Kristen Park Wedlock

In both my critical and creative scholarship, I investigate and practice contemplative writing in the dharma arts tradition of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Allen Ginsberg, Anne Waldman, Reed Bye, and Bhanu Kapil. As a creative artist, my background in physiology, kinesiology, dance, and somatic yoga informs the way I compose the page: a choreography of words excavated from the body. Through mindfulness practice on the cushion, mat, or page, one can learn to listen to their body, hear their thoughts, identify prejudice or unconscious bias, and cultivate a place of non judgment. It is possible to disrupt habitual thinking, and thus, dismantle the thoughts, language (constructs), and systems that perpetuate injustice and inequity. Language can facilitate or hinder the restorative process. Writing can hold the space or obstruct it. In the classroom, I invite writers to participate in this process by engaging the 1st person critical lens, identifying bias in their own texts and others, challenging readings and being challenged by readings, and cultivating intellectual humility and cognitive empathy.  

Publications

• Wedlock, K.P., (2018). Empathy of place: Threshold as time piece. Precipice: Writing at the Edge (pp. 207-220). Boulder, CO: Precipice Collective.
• Park, K., (2015). Strangers at the event horizon, Boulder, CO: Gesture Press.
• Park, K., (2014). Poetics of empathy: Gesture-sound-word as compositional units of a somatic frame, Something on Paper, Vol. 2, Boulder, CO: Naropa University
• Park, K., (2013). excerpt from Aurelia, Gesture Literary Journal, Vol. 2, Boulder, CO: Gesture Press.

Presentations

• Mazzarotto, M. & Wedlock, K.P. (2020). From awe to awake: The power in exposing and dismantling stereotypes through American poetry and television, presented at D.C. Mercy Roundtable, Washington D.C.: The Conference for Mercy Higher Education.
• Wedlock, K.P. (2020). Ballerina as blister; Ballerina as callous: Dismantling binaries in the shift from stage to screen – an analysis of Flesh & Bone and Black Swan, presented at 2020 Popular Culture Association Conference, Philadelphia, PA: PCA/ACA.  
• Wedlock, K.P. (2019). Case closed: Teaching Sherlock as a blueprint for dismantling conclusions and disrupting bias in composition, presented at 2019 Annual Conference of the Mid-Atlantic Popular & American Culture Association, Pittsburg, PA: MAPACA.
• Wedlock, K.P., & Ivaliotis, C. (2019). The Eye/I of the beholder: Critically examining the creative and creatively examining the critical—practices for academic research writing, presented at 20^th Annual NJWA Conference What the Heck is Critical Thinking, and How do You Teach It?, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ: New Jersey Writing Alliance.
• Park, K. (2015). Cultivating the 1^st person critical lens in research and writing, presented at Best Practices Presentation, Gateway Program Retreat, Smithfield, RI: Bryant University.
• Park, K. (2014). Typography/Topography: the bite and relief of exorcising place, presented at JKS Disembodied Poetics 40^th Anniversary Conference, Boulder, CO: Naropa University.
• Park, K. (2011). Dharma art and the sustainable writer, presented at Dharma in a Self-Serving World: Role of the Writer, Boulder, CO: Summer Writing Program, Naropa University.

Featured Readings

• Precipice Collective (March 2019) Writing at the Edge Book Launch – Reading and Somatic Lab Workshop, held at Counterpath in Denver, CO.
• Gesture Literary Press (August 2015) Strangers at the Event Horizon Book Launch – Reading and Somatic Lab Workshop, held at Buchanan’s Coffee & Pub in Boulder, CO.
• Precipice Collective (June 2013) Littoral: Restore the Shore: Yoga, Poetry, and Community Building Event, Bay Head Beach, NJ.
• 4 X 4 Reading Series, (May 2012), Colorado State University, University of Denver, Naropa University, and University of Colorado-Boulder – Naropa University selected student reader
• Women of Naropa Reading (April 2012), Naropa University, Boulder, CO.