Core Writing Studies Courses: Minor in Writing and Rhetoric
Must take at least one; each offered at least once per year; Writing 201 will launch in Fall 2024; Writing 202 and Writing 203 will launch in Spring 2024. Course codes in process.
Writing 201 History of Writing Studies Survey of milestones in the discipline of Writing Studies, from ancient roots and literacy development across time and cultures, to intersections with adjacent disciplines and contemporary debates.
Writing 202 Theoretical Frameworks of Writing Studies Introduces the major theories and debates informing Writing Studies, covering cognitivist, expressivist, process-based, and post-process schools and considering intersections with broader educational and sociopolitical movements.
Writing 203 Research Methods in Writing Studies Introduces foundational and emerging research methods in Writing Studies, including case studies, rhetorical analyses, bibliographic research, archival research, corpus analysis, critical discourse analysis, counterstory, and institutional ethnography.
Electives for the Minor in Writing and Rhetoric
(Courses Originating in TWP)
While students can take more than core Writing Studies course (see above) as part of their five total courses for the minor, students can also choose from among the following TWP-originating electives to meet the five-course total minor requirement. (See also the list of approved electives from courses originating outside of TWP.)
TWP will offer at least six of the following electives per semester beginning Fall 2024. Courses with ** designate that they will be launched in Spring 2025, Fall 2025, or Fall 2026.
Writing 165S Making Your Voice Heard: The Arts of Oral Communication, Critical Speaking, and Digital Rhetoric Exploration and practice in the traditions, legacies, and emerging landscapes for oral and digital rhetoric in academic, professional, public, and social contexts. Focus on ethics and sociocultural structures that shape, promote, and/or limit one’s opportunities to be heard.
Writing 190S Special Topics: Writing in the Disciplines Investigation in Writing Studies and Writing in the Disciplines. Topics vary by semester.
Writing 205S Composing Oneself: Stress, Identity & Wellness Fusing science, theory, art, literature, and performance, this course explores the structural causes of stress, their physiological effects, and the stressors that impact our identities and community ethics.
Writing 233S Technical and Professional Communication** Explores the purposes, ethics, challenges, and approaches informing technical and professional communication across contexts and across written, verbal, and digital modes.
Writing 255S Literacy, Writing, Tutoring [cross-listed: EDU 255] Theories of literacy and high school and college level teaching tutoring practices. Composition studies, literacy studies, and writing center/tutoring theories. Includes tutoring students.
Writing 267S The Dialogue Laboratory [cross-listed: THEATRST 281S & EDUC 267S] Interactive, performance-based course grounded in dialogue and discussion, with a focus on reflection, student-based norms, and the development of individual and collective goals.
Writing 270 Composing the Internship Experience: Digital Rhetoric and Social Media Discourse (Typically offered only in summer.) Theoretical perspectives and practice in audience, purpose, and context with writing on digital platforms and social media. Students apply course concepts to their internship/work experiences as they produce digital and social media content.
Writing 275S Cyber Connections: Communication in the Digital Age Explores historical and contemporary challenges, contexts, and opportunities related to rhetoric and communication, and how these practices and complexities have persisted and shifted in the digital age.
Writing 280S Communicating Science Research** Explores the promises and perils of scientific publishing in the twenty-first century, catering to academic and public contexts, and provides practice in critical reading and analysis of science research, including health-science research and climate-related science research.
Writing 281 Approaches to Rhetorics of Health Medicine** Critical engagement with the language, theoretical frameworks, and audiences of health and medicine.
Writing 285S African American Rhetorics and Writing Studies Explores African American Rhetoric and Writing Studies scholarship to provide insights on how the Black community has used their literacy practices to make positive individual, institutional, and societal change.
Writing 293 Research Independent Study Individual investigation, reading, and writing under the supervision of a faculty member leading to a substantial written document.
Writing 305S Writing about Performance [Cross-listed: DANCE 302S, THEATRST 283S, MUSIC.305S] Introduction to performance-related writing, exploring how meaning is enacted through movement, sound, lighting, rhythm, voice, emotion, and audience interaction.
Writing 315S Argument Across Disciplines [Cross-listed w/ Economics and Education] Practice in analyzing and using the conventions of research writing in students’ chosen disciplines to hone students’ awareness of how these conventions advance disciplinary knowledge.
Writing 316 Persuasive Writing for Change** Critical engagement with bias and ethics in argumentation, strategies in persuasion, marketing, and propaganda, and the rhetorics of news media, hashtag activism, and local/global social movements.
Writing 323 Writing Pedagogy for K-12** Historical and emergent theories and practices of composition pedagogy within K-12 contexts, including pedagogies for multimodal composing, language diversity, and assessment of student writing.
Writing 350 Feminist Writing Practices/Theory** Explores writing through the lens of feminist theory, considering histories, theories, and pedagogies of writing that embrace and enact intersectional and rhetorical possibilities and feminist praxis through writing.
Writing 384 Public Speaking: Policy Advocacy and Communication [Cross listed PPS] Theoretical and practical understanding of the elements of effective advocacy, especially as applied to policy issues, with a focus on the human dimension of communication, such as voice, body behavior, control, and self- awareness.
Writing 308S Style, Voice, and Editing** Strategies for and complexities around style, voice, and editing through exploring ethical nuances, guided practice, and reflections on developmental editing and copyediting.
Writing 362 The Social Life of Words, Memes, and Emojis** Explores the major concepts of semiology to interrogate how symbols, signs, and icons are used and transformed in the digital world and in digital communication.
Writing 390S Advanced Special Topics: Writing in the Disciplines Advanced investigation in Writing Studies and Writing in the Disciplines. Topics vary by semester.