Instructor: Martinez | TuTh 09:30 AM – 10:50 PM
In this course, students will learn about essential fiction, non-fiction, and poetic techniques that will help them develop their creative writing skills. Students will read from a variety of published texts (short stories, novel excerpts, lyric essays, poetry, amongst other things)—then take “permissions” (a term used by multi-genre writer and professor Julie Marie Wade) from these readings in order to strengthen their creative writing toolkit. Students will come to understand that creative writing does not take on one perfect form, but can encompass a variety of forms and “un-forms,” all of which are valuable and interesting.
Writing will often take place in the form of free-writes and writer’s notebook assignments, designed to encourage experimentation and help students try out new techniques. Other forms of writing will be more finalized, such as a revised portfolio of prose and poetry that students will submit to their instructor at the end of the semester. Each week will be dedicated to introducing and practicing a selected creative writing technique, but students are encouraged to allow their writing to become aggregate, curatorial, cumulous, etc.—in other words, to combine techniques and enjoy the fruits of their learning.