Advanced Creative Cross-Genre Writing (309-0-20)

Topic

Writer as Witness

Instructors

Daisy Hernandez

Meeting Info

Harris Hall L05: Mon, Wed 2:00PM - 3:20PM

Overview of class

At times, we write because we have witnessed an event or emotion that we want to capture in words. At other times, we write because we need to imagine a world that we have not yet witnessed. And then, at times, we find ourselves witnessing more than we could have ever anticipated. The author Michael Cunningham observed, "If you survive a war or epidemic, your sense of life and the world is changed…And you work with that."Given the large-scale events that we are witnessing, from the pandemic and police brutality to the climate crisis, how do we negotiate with this material as writers? How, in our creative works, does language and narrative change in light of such circumstances?

In this course, we will read fiction, creative nonfiction and poetry engaged with these questions of the writer as witness, including works by Edwidge Danticat, Alejandro Zambra, and Claudia Rankine among others. We will discuss experiments with point of view and structure, as well as the ways that writers use techniques like anaphora across genres. You will write three short works and a longer work in the genre of your choice. Writing exercises will support you in generating new works, and small group workshops, in addition to the traditional workshop, will provide you with feedback on your writing in a variety of ways.

Enrollment Requirements

Enrollment Requirements: Pre-Requisite: Students must have taken & passed English 206-0 to enroll.