creative writing in media

What Is Creative Writing? Types, Techniques, and Tips

by Kaelyn Barron | 5 comments

Even if you’re not a big reader of fiction, you’ve more than likely encountered creative writing—or at least, the outcomes of creative writing—at some point. In fact, you can thank creative writing for your favorite films, songs, musicals, and much more.

But what exactly makes writing “creative?”

Simply put, creative writing is any writing that falls outside of technical, journalistic, or academic writing.

You can think of it as classic storytelling. It can be written with a number of intentions: to entertain us, comfort us, or teach us a lesson; most importantly, good creative writing speaks to our shared human experience. It shouldn’t just tell us something—it should make us feel something new.

Creative Writing: An Overview

We’re all familiar with school-required “creative writing exercises.” Maybe you had a traumatizing experience when your eighth grade teacher forced you to write a story and read it aloud for the class (no? just me?).

Or maybe you think creative writing is reserved for the artsy free spirits who churn out novels in coffee shops or on sunny farms in Tuscany.

In reality, creative writing is much more than something for your great aunt to scoff at when discussing your major at Thanksgiving dinner.

In this post, we’ll break down creative writing and explain everything you need to know, including:

• Types and examples • Techniques • Who should practice creative writing? • Creative writing exercises to get started

Types of Creative Writing

Examples of creative writing can be found pretty much everywhere. Some forms that you’re probably familiar with and already enjoy include:

• Fiction (of every genre, from sci-fi to historical dramas to romances ) • Film and television scripts • Songs • Poetry • Plays • Vignettes

But creative writing doesn’t have to be limited to fictitious content. It can also include:

• Personal essays • Memoirs • Journals and diaries • Letters

As we can see from this list, some works of nonfiction can also constitute creative writing. After all, many books and films tell stories of real people and real events.

Take, for example, the 2010 film The King’s Speech . The film tells the story of real people and real events, but the script can be considered creative writing as much as the script for Jurassic Park, because it charges historical events with emotion and makes the audience feel invested in the characters.

Writing about your own life is no different. Journals and diaries—when they contain personal thoughts, experiences, or emotions—can also constitute creative writing. Even letters can be included, when they do more than stating facts (not just “today I went to the store” or “today it rained.”)

Creative writing doesn’t require you to make up names or inject unicorns into your manuscript. It just requires a bit of storytelling through more imaginative techniques.

Techniques Used in Creative Writing

You’ll want to make your story one that resonates with people, since creative writing is ultimately telling stories about the human experience. To achieve this, you can apply some of these techniques and literary devices:

Including conversations between characters can help bring them to life, while also moving the plot along without relying solely on the narrator.

This was a favorite technique of Ernest Hemingway. Famous for his simple, straightforward style, he let his characters do most of the talking, which also helped to make them more accessible and relatable.

One great example of character development through dialogue can be found in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice :

“A single man of large fortune; four or five thousand a year. What a fine thing for our girls!”

“How so? How can it affect them?”

“My dear Mr. Bennet,” replied his wife, “how can you be so tiresome! You must know that I am thinking of his marrying one of them.”

“Is that his design in settling here?”

“Design! Nonsense, how can you talk so! But it is very likely that he may  fall in love with one of them, and therefore you must visit him as soon as he comes.”

Without Austen telling us anything directly, we as readers can get a feel for Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, their relationship, and what they each prioritize.

Good dialogue should sound realistic, but also carry a purpose so that the story can progress in a natural way.

Metaphors and similes

Alternatively, writers can choose to pack their prose with imaginative language, offering the reader vivid descriptions to evoke emotion. This is typical in many forms of creative writing, and it is often achieved through literary devices, like similes and metaphors.

For example, in “A Red, Red Rose,” Robert Burns writes:

“O my Love is like a red, red rose That’s newly sprung in June; O my Love is like the melody That’s sweetly played in tune.”

