220 contemporary poetry
places in bold, verbatim extracts from the transcripts of testimony
of mineworkers who survived a methane gas blast in Sago, West
Virginia, on 2 January 2006 , when twelve miners lost their lives and
fourteen were rescued. The testimonies were recorded between 17
January 2006 and 19 June 2006 and the 6 , 300 pages uploaded to the
West Virginia mine safety website.^36 Secondly, Nowak uses three
lessons excerpted from the American Coal Foundation’s ‘Lesson
Plans’.^37 Finally, sources placed in italics throughout focus on
Chinese mining disaster news reports and bulletins accessed from
the web. Nowak’s relentless use of news material informs the sick-
ening regularity of mineworkers’ deaths – to this end he has also
established an ongoing web page which records recent disasters
and reports.^38 The dispersal of these different documents enables
the distinct textures of pedagogical instruction, intimate account
and reportage to refl ect upon one another. Frequently, Nowak uses
these materials against one another as ironic commentary, or coun-
terpoint. A deliberate contrast is created by his juxtaposition of an
extract from a lesson plan and a report of a mine blast in the Sihe
Coal Mine in North China’s Shanxi province:
Procedure (cont):5. Have each student
purchase ‘mining equipment’
(fl at and round toothpicks
and paper clips).
More than one piece of equipment
may be purchased,
but no tools may be shared among students
Sell a fl at toothpick for $ 2 ,
A round toothpick for $ 4
And a paper clip for $ 6.
Sell replacement tools when necessary. (p. 110 )A colliery gas blast on Wednesday killed at least 23 miners and
sickened 53 others in North China’s Shanxi Province, local mine
safety authorities said yesterday. Altogether 697 miners were
working in the pit when the blast went off around 7 : 00 p.m. at