Writing an Identity Not Your Own with Alex Temblador

Tuesday(s), May 6 & 13, 2025, 6:30-8:30pm CST, via Zoom

Nonmember $135        Member    $115                  Student $80

*EARN CPE’S

TWO SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Do you want to craft diverse and dynamic characters with respect and care for their unique identities? What honest questions must you ask yourself when creating characters different from you? Let’s explore character creation in a thoughtful way!

In this two-session workshop, Mixed Latine award-winning author Alex Temblador of Writing An Identity Not Your Own will discuss one of the most contentious topics in creative writing: crafting a character whose identity is not your own. We will examine bias and how it might influence the text through stereotypes, harmful storyline tropes, character descriptions, dialogue, and more. 

The class will also cover the history and state of diversity and representation in publishing. Then, we will discuss how a writer might approach writing main, secondary, and tertiary characters who have historically marginalized identities, including race and ethnicity, sexual and romantic orientation, gender identity, disability, nationality, etc. 

This course is open to writers of all genres, backgrounds, and skill levels, 18+.

Students will leave this workshop with: 

• Awareness of how a writer’s own bias can appear in their creative writing  
• A list of considerations before you write, as you write, and in the editing process of character development
• An introduction to using an intersectional identity approach to crafting characters

Alex Temblador is the Mixed Latine award-winning author of Writing An Identity Not Your Own, Half Outlaw, and Secrets of the Casa Rosada. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Central Oklahoma and is a contributor to Living Beyond Borders: Growing Up Mexican in America and Speculative Fiction for Dreamers: A Latinx Anthology. Her work has also appeared in PALABRITAS, D Magazine, and Colorado Review. Alex has taught creative writing seminars, workshops, and classes with the Women’s Fiction Writers Association, WritingWorkshops.com, the Writer’s League of Texas, and more, as well as spoken about diversity in the literary world with Macmillan Publishers, Texas Library Association, Abydos Learning Conference, and at many other festivals, conferences, and universities. Alex lives in Dallas, Texas, where she runs a literary panel series called LitTalk and is the Executive Director of Write Here DFW. 

Social media links: IG and Twitter and Threads: @Alex_Temblador, https://www.facebook.com/alextemblador