Leading Discussion: The How-To Post
Jun. 2nd, 2017 11:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reading221b_mod posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
reading221b Have a question that's not answered here? Drop us a private message at the mod DW account.
How do I get to lead a discussion?
All you have to do is to tell the world that you want to! Discussion leaders volunteer to lead conversations about a particular fic or a particular stream, rather than making a blanket offer. You can express your interest during the nominations period, either by nominating a new story (or seconding a nomination, if the nominator has said they might want help) or volunteering for a Leader's Choice stream.
Boy, I really love this story. I can't wait to squee about it with other people. I'm good to go, right?
Not really, no. The discussion leader's job is to make room for the full range of responses, and not everybody is going to love the story. As far as we're concerned, that kind of disagreement isn't a problem, it's an opportunity for everyone to learn more about how the fic is working: why it is affecting different readers in different ways, or even seems to be saying different things to different readers, or seems convincing or in-character to only some of its audience.
You don't have to defend the fic against every criticism somebody raises; in fact - although you are of course welcome to respond, and to offer your own interpretation - it's important to us that everyone knows (and feels) that they are allowed to criticize the stories. We don't welcome fic-bashing (or author-bashing, or character-bashing) but this kind of productive criticism - aimed at reaching a better understanding of the story - is our lifeblood as a community.
If you don't think you would feel comfortable leading a discussion on these terms, you may not want to be a discussion leader for this comm.
What should I talk about in my opening discussion post?
Talk about the things that drove you to nominate (or second) the story in the first place! You can start with your own reactions: what did you love? What did you find interesting? What did you find confusing, or frustrating, or left you wishing something had been different? Secondly, you can raise questions to help get underneath your reactions: what are the attributes or aspects of the story that elicited those reactions from you? What other things (e.g. particular views of of the characters, understanding of the fic's genre) has to be in place, do you think, for the story to elicit that response? How does the story conform to, or differ from, the patterns laid down by other fics of this kind?
if you would like more guidance in developing your opening post, you can contact the mods. We have a template we can send you to help get you started. We can also throw around some ideas with you, if we're familiar with the story.
When the time comes for me to start the discussion, how do I make the post?
When you do post to the comm, please use Discussion Post: [Title of fic] as the subject. Please use the following header at the top before starting your discussion:
Title:
Author:
Rating:
Warnings:
Links:
Author's Summary:
A bit of introductory matter: your own expansion of the author's summary, some words about what makes this story wonderful, and/or interesting, and/or problematic.
***CUT***
The bulk of your discussion should go below a cut, so as not to swamp people's feeds. Including a cut is easy, and there are a few ways to do it, which you can red about here.
comments: In the past, many of our discussion leaders have organized the conversation by "threading" comments: that is, they have created comment on the original post for each of the different major areans of discussion that they take to be importnat. For some longer fics, discussion leaders have also created comments for different parts of the story. We do not require that you use this method to organize discussion, but we do recommend it.
Also, please tag your post with the round number (e.g. "round 2") and with the name of the stream. Please DO NOT tag it with other streams or genres, even if you think the fic could be classified that way.
How do I get to lead a discussion?
All you have to do is to tell the world that you want to! Discussion leaders volunteer to lead conversations about a particular fic or a particular stream, rather than making a blanket offer. You can express your interest during the nominations period, either by nominating a new story (or seconding a nomination, if the nominator has said they might want help) or volunteering for a Leader's Choice stream.
Boy, I really love this story. I can't wait to squee about it with other people. I'm good to go, right?
Not really, no. The discussion leader's job is to make room for the full range of responses, and not everybody is going to love the story. As far as we're concerned, that kind of disagreement isn't a problem, it's an opportunity for everyone to learn more about how the fic is working: why it is affecting different readers in different ways, or even seems to be saying different things to different readers, or seems convincing or in-character to only some of its audience.
You don't have to defend the fic against every criticism somebody raises; in fact - although you are of course welcome to respond, and to offer your own interpretation - it's important to us that everyone knows (and feels) that they are allowed to criticize the stories. We don't welcome fic-bashing (or author-bashing, or character-bashing) but this kind of productive criticism - aimed at reaching a better understanding of the story - is our lifeblood as a community.
If you don't think you would feel comfortable leading a discussion on these terms, you may not want to be a discussion leader for this comm.
What should I talk about in my opening discussion post?
Talk about the things that drove you to nominate (or second) the story in the first place! You can start with your own reactions: what did you love? What did you find interesting? What did you find confusing, or frustrating, or left you wishing something had been different? Secondly, you can raise questions to help get underneath your reactions: what are the attributes or aspects of the story that elicited those reactions from you? What other things (e.g. particular views of of the characters, understanding of the fic's genre) has to be in place, do you think, for the story to elicit that response? How does the story conform to, or differ from, the patterns laid down by other fics of this kind?
if you would like more guidance in developing your opening post, you can contact the mods. We have a template we can send you to help get you started. We can also throw around some ideas with you, if we're familiar with the story.
When the time comes for me to start the discussion, how do I make the post?
When you do post to the comm, please use Discussion Post: [Title of fic] as the subject. Please use the following header at the top before starting your discussion:
Title:
Author:
Rating:
Warnings:
Links:
Author's Summary:
A bit of introductory matter: your own expansion of the author's summary, some words about what makes this story wonderful, and/or interesting, and/or problematic.
***CUT***
The bulk of your discussion should go below a cut, so as not to swamp people's feeds. Including a cut is easy, and there are a few ways to do it, which you can red about here.
comments: In the past, many of our discussion leaders have organized the conversation by "threading" comments: that is, they have created comment on the original post for each of the different major areans of discussion that they take to be importnat. For some longer fics, discussion leaders have also created comments for different parts of the story. We do not require that you use this method to organize discussion, but we do recommend it.
Also, please tag your post with the round number (e.g. "round 2") and with the name of the stream. Please DO NOT tag it with other streams or genres, even if you think the fic could be classified that way.
