Spring 2020 WRT Course Offerings

Linked course titles have extended descriptions. Syllabi provided where available.

Course	Title	Day	Time	Instructor	Room	Syllabus	Description
WRT 255 M002	Advanced Argumentative Writing	TTh	9:30-10:50am	Lois Agnew			Core Course: Intensive practice in the analysis and writing of advanced arguments for a variety of settings: public writing, professional writing, and organizational writing. (Core Requirement for Majors & Minors.)
WRT 301 M001	Civic Writing	TTh	5:00-6:20pm	Tony Scott			Practical skills necessary for effective civic or advocacy writing. Examines the nature of public(s) and applies theoretical understandings to practical communication scenarios. (G&P)
WRT 302 M001	Digital Writing	MW	3:45-5:05	George Rhinehart			Practice in writing in digital environments. May include document and web design, multimedia, digital video, weblogs. Introduction to a range of issues, theories, and software applications relevant to such writing. (Core Requirement for Majors.)
WRT 307	Professional Writing			Multiple Instructors			Professional communication through the study of audience, purpose, and ethics. Rhetorical problem-solving principles applied to diverse professional writing tasks and situations. (Core Req for Majors.)
WRT 340 M001	Advanced Editing Studio (Intertext)	F	9:30-12:15pm	Patrick W. Berry			What does it take to produce a publication from start to finish? In this course, we will explore publication processes: reviewing past issues of Intertext, analyzing audience, reading and selecting submissions, editing copy, finding and creating visual content, designing layouts, and developing supplemental editorial content. We will also explore production and manufacturing costs as well as issues pertaining to marketing, social media, promotion, and advertising. The ultimate goal is to create the 2020 issue of Intertext along with a supplemental Web-based component. (G&P)
WRT 413 M001	Rhetoric and Ethics	TTh	12:30-1:50pm	Tony Scott			Introduces historical conversations concerning rhetoric's ethical responsibilities and explores complications that emerge as assumed historic connections between language and truth, justice, community, and personal character are deployed in various social, political, cultural, national, and transnational contexts. (Core Requirement for Majors.)
WRT 422 M001	Studies in Creative Nonfiction: Writing the Journey	TTh	2:30-3:20pm	Eileen Schell			Nonfiction narratives often involve stories of epic journeys, whether travel writing, adventure narratives, athletic feats, or spiritual quests. This course will involve reading and writing journey narratives, focusing on memoir, profiles, place-based writing, travel writing, and multimedia writing. The elements of creative nonfiction (vivid scenes, characterization, dialogue, setting) will help render those journeys—both ones that you have taken or that others are engaged in--for both private and public audiences. (G&P)
WRT 426 M001	Studies in Writing, Rhetoric, and Information Technology: Through a Glass Darkly: Black Mirror and the Backlash against Internet Culture	TTh	3:30-4:50pm	Collin Gifford Brooke			Ten years ago, as Facebook and Twitter were mesmerizing us with the potential of social media, a single British television show was cutting against the grain of Internet optimism. In the near decade since the debut of Black Mirror, our assessment of the Net’s impact on our lives has changed. In this course, we will be screening a sizable number of Black Mirror episodes, and pairing them with relevant essays, to construct a “history” of the Internet. (H&T)
WRT 427 M001	Emerging Technologies in Professional and Technical Writing	M	6:45-8:05pm	Rusty Bartels			This class examines ethical and rhetorical considerations of adopting and designing for emerging technologies. Our work will include student-driven group projects centered around identifying a client and their needs, proposing a plan and prototype for adopting recommended technologies, and providing the rationale for doing so. We’ll also read texts centered around issues of privacy/surveillance, accessibility, and intellectual property. As this is a hybrid course, students will be expected to use a variety of technologies to participate collaboratively face-to-face and online. (G&P)
WRT 428: U800	Studies in Composition, Rhetoric and Literacy: Worth a Thousand Words: Visual Literacy and the Rhetoric of Images	Winterlude – 12/16/19-1/10/2020		Collin Gifford Brooke			We are beset on a daily basis by images. They attempt to influence us, to provoke in us reactions, whether they take the form of a fave or like, a comment, purchase, or shift in attitude or action. Images don’t operate according to the same cultural logics as the printed word, however. This course will explore the rhetorical impact of images even as we work to understand the visual elements that contribute to a complete picture of rhetoric. Students will need reliable Internet access and self-discipline to take the course. Students must meet with the course instructor prior to beginning the course. (H&T)
WRT 440 M001	Studies in the Politics of Language and Writing: Languaging Across Borders	MW	12:45-2:05	Brice Nordquist			Language shapes our experience of the world, and we live together and build community through language. This course considers theories and ideologies of language and the ways these inform our everyday practices, identities and power relations across educational, social, cultural, and national borders. Readings and discussions will focus on social issues intertwined with language; including, race, gender, class and language; attitudes towards dialects; processes of linguistic standardization; national language policies; the spread of “global” English and the development of “world Englishes.” (H&T)