Similes create images for the reader by using comparisons, rather than simple adjectives. (What kind of poem would the example above be if Burns just told us his love is “beautiful”?)

While similes can help us to imagine a scene more vividly, they can also be open to interpretation. Because similes rely on association, one word might carry different connotations for different readers (this may very well be the author’s intention).

Metaphors, instead, draw parallels and can take up a few lines, like this famous excerpt from Romeo and Juliet :

“But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!”

Or sometimes, metaphors can be recurring elements in a text, like in Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist , where the desert setting serves as a metaphor for life itself.

Good metaphors can serve as a shortcut to understanding a text because they can convey something complex in terms that are more concise, yet universal. For this reason, metaphors can add extra depth to your story.

Point of view

Deciding which point of view you want to tell your story from is an essential step because it will determine the story’s voice.

Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby , for example, is written in the first-person limited perspective—but imagine how different the story would be if Daisy were narrating instead of Nick! Changing the point of view can change the entire story.

Anecdotes are like small stories within the big story. When used in creative writing, they offer readers a chance to learn more about a character without simply stating it directly. They can be used to evoke empathy, to entertain, to teach a lesson, or simply to reveal other dimensions of a character.

We can turn to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein for one such example:

“Justine, you may remember, was a great favorite of yours; and I recollect you once remarked, that if you were in an ill-humor, one glance from Justine could dissipate it, for the same reason that Ariosto gives concerning the beauty of Angelica—she looked so frank-hearted and happy. My aunt conceived a great attachment for her, by which she was induced to give her an education superior to that which she had first intended.”

This anecdote, delivered by Elizabeth to Victor Frankenstein, provides background for Justine’s character and reveals the history between the characters’ families. By testifying to Justine’s “frank-hearted and happy” nature, readers are led to sympathize with the character even more, especially in light of her tragic fate (she confesses to a crime she did not commit and is promptly executed).

Making proper use of the right techniques can make any writing better, but it’s especially important in creative writing if you want a well-developed story that resonates with readers and doesn’t feel forced.

Who Should Practice Creative Writing?

Now that we’ve gone over what exactly creative writing is and the techniques used to compose it, you might be wondering what exactly you can do with this information.

Because creative writing isn’t just for English majors and best-selling authors. We all have stories to tell, and even if you never show your work to anyone, practicing creative writing can be beneficial to just about everyone.

Aside from proven therapeutic benefits , creative writing exercises can help to:

Build your imagination and creativity: By stimulating the parts of your brain responsible for creativity, you’ll train your mind to think “outside the box” to find new, innovative solutions.

Organize your thoughts: Developing a plot requires the ability to think logically, since you’ll want to make the underlying point clear. This kind of thinking can of course be helpful in the workplace and many other parts of your life.

Grow your confidence: Putting your thoughts down on paper takes guts. Expressing yourself through writing and seeing your ideas translated to words can help build self-confidence.

Improve your communication skills : By refining your writing skills, you’ll be able to communicate more effectively, both in speech and on paper.

Give your mind a break: Like reading, creative writing offers the perfect escape from everyday life. You’re in complete control of everything that happens, so let yourself go and see the wonderful things your mind builds when you set it free.

How Can You Get Started?

If you’re new to creative writing, there are a number of ways to get started. Keeping a diary to write down your thoughts and ideas can be extremely helpful. Or, check out our many great writing prompts to get your creativity flowing!

What do you love to write about? Feel free to share with us in the comments below!

If you enjoyed this post, you might also like:

• 70 Creative Writing Prompts to Inspire You to Write
• 10 Creative Writing Exercises for Beginners and Writers
• How Writing Prompts Can Boost Your Creative Writing Skills
• Fast and Loose: 3 Ways Freewriting Will Upgrade Your Creative Career

As a blog writer for TCK Publishing, Kaelyn loves crafting fun and helpful content for writers, readers, and creative minds alike. She has a degree in International Affairs with a minor in Italian Studies, but her true passion has always been writing. Working remotely allows her to do even more of the things she loves, like traveling, cooking, and spending time with her family.

