This course develops minimal entry-level college writing competencies prerequisite for Writing Seminar. The credits earned do not comprise part of the student’s normal Liberal Arts general education core curriculum, nor may the course be substituted for Writing Seminar. May be taken as a general education elective.

Various Instructors and Times

This is a one-quarter, four-credit seminar limited to 19 students per section designed to develop first-year students' proficiency in analytical writing, critical reading, and critical thinking. Students will read, understand and interpret a variety of texts representing different cultural perspectives and/or academic disciplines. Texts, chosen around a particular theme, are designed to challenge students intellectually and to stimulate writing for a variety of contexts and purposes. Attention will be paid to the writing process including an emphasis on teacher-student conferencing, self assessment, class discussion, peer review, formal and informal writing, research, and revision. 

Prerequisite: Liberal Arts Qualifying Exam (LAQE) for students who scored below 560 on verbal portion of SAT, below 6 on the SAT essay, or below 23 on the ACT.

This is a one-quarter, four-credit seminar limited to 16 students per section designed to develop first-year students’ proficiency in analytical writing, critical reading, and critical thinking. Students will read, understand, and interpret a variety of texts. Texts, chosen around a particular theme, are designed to challenge students intellectually and to stimulate writing for a variety of contexts and purposes. Through this course, students will gain experience analyzing topics critically and developing writing strategies that will be strengthened throughout their academic careers. There will be particular attention to the writing process including an emphasis on teacher-student conferencing, self assessment, class discussion, peer review, formal and informal writing, research, and revision.

All fields and professions require us to present arguments that support our statements and our proposals. So students of all subjects need to know how to make claims, provide evidence, explore underlying assumptions, and anticipate and address counter-points. In this course, students will study and apply the elements of reasoning to their written assignments. Students will discuss and identify the argument in a piece of writing, assess the argument’s effectiveness, and recognize particular means of argumentation. Students will practice evaluating argument by writing analyses of and responses to various texts that may be taken from academic, political, and scientific fields. Students will apply the principles of argumentation to a documented research project and to original arguments of their own. Part of the Writing Studies concentration and minor. May also be taken as an elective.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

This course provides knowledge of and practice in technical writing style; audience analysis; organizing, preparing and revising short and long technical documents; designing documents using effective design features and principles, and format elements; using tables and graphs; conducting research; writing technical definitions, and physical and process descriptions; writing instructions; and individual and group editing. Required course for Communication majors and a professional elective for Advertising & Public Relations majors. Part of the Writing Studies concentration and minor; the Communication minor. May also be taken as an elective.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

What makes the English language so difficult? Where do our words come from? Why does Old English look like a foreign language? This is a course about the history of the English language, organized into units that comprehensively cover periods of the English language within the context of their history, culture, and society (e.g. Old English, Middle English, Early Modern English, Modern English, and English as a global language today). The course uses a comprehensive and accessible textbook, in addition to media and various online resources. Participants will have the opportunity to engage hands-on with texts produced in each language period. Designed for anyone curious about the English language or the nature of language change, the course may be taken as a professional elective for Communication majors, as part of the Communications and Writing Studies minors and concentrations, and as a Liberal Arts elective.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Here is a world of writing that includes reading the investigations of a Nobel- prize winning physicist, an oral history/memoir of holocaust survivors as told in comic book form, letters by executed anarchists, selected stories, and explorations in words and photographs of what the world eats. Writing assignments are diverse and range from personal narrative, research and analysis, oral history, literary interpretation and documentary analysis. Emphasis is placed on the process of writing through drafts and revisions with short responses and longer researched essays. Films, videos, and photographs enlarge our understanding of the complexities of representation, the social context of language, and the difficulties of sorting out the real from the fabricated. Part of the writing studies concentration and minor and an elective for the Communication major. May also be taken as a general elective.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

An exploration of the techniques of writing poetry in both open and closed forms. Professional elective for Technical Communication major. Part of the Creative Writing minor and may also be taken as an elective. Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

An exploration of some of the most important contemporary techniques of prose fiction in the short story form. My be taken as a professional elective for Communication majors; part of the Creative Writing minor; and may also be taken as an elective. Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Students who have completed Creative Writing or who have satisfied the instructor (normally by presentation of a writing sample) of their readiness to undertake the course are given an opportunity to explore in depth a literary genre, subject or theme chosen by the individual student in conference with the instructor. The acceptability of the student's project is determined on the basis of its intrinsic literary merit and its potential value to the student's development as a writer. Part of the Writing Studies concentration and minor; the Creative writing and the Science Writing minor; and may also be taken as an elective.

