HOW TO WRITE MEMOIR when your story involves a subculture that few people have ever witnessed? When Shirley Showalter proposed that to me as her topic for her Writing Lessons post, I knew we had hit on a fine subject. After all, all families are micro-cultures, meaning that reading anyone’s memoir writing requires nothing less from the reader than traveling to some foreign territory. How to get the reader to go is the issue for the writer. Here, in celebration of her just-published memoir, Blush: A Mennonite Girl Meets a Glittering World, is an experienced hand telling you how. Read on.     How to Write About a Subculture so that Mainstream Readers Understand and Care by Shirley Hershey Showalter Most people in America have never met a Mennonite. In fact, the most frequently asked question at my publisher’s website is “what’s the difference between Mennonites and Amish?” The American people have been fascinated by both groups, particularly the Amish, for a long time. Their dress, their dialect, their horses and buggies, their courtship rituals, their farming practices, and modes of worship stand apart from, and therefore serve as a gentle critique of, American beliefs in individualism, progress, and consumerism. … Continue reading Writing Lessons: Reporting From a Subculture, with Shirley Hershey Showalter