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Creative Writing: 21st-Century Creative Writing

ENGL 010.601
instructor(s):
Wednesdays 5-8:00 pm

In 1882, Friedrich Nietzsche used his typewriter to declare: “Our writing tools are also working on our thoughts.” How might we consider forms of poetry and fiction in a time when our thoughts are being worked over by iPhones, YouTube, and Google? This class follows new trends in 21st creative writing, where literature is equally likely to appear in a book or at an art gallery, through PDFs, GIFs, online videos, or even on Facebook. Through readings and class visits from internet artists and emerging poets, we will explore works that push the literary envelope into a variety of new media formats. How might Twitter facilitate a serial novel? What does YouTube demand of poetry? Using the workshop format, we’ll engage in a series of weekly writing experiments that attempt to find some of our own answers to today’s most pressing technological demands. Readings include diverse figures including Marshall McLuhan, Yung Jake, Wendy Chun, Kenneth Goldsmith, Marjorie Perloff, Tan Lin, Friedrich Kittler, and Charles Bernstein. By the end of the semester, students will have the technical and creative tools necessary to gather these experiments into an impressive online portfolio. This collection of works will serve as a final for the course. In addition, this course thrives on weekly creative assignments and group listserv responses. No previous training in poetry or new media is required!

 

fulfills requirements