Prerequisite: Creative Writing and Writing Seminar 0502-227.
 

Everyone tells stories—orally, in written memoirs or formal autobiographies, through blogs or MySpace, or in interviews and oral histories. This course focuses on forms of writing about the self and others. The forms may be linear narratives or constructed projects such as artist books. Students learn about the relationships between orality, image, and texts, about how we know ourselves through others, and others through ourselves. This course emphasizes the reflective process of memoir, autoethnographic, and autobiographical writing, moving from short exercises into longer, peer-reviewed papers. Also, there is instruction on the process and techniques of oral history through careful listening, transcribing, and editing with an emphasis on the historical awareness necessary to recreate history. Students read from culturally diverse memoirs and oral histories, study concepts of narration, view photographs and films. Recent texts have included Maya Lin’s Boundaries (designer of the Vietnam War Memorial), graphic memoir, Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi, Crossing the BLVD, a combination of images, graphic design, and first person narratives of neighborhoods in Queens, New York, Buffalo photographer Milton Rogovin’s biography, probes into our dreams with Randy Pausch’s The Last Lecture and our demons with Lynda Barry’s One! Hundred! Demons! Also, we view videos such as Struggles in Steel, a film of African-Americans in the US steel industry and Stranger with a Camera, a documentary about an encounter between insiders and outsiders in the context of the 1960s War on Poverty. This course can be taken as a writing elective, as part of the Writing Studies minor, and as an elective for the Professional Technical Communication major.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Galileo was not only one of the world's most important scientists, but also one of the world's most talented writers. Why did he make the Pope so angry? Why the controversy over Rosalind Franklin and the discovery of DNA? In this course, students will decide whether scientific research is a matter of crafting the most persuasive arguments? Examples will be drawn from key figures and texts in the history of science, ongoing controversies in contemporary scientific debates, and in the popularization of science. Part of the Writing Studies Concentration and Minor, required course for Science Writing minor and may also be taken as an elective.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

Have you ever been made fun of for the way you talk? Or judged someone else based on their accent or use of slang? In this sociolinguistics course, we will learn the science and history behind why people who supposedly speak the same language do so in such a different way, and how the way we speak marks our identity in society. How did British and American English get to be so different? Are New Yorkers really street smart and Southerners really laid back, or is that just a stereotype associated with their dialects? Why does language tend to change anyway? In addition to regional dialects, we will look at how social factors such as race, ethnicity, gender, and social class affect language use. We will also consider the relationship of signed languages to Deaf identity and address sociolinguistic variation in American Sign Language. Other issues of language and society to be addressed include language in politics, language in advertising, bilingualism, Spanish in the US, Ebonics (African American English), and the movement to make English the official language of the US. Students will be encouraged to find topics of study for projects based on their own interests and backgrounds. Part of the Writing Studies Concentration and Minor. May also be taken as an elective.  Class 4, Credit 4 (offered every other year).

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227 or equivalent.

Welcome to a course in writing creative nonfiction! In this intensive workshop we will study the craft of writing, explore the “I” as a guide, seek the extraordinary within the ordinary, and find the story within the facts. Reading/reflection and writing/revision will be emphasized the entire quarter. You will explore the repertoire of creative nonfiction forms with readings and exercises. Ongoing written work will be discussed with peer editors in each class, which will not only help you rethink your work but teach you to become an editor. In this weekly reading and writing you will learn to talk about creative nonfiction like a seasoned writer. You will keep a process folder of your on-going work that you will take through several drafts. Experimentation and dedication expected. Fun anticipated. Creativity sought.  Part of the Writing Studies concentration and minor; the Creative Writing and the Science Writing minor; and may also be taken as an elective.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Students will explore the art of narrative and other literary approaches to explain concepts in science and technology: What makes climate change research credible? What is the history of the word “sustainable” and how is it used in differently in different contexts or cultures? What is a virus and what do we know about any particular virus? The course focuses on writing about scientific and technological subjects for popular presses and for literary and science magazines. A considerable part of the class will be devoted to the art and craft of the science essay: choosing a good narrative and structuring the story. In this class we will workshop drafts and complete multiple revisions of the assigned essay. To stimulate student thinking and provide models, we will read samples of creative nonfiction in “literary science.” Part of the Science Writing minor.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

