Storytelling for Social Justice

WRITING X 424.21E

Craft your passion for justice through urgent stories that address pressing social issues in this course.

What you can learn.

Identify urgent and important stories in your life and your community that only you can write
Develop work rooted in fact and experience while writing across genres and formats
Read published works that help you identify opportunity for your writing
Spark new work you can develop into complete projects

About this course:

Well-told, new narratives can change the world. Living in a time of rising movements such as Black Lives Matter, MeToo, DACA/refugee and immigrant rights, LGBTQ rights and more, students are encouraged to uncover stories that are not included in our history textbooks. Through workshops, students gain access to pathways to explore personal history, family narratives and stories amidst their communities. Students read and produce compelling creative nonfiction—memoir, essays, literary journalism, blogging, audio/video recording, live performance and more—to share with larger audiences. Integral to the creation of new work is revision, peer feedback and literary work that serves as models. By the end of the course, students have begun a narrative in a format of their choice that they develop into a completed project in order to share with the larger community.