New McMaster writer-in-residence asking for your musings on ‘home’ amid a pandemic
Janet Marie Rogers wants to hear about your love-hate relationship with “home.”
The Mohawk/Tuscarora writer, who lives on Six Nations, is the Mabel Pugh Taylor Writerin-Residence with McMaster University and the Hamilton Public Library. She began her year-long residency at the end of March — smack dab in the middle of the pandemic, which got her thinking: How could she use her new role to reflect our new reality?
The answer she came up with was to ask people for their thoughts on what “home” means to them, and then turn it into a podcast.
“It’s a theme that, depending on who you ask, you’re going to get a different reply,” Rogers said. “I think we see that on social media now — ‘Oh, my kids driving me nuts’ or ‘Hey, I love working from home.’ ”
To create the podcast, Rogers is asking McMaster students and Hamilton-based poets and writers to submit pieces of writing or audio recordings, including reflections or poems. From those she receives, she’ll choose a selection and compile them for a podcast.
As for her own thoughts on “home,” they’re mostly positive. Rogers said she enjoys working from home — she’s been conducting most of her writer-in-residence duties online or over the phone, though she misses the face-to-face interactions she would otherwise be having with Mac students and community members. And she’s been highly productive, now well on her way to releasing her seventh book, “Ego of a Nation,” which looks at human relationships, ego and colonial legacies in Canada.
Those looking to submit work should include an MP3 audio recording of themselves reading their writing, no longer than five minutes, or a text file of their work, along with a description, a title and information about their inspiration, and a biography no longer than four lines.
Submissions can be emailed to Rogers at englwir@mcmaster.ca. The deadline to submit work is May 8.
When the podcast is complete, likely at the end of May, it will be shared on McMaster University and Hamilton Public Library websites and social media platforms.