This is what makes our students so brave and so humble. They are willing to engage in a process that challenges and frustrates, that so often does not capture their thoughts and ideas in the way they desire. They humbly seek out feedback. They enroll in courses during which all their thoughts and ideas may only be assessed by writing. They choose writing to represent them. That humility is at the center of the writer.

If writing is an act of humility, then writing classrooms and communities call for “humble listening.”² Those of us who work with writers must respond with love of neighbor, an openness to learn rather than simply a dispensing of judgment, a ”gesture of hospitality” that makes space for another’s views amidst our own.³ I work with a team of student writing tutors who do this so well. I’ve watched them sit down with their peers, listen, and draw out ideas with thoughtful questions. They give honor to the vulnerability with which their classmates share their writing. They don’t measure a classmate by a piece of writing but rather view that writing as part of a continuum of growth and learning.⁴ For those students whose past experiences with writing have been marked by condemnation, shame or anxiety, these experiences with “humble listening” can be empowering and transformative. They feel respected, understood, and strengthened to continue in the task of writing.

References:

1. Ann Patchett, This is the Story of a Happy Marriage (New York: HarperCollins, 2013), 25.
2. Richard H. Gibson and James E. Beitler III, Charitable Writing (Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2020), 49.
3. Gibson and Beitler, Charitable Writing, 58.
4. Stephen M. North, “Training Tutors to Talk About Writing,” College Composition and Communication 33, no. 4(Dec. 1982): 434-441, https://www.jstor.org/stable/357958.