This article builds on the author's previous research on student learning journals to explore how their use can give students a `space' to engage meaningfully and in their own way with their university work. Drawing on the psychoanalytical concept of transitional space and on notions of narrative, it is argued that the student learning journal can be seen as a hybrid genre of writing positioned between `life narrative' and the `university essay'. At the same time, journal writing can invite the (...) writer to make a psychic shift into the transitional space that enables adult play and creative activity. The discussion includes analyses of extracts from students' learning journals. (shrink)