Attention to all aspects of creating a literary & art magazine, with emphasis on developing an editor’s eye for literary judgment, as well as instruction in the history of the little magazine at RIT and elsewhere. Hands-on practicum focusing on production of the student-designed magazine Signatures, RIT's oldest continuous literary publication. Part of the Creative Writing minor and may also be taken as an elective.

Students will explore the art of narrative and other literary approaches to explain concepts in science and technology: What makes climate change research credible? What is the history of the word “sustainable” and how is it used in differently in different contexts or cultures? What is a virus and what do we know about any particular virus? The course focuses on writing about scientific and technological subjects for popular presses and for literary and science magazines. A considerable part of the class will be devoted to the art and craft of the science essay: choosing a good narrative and structuring the story. In this class we will workshop drafts and complete multiple revisions of the assigned essay. To stimulate student thinking and provide models, we will read samples of creative nonfiction in “literary science.” Part of the Science Writing minor.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

This course introduces students to topics that illuminate the way language is represented in the human mind: neurolinguistics (where in the brain language is localized), the language “instinct” or innateness of language (how the human brain is biologically programmed for language), psycholinguistics (how language is acquired and processed), language and thought (whether our thoughts are controlled by the particular language we speak), language disorders (atypical language due to aphasia, autism, etc.), and language evolution (how language first evolved, from sign to speech). Students will read in-depth yet accessible research from the field (e.g. Stephen Pinker’s best-selling The Language Instinct) and will write on these topics in cognitive science. Guest speakers from other disciplines will appear in class throughout the term. This class is part of the Writing Studies concentration and minor and the Science Writing minor.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

This course introduces the basic concepts of linguistics, which is the scientific study of human languages. Students will be introduced to the core disciplines and principles of linguistics through discussion and the analysis of a wide range of linguistic data based on current linguistic models. English will often serve as the reference language, but we will discuss a wide variety of languages, including American Indian languages and sign languages to illustrate core concepts in linguistics. The course will have relevance to other disciplines in the humanities, sciences, and technical fields. Students will be encouraged to develop critical thinking regarding the study of human languages through discussions of the origins of languages, how languages are acquired, their organization in the brain, and languages' socio-cultural roles. Some of the other topics that will be introduced are: language endangerment, language and computers, language description and documentation, and forensic linguistics.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

We will explore the relationship between language and technology from the invention of writing systems to current natural language and speech technologies. Topics include script decipherment, machine translation, automatic speech recognition and generation, dialog systems, computational natural language understanding and inference, as well as language technologies that support users with language disabilities. We will also trace how science and technology are shaping language, discuss relevant artificial intelligence concepts, and examine the ethical implications of advances in language processing by computers. This is an interdisciplinary course and technical background is not required.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227

This course introduces the basic concepts of linguistics, which is the scientific study of human languages. Students will be introduced to the core disciplines and principles of linguistics through discussion and the analysis of a wide range of linguistic data based on current linguistic models. English will often serve as the reference language, but we will discuss a wide variety of languages, including American Indian languages and sign languages to illustrate core concepts in linguistics. The course will have relevance to other disciplines in the humanities, sciences, and technical fields. Students will be encouraged to develop critical thinking regarding the study of human languages through discussions of the origins of languages, how languages are acquired, their organization in the brain, and languages' socio-cultural roles. Some of the other topics that will be introduced are: language endangerment, language and computers, language description and documentation, and forensic linguistics.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.

This is a hands-on course for those who know the basic elements of writing short stories. Participants should have taken Creative Writing: Prose/Fiction, or at the very least published a short story. The goal is to produce a 15- to 20-page Science Fiction manuscript suited for publication, or a mixed-media presentation suitable for broadcast. The course begins with a discussion of the history of the genre, and movies quickly through some consideration of the theories of top Science Fiction writers to workshops of individual stories. Students will be expected to submit drafts or revisions at each class session.

Prerequisite: Writing Seminar 0502-227.