A Crossfield writer is hoping to bring deep and meaningful conversations back into homes and schools after noticing the advent of social media had driven a personal disconnect in society.
Inspired by an article on the need for a resurrection of the literary salon, which were a gathering of people as a means to entertain or educate and was popular in Europe from the 16th to 19th century, Julianne Harvey decided to create the means for people to host such events.
“Essentially (a literary salon) is the art of conversation,” Harvey said. “It’s something I’m excited about because we live in a digital world, a world where we’re disconnected from face to face conversation.”
The format of the salon is very casual, as a host invites friends into his or her home where Harvey reads from her book and then the party converses over open-ended questions drawn randomly.
Questions cover a range of topics including our fears, what we want in the future, what our concerns are, how we can better ourselves and are meant to strike discussion on a path towards personal understanding and growth.
“I’ve tried to carefully craft these questions,” she said.
Harvey added she loves to sit and talk about profoundly deep concepts and really enjoys when that happens organically, like at dinner parties.
But she said those deep concept discussions do not always happen and she believes people should make time to sit and have these conversations with others.
She hosts her very first literary salon on Oct. 17 from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the Crossfield Public Library and hopes to one day bring this conversation format to school.
“For teens and young kids who have only ever known social media and a digital presence, they are at potential risk for losing the ability to look at someone and talked about the deeper things in life,” she said.
Harvey has also been busy bridging her writing and speaking skills together into a new book and seminar called It’s on You that navigates the questions of identity during the middle school transition in life.
She began writing the book last year when her daughter was in Grade 6 and asking the question, “Who am I and do I have the courage to be who I am even if it’s not popular with everyone else, or am I going to be a different person to fit in?”
“In helping her through these things, I started writing down what we were talking about,” Harvey said.
Wanting the message of It’s on You to go broader than the four walls of her house, she has planned a 45-minute seminar for students in Grades 6, 7 and 8 at W.G. Murdoch School around the concepts of intuition, body and owning one’s value.
Writing for the middle school demographic for the very first time, Harvey said she had to compose short sentences, clear concepts and relate stories that are specific to them to hopefully guide children to a self realized answers to some of the many questions during this changing period in a persons life.
“I’m really excited,” she said. “It’s a message of how responsibility and healthy decision making go together.”
With four books and an unpublished manuscript to her name, Harvey has felt she has also grown personally through writing from when she first started blogging five years ago.
“Now I feel much more free to explore wherever my curiosity is leading me next,” she said.
