) adds, “the peer learning approach for adult learners can help them reach the goal of self-determination and develop their tolerance for uncertainty and conflict” as they navigate their academic journeys. In WFC, students are required to give and receive peer feedback for all first and second drafts of papers. To avoid redundancy, with each paper and draft students are required to answer a unique set of peer feedback questions that focus on content and development instead of grammar. These types of questions allow the student to provide feedback from a position that does not presuppose that they possess a level of subject matter expertise that they do not have. This helps to build student confidence and facilitate learning. What we have seen is that though some students are initially apprehensive about giving and receiving peer feedback the majority eventually embrace it and rate it as one of the most beneficial aspects of the course in course evaluations. This response to peer work is not unique to our program, as a recent national survey of non-traditional adult learners found that two-thirds of participants rated peer interaction as an important aspect of their learning experience (Ohio Department of Higher Education, 2015). Further, in their recent study of students in a writing-intensive tutorial program at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, South Africa, Bargate and Maistry (2015) found that “interaction between the students feeds their confidence in a self-reinforcing process.” Further, with their growing confidence, “they develop particular skills that allow them to articulate in deep and profound ways.”
The course concludes with a reflective essay and ePortfolio. In the reflective essay, students are encouraged to think beyond the skills they can practice and acquire in ten weeks. As part of this essay, they must create a learning plan that will lay out how they will continue to improve and build on their writing skills both academically and professionally. Caruth (2014) advises that “in order for learning to be effective, the focus of learning must be on the adult learner gaining self-confidence. This self-confidence will subsequently motivate the learner to continue learning and build on past knowledge and experiences.” The assignments in the course help our students to build self-confidence, and the final reflection affords them the opportunity to plan to build on it. . .
Citation
Hayes, N., Triller Fry, S. and Cummings, K. (2018), "Designing a Writing Program for non-traditional adult students: a case study (HETL Scotland 2017)", Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education, Vol. 10 No. 2, pp. 130-139. https://doi.org/10.1108/JARHE-04-2017-0046
Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited
Grammatical Perceptions
by Kamilah Cummings
Originally published January 29, 2015
SNL Writing News Blog
Excerpt
In my research for a grammar workshop that I am developing, I read an article titled “I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar. Here’s Why.” It was written for the Harvard Business Review by Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit. He proudly proclaims that he mandates grammar tests for all potential employees and tosses applications from people with “bad” grammar, regardless of the position. Wiens argues that bad grammar, such as incorrect comma usage and the inability to distinguish between to and too, reflects poor attention to detail, laziness, and a steep learning curve (Wiens). In a NY Times op-ed response to Wiens’ article, esteemed linguist and professor John McWhorter, wrote “There is an extent to which scornful condemnation of “bad grammar” is one of today’s last permissible expressions of elitism” (McWhorter). As colleges increasingly move toward career preparation, faculty cannot ignore that these perceptions of grammar exist in the workplace. However, as faculty we must also acknowledge that they exist within academia as well. To prepare college students for employment, we must approach grammar as a skill that they can develop and refine without judging them for lacking it. . .
I have certainly been guilty of making my own judgments about grammar. My mother was a grammar queen, making sure my siblings and I were grammatically correct at all times. In addition to home instruction, I attended a grade school where we had amazing language arts classes and teachers. However, I know that this was not and is not everyone’s experience. As I provide feedback on student writing, I know that I must consciously acknowledge and assess my own attitudes regarding grammar so that I do not make students feel “stupid” or imply that they are “lazy” or “unrefined” for not knowing grammar that they might not have ever been taught or been required to use in the last 20 years. . . .
Further dispelling the myth that grammar and ability are linked, research has shown that students who lack “good” grammar can improve grammar through writing without requiring as much formal grammar instruction as one might think. “We know that grammar instruction that works includes teaching students strategies for revising and editing, providing targeted lessons that students immediately apply to their own writing . . .” (Cleary). This has certainly been the case with my student whose revisions demonstrate her ability to apply what she is learning to improve her grammar. College classrooms present the perfect opportunity for students to write to get it, well, right. As faculty, we have to be more aware of our own perceptions of grammar and how they translate into the feedback that we give students.
I admit that I still cringe when I see grammatical errors (including my own) in professional and personal written communication. However, I think that by removing expectations and judgments about students based on grammar, faculty can help students improve grammar in a way that encourages their assets rather than focuses on their deficits. We want to instruct and improve rather than interrogate and vilify students who lack the grammar skills we expect them to have by the time they enter college. I compare it to the gym. The gym isn’t a place where only fit people go to maintain their well-toned bodies. It is also a place for people who want to develop well-toned bodies. Likewise, the college classroom should not be a place only for people with “good” grammar. It should be a place for people who want to improve their “bad” grammar as well.
Works Cited
Cleary, Michelle Navarre. The Wrong Way to Teach Grammar. 25 February 2014. 1 December 2014 <http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/the-wrong-way-to-teach-grammar/284014/>.
McWhorter, John. Good Applicants with Bad Grammar. 13 August 2012. 27 January 2015 <http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/08/13/is-our-children-learning-enough-grammar-to-get-hired/good-applicants-with-bad-grammar>.
Wiens, Kyle. I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar. Here’s Why. July 20 2012. 27 January 2015 <https://hbr.org/2012/07/i-wont-hire-people-who-use-poo>.
A Bit of Mindfulness in the Classroom
by Kamilah Cummings
Originally published April 30, 2015
SNL News Writing Blog
Excerpt
As author and psychotherapist Russ Harris states, “We can use mindfulness to . . . improve our self-knowledge – to learn more about how we feel, think and react. Considering that we require our students to do a great deal of reflection in our courses, I thought that my classes would be a perfect place to introduce students to mindfulness through the inclusion of an assignment that allowed them to write about their feelings in the present moment. . . .
I replaced the normal writing journal prompts that I used to use with what I call a “Right Now” journal. The assignment gives a brief explanation of the use of writing as a mindful practice and then requires the student to write a journal entry that begins with the prompt, “Right now I . . .” . I allow students 10 minutes to write while I play calming instrumental music – usually Reiki, meditation, or Santana. I also invite students to start the assignment by taking a couple of deep breaths if they want. I give the same assignment every week.
At first, I was unsure how students would receive the assignment, so I only used it in a small face-to-face class. I was surprised by how quickly the students took to the assignment (and the music). Students wrote about everything from anxiety related to the class and assignments to residual feelings from disagreements with family and friends, the day at work, and the commute to class. I usually engaged in the practice along with them. I always gave the option to share their entries afterward. Sometimes we all shared; sometimes we didn’t. Either way, it was rewarding to see students using the assignment to navigate present feelings about their experiences. As the term progressed, they shared how they used the assignment outside of class at home and at work during stressful situations. They also stated that starting the evening with the mindfulness assignment helped them to de-stress and focus more on the class.
In addition to the benefit of giving students practice writing in general, another benefit to the “Right Now” journal assignment for me was that it afforded an opportunity to connect with my students on a different level and to learn more about them. Because I try to take a holistic approach to teaching, I found the level of community building that occurred in the class as a result of this assignment allowed me to better understand, teach, and encourage my students. . .
Works Cited
Christopher Germer, Ph.D. "What is Mindfulness?" Insight (2004): 24-29.
Harris, Russ. "Mindfulness without Meditation ." Healthcare, Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal (2009): 21-24.
Mayo Clinic Staff. Work-life balance: Tips to reclaim control. 12 July 2012. 30 April 2015 <http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/adult-health/in-depth/work-life-balance/art-20048134>.