I see during my searches of creating writing that the term, snippet is not used. Why is this, as it is a very entertaining concept, as I enclose an example.

The small boy asks his grandpa, “Grand daddy, what will you do if you ever catch the last beaver in th e world?”

“Well son, that will be the saddest day that I ever could imagine.”

“You know son, that almost happened a couple hundred years or so ago. Money was hard to come by and rich people over in Europe wanted all the beaver they could buy from men that were willing to risk their lives in the new America that had a seemingly endless supply of the rich furred animals.”

The old man said, “the only thing that stopped the beaver from being totally wiped out was the silk worm.”

That didn’t stop the boy from his original line of questions about beavers, he could care less about any worms. After all he was a trapper, in his own mind.

The boy, stopped his Grandpa again, in the manner that young kids do, that are impatient for another answer. “Granddaddy, how long have you been trapping beavers?”

“Well son, let me see; I started just about the time I was your age I think.”

“How many have you caught,” came next.

“There’s no telling, maybe a truck load, maybe two.”

The boys next words took the old trapper back a step or two when the boy said, “Granddaddy do we have to catch them all, or can we leave me a few so I can take my son, someday, and show and tell him what you’ve taught me.”

Interesting

Thanks, hope you enjoyed the post!

Great article. I appreciate reading even more now. Understanding these things has opened a new door for me. I mostly wrote for my own entertainment, but what I have learned here, I am inspired to give it a try on a bigger scale.

Thank you for the inspiration.

You’re very welcome Cindy, and thank you for the kind words! I’m so glad you enjoyed the article :) Happy writing!

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• Published: 05 February 2019

Teaching digital fiction: integrating experimental writing and current technologies

• R. Lyle Skains   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8869-0215 1  

Palgrave Communications volume  5 , Article number:  13 ( 2019 ) Cite this article

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• Cultural and media studies
• Language and linguistics

Today’s creative writers are immersed in a multiplicative, multimodal—digital—universe. It requires “multiliteracies”, all in a constantly and rapidly evolving technological environment, which are not yet fundamentally integrated into the basic literacy skills entrenched in school learning. How can creative writing instructors in higher education best prepare their students for the real-world contexts of their creative practice? One approach is to integrate the creative writing workshop with a focus on digital and interactive design. This paper outlines a module incorporating multiple literacies into a creative writing course, Playable Fiction, noting the affordances, limitations, and benefits of teaching workshops for writing digital fiction (“born-digital” fiction, composed for and read on digital devices). The researcher took an ethnographical approach to the question, designing a module to encourage creative writing students to experiment with digital fiction, and observing the effects on the students’ attitudes and their coursework. Included is a discussion of the benefits to students of developing multiliteracies and considerations for teaching, including issues of technical know-how and the lack of infrastructural support. Finally, the paper describes the model class taught to second-year and third-year undergraduates in the ‘Games Design and Professional Writing' programs at Bangor University, in the UK, including marking recommendations and reading list advice.

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Introduction

The prevailing notion of creative writing workshops in higher education—that our creative writing students are all going to become short fiction writers and novelists—is not only shortsighted, it is backwards-facing. Today’s creative writers are immersed in a multiplicative, multimodal—digital—universe. To ignore the many different modes and methods of narrative storytelling they have at their fingertips is to render our classrooms as backwaters, excluding “significant student knowledge from the learning environment” (Ryan et al., 2010 , p. 477). In this paper I outline a module in which I incorporate multiple literacies into a creative writing course, Playable Fiction, noting the affordances, limitations, and benefits of teaching workshops for writing digital fiction Footnote 1 . For creative writers, digital fiction workshops offer a multiliteracies approach (Cazden et al., 1996 ; Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 ) that develops digital literacy, reflective practice, and audience awareness, as well as organically opening students up to fresh and even experimental techniques and perspectives in their writing practice.

