IASH Fellows and Affiliates recently enjoyed a writing retreat in the Scottish Highlands, kindly facilitated by Dr Anna Pilz.
From 22-24 November as part of Academic Writing Month, 25 members of the IASH community visited the Burn, a country house near Brechin owned by Goodenough College, an independent educational charity. The group enjoyed walks, board games, art-making activities and discussions alongside focused writing sessions. Each attendee set a writing goal for the weekend, and was able to take advantage of four structured sessions each day, interspersed with plenty of coffee and cake.
Anna produced a fascinating blog about the weekend, titled Building Community through Writing Retreats, for the IAD website, which you can read in full here.
Social writing means to write with others in real-time increments. Across the three days, we had 60 and 90-minute focused writing slots that provided us with a structure, interspersed with coffee and lunch breaks as well as time for walks. A structure ensures writing is the primary activity, but also attends to physical aspects such as needs for breaks and exercise. Two of our participants describe the multi-varied benefits of a writing retreat that includes the creative inspiration a different environment can bring alongside the freedom to just focus on the task at hand without any other responsibilities:
- ‘I was also very pleased that it was a writing-focused retreat, yet with space for socialisation with colleagues and connection with nature. Not having to think about preparing food, along with easy access to tea and coffee, added to the joy I felt from truly being in a retreat away from everyday responsibilities.’
- ‘I really enjoyed the peer-support (not peer pressure!) of working alongside one another on research projects, without the distraction of emails or teaching prep.’
Our thanks to Anna for facilitating so brilliantly, and to the staff at the Burn for their thoughtful care.