{"id":9448,"date":"2014-12-03T09:06:54","date_gmt":"2014-12-03T14:06:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/college.unc.edu\/?p=9448"},"modified":"2024-07-02T14:45:24","modified_gmt":"2024-07-02T14:45:24","slug":"gram-o-rama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/?p=9448","title":{"rendered":"Gram-o-Rama elicits laughs, cheers"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Erik<\/a>
Erik Augustine performs during Gram-O-Rama. (photo by Dan Sears)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For an hour Tuesday evening, 14 UNC-Chapel Hill students made more than 200 peers, faculty, parents and Chancellor Carol L. Folt laugh and cheer as they performed skits about an unlikely topic: grammar.<\/p>\n

The students in English 307 presented Gram-o-Rama, a series of acts and songs the students wrote that take a playful look at the rules of language.<\/p>\n

For instance, in one skit about the tragic death of Bozo the Clown, student Heather Wilson spoke only in the passive voice.<\/p>\n

\u201cBozo was met by me on the second day of clown school when a banana peel was slipped on by both of us. A lifelong friendship was then formed by us. Great sadness was had by all when violent dying was experienced by Bozo,\u201d Wilson recited on stage. <\/em><\/p>\n

\"Marianne<\/a>
Marianne Gingher reacts to a round of applause for her role in producing this year’s Gram-o-Rama performance. (photo by Dan Sears)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In a skit that emphasized parts of speech, senior Carly Griffin discussed starting school at Grammar High and wondered which group of nouns she would become friends with and what groups she would join.<\/p>\n

\u201cShould I sign up for a team of verbs? They always seem to be popular because of their ability to run, dribble, pass, shoot, block, all for the glory of the school,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t think I will be trying out for the interjection squad though. I cannot see myself standing around all day shouting yeah, yahoo \u2026 hip hip hooray. And I don\u2019t want to be a preposition, always bossing nouns around and telling them how to do things: \u2018Sit over there. Don\u2019t talk to him or don\u2019t go against the status quo.\u2019 Prepositions don\u2019t allow much free thinking.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Gram-o-Rama is part of a creative writing course taught by professor Marianne Gingher in the College of Arts and Sciences<\/a>. The students write independently some of the time but often are assigned to work in pairs and groups. The goal is for the students to improve as writers and \u201clet their egos go\u201d as they work in teams, Gingher said.<\/p>\n

\"Long<\/a>
Long time creative writing faculty member Daphne Athas gets a hug as she arrives for the Grammar Salad performance. (photo by Dan Sears)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI also hope that the course helps them gain confidence in public speaking and performance,\u201d Gingher said. \u201cBringing what they have written alive, thoughtfully, clearly, smartly, for a new audience is a big goal of the class.\u201d<\/p>\n

To get into the course, students must have completed an introduction to poetry, creative nonfiction or fiction course and have interviewed with Gingher. They also have to be willing to commit an extra hour a week to class-time. Writing assignments are due every class and students read their writing to their classmates.<\/p>\n

After fall break, the students began selecting pieces for the show. They narrowed down more than 400 possibilities to just 30 skits for the night\u2019s performance. Rehearsals began in early November.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody, even the shyest violets, must perform. The thrill is that they can\u2019t believe they\u2019ve come out of their shells during the semester,\u201d Gingher said.<\/p>\n

Griffin said the course and the performance forces the students out of their comfort zone.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt makes you push the boundaries of language to a point you didn\u2019t think it could go,\u201d Griffin said. \u201cFor someone who has never been on stage before, it was quite cathartic. I\u2019m just really proud of what we did.\u201d<\/p>\n

The class also helped Griffin look at language in a new way. Tuesday, for example, two students performed a skit, \u201ceHarmo-whaty,\u201d without nouns. Other skit themes included misplaced modifiers, possessives and indefinite pronouns.<\/p>\n

Fedor Kossakovski, a junior chemistry major, admits he sometimes dreaded coming to class because it was long and there was a lot of work. He ended each class, though, in an upbeat mood.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the fastest, most enjoyable class every time,\u201d Kossakovski said.<\/p>\n

Watch a video <\/a>of Marianne Gingher as she talks about Gram-o-Rama and teaching creative writing at UNC.<\/p>\n

Story by Natalie Vizuete and photos by Dan Sears of Communications and Public Affairs. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For an hour Tuesday evening, 14 UNC-Chapel Hill students made more than 200 peers, faculty, parents and Chancellor Carol L. Folt laugh and cheer as they performed skits about an unlikely topic: grammar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":9449,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-carousel","category-fine-arts-humanities"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9448"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9448\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47076,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9448\/revisions\/47076"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}