As undergraduate creative writing instructors, our aims and learning objectives for our students have necessarily changed from the 20th century. As tuition costs rise, we are being asked more and more not only to develop critical thinking skills and, more specifically, creative writing skills in our students, but to help them gain vocational and transferable skills as well (Bok, 2009 ; Carr, 2009 ). In the 21st century, those include multimodal communication, which plays an increasingly important role in everyday life, the workplace, academia, citizenship, and even issues of agency and the self (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 ; Archer and Breuer, 2016 ). Higher education, however, has been slow to engage in multimodal literary practices (Goodfellow, 2011 , p. 136), for whatever reason: lack of holistic teaching approaches in the academy; the quickly changing literary landscape; or insecurities about new technologies and practices. Arlene Archer and Esther Breuer make an eloquent case for embracing these multimodal and digital challenges in higher education:

…a multimodal approach has the potential to provide a healthy antidote to monolingual and logocentric approaches to meaning-making, enabling a metacognitive view of semiosis as occurring across languages and modes, as well as a successful way of enabling access to dominant and powerful forms ( 2016 , p. 14).

The future of writing is multiplicative: multimodal, collaborative, participatory, and distributed (Short and Kauffman, 2000 ; Clark, 2010 ; Jacobs, 2012 ). It is imperative that we engage our creative writing students with all of the sign systems available to them for meaning-making in digital contexts; not only will teaching digital fiction help them to be better writers with wider career opportunities, but it will also to enable them to develop some of the skills that are expected of them as 21st century citizens (Dogan and Robin, 2008 , p. 902).

While many instructors are reluctant to embrace the “digital” element of writing fiction, the form itself grew out of experimental and avant-garde literatures: OuLiPo, literary cubism, temporal contortionism, and both Modernism and postmodernism, standing on the shoulders of Jorge Luis Borges, John Barth, Italo Calvino, Samuel Beckett, Virginia Woolf, and James Joyce, to name a few (Ciccoricco, 2012 , p. 472). Its early forms are early video games: text adventures (a genre that is alive and well, now often called “interactive fiction”), which dominated the 1980s game industry (Briceno et al., 2000 ). As games moved toward visual graphics and first-person avatars, hypertext fictions began to circulate, with Michael Joyce’s afternoon ( 1987 ) generally noted as the first, preceding even the Internet (Ensslin and Skains, 2017 ). Digital writers proceeded to turn every software platform and distribution system to their own ends, including HTML, Macromedia/Adobe Flash, JavaScript, game engines, and mobile applications. Collectively, the narrative-focused, multimodal, digital works they create are termed “digital fiction” (a form of electronic literature):

fiction written for and read on a computer screen that pursues its verbal, discursive and/or conceptual complexity through the digital medium, and would lose something of its esthetic and semiotic function if it were removed from that medium (Bell et al., 2010 , p. np).

As a still emerging and evolving form of narrative storytelling, digital fiction offers creative writers an opportunity to create and develop literacies in the “visual and digital media they consume and produce in mass quantities on a daily basis” (Hergenrader, 2015 , p. 46). This paper offers a model for teaching digital fiction workshops for undergraduate instructors. The following sections establish the benefits to students of immersing them in this multimodal form, as they develop crucial multiliteracies in the creative writing classroom. Considerations for teaching are discussed, including issues of technical know-how and the lack of infrastructural support for these types of texts. Finally, I describe the model class I teach to second-year and third-year undergraduates in the Professional Writing program at Bangor University, in the UK, including marking recommendations and reading list advice.

The benefits of teaching digital fiction for creative writers

Twenty-first century writers face a wild and varied landscape unlike any previously known. Prior to written culture, crafting fiction involved memorization, appropriation, transformation, and recitation: an oral tradition that, while rich, was limited by the bounds of memory, language, and time. The era of print—a technological revolution itself—extended these boundaries, but introduced new boundaries in form, sequence, copyright, and commerciality. Moreover, print writers craft fiction using what has become an endemic or ‘neutral’ skill: communicating through written language. Comparatively, if print writing is a road well-traveled, the digital writing landscape is a barely explored wilderness. It requires “multiliteracies” (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 ): writing; awareness of various film, music, Internet, and game conventions; awareness of cultural signs and references; video, image, and sound manipulation; HTML coding; and potentially much, much more, all in a constantly and rapidly evolving technological environment. These skills—with the exception of writing, reading, and hopefully some cultural dialogue—are not yet fundamentally integrated into the basic literacy skills entrenched in school learning. Nor can we expect our undergraduate students to undertake to learn them in the didactic teaching model that has dominated Western pedagogy for so long, by taking individual classes in computer programming, graphic design, sound design, web design, filmmaking, animation, and creative writing.

The current creative writing landscape calls for a more integrated approach, one that recognizes the wide variety of professional options for our students once they graduate. Less than 10% of creative writing students go on to stereotypical “writing” careers (fiction writing, publishing, translating); far more go into arts/design/media careers (17.7%) and marketing/public relations/sales (11.3%)—not to mention the significant numbers who enter professions such as education, health, business, information technology, and law (Logan and Prichard, 2016 ; What can I do with a creative writing degree? 2018 ). These fields—creative writing included—increasingly call for multiliterate professionals; we are failing to prepare our students properly for their careers if we restrict our teaching to the Raymond Carver “minimalist” prose and poetry workshop model (Koehler, 2015 ).

In defining the Multiliteracies Pedagogical Framework, Bill Cope and Mary Kalantzis argue for teaching design rather than the rules of language, grammar, and canon ( 2009 ). Like multimodality, a design-focused approach engages students in multiliteracies holistically, encouraging them to practice a process of development for their work that closely resembles the draft-workshop-revise creative writing process we have taught for decades. It reaches further, however, asking students to: develop awareness of all the methods of communication at their disposal; analyze their audience, market, and communication media; choose communication methods and modes that best suit their message and audience; construct texts that make the best use of these options—and, at their best, create a text that not only adds these media and modes together, but combines them in such a way that their meanings, when (re-)constructed by the reader, are multiplicative (Lemke, 1998 ), the whole more than the sum of its parts. This is the goal of multiliteracies pedagogy, onboarding students with interpretive strategies and flexible skillsets that not only enhance and progress the art of narrative fiction creation, but also outfit them with transferable skills valuable in modern careers across all professions.

While most students are certainly immersed in digital media, from social media and text messaging to web comics and gaming, most undergraduate students are largely unfamiliar with digital fiction as a creative writing endeavor. They may be familiar with the fringes of digital fiction that are part of the mainstream, such as walking simulators, YouTube mashups, and mobile app versions of classic texts (along with a range of virally/socially shared texts Leonardo Flores terms “3rd generation e-lit” [ 2018 ]); they rarely conceive of these texts, however, as falling under the banner of creative writing, even if they have dabbled in composing some themselves. Thus, the simple transition of the writing space from word processor (and, typically, some work in pen and paper) to HTML composer introduces a simple but significant change to their writing practice, an element of “trouble”, as Howard Garfinkel ( 1967 ) terms it, that brings their habitual practices and habits into relief, allowing for greater introspection, reflection, and experimentation.

The shift in the writing space brings with it a multimodal practice. Whereas prose comes with a relatively rigid presentation mode (codex, black text, white/cream page, left-to-right, top-to-bottom, first page to last), the nature of the digital medium opens a multitude of communicative potentialities. Their narratives can include multilinear plotlines relying on reader interactivity; they may incorporate color, image, sound, video, movement, music, and gameplay. Composing digitally increases the opportunity for writers to use these additional modes to convey narrative metaphor, character, and setting (Chisholm and Trent, 2013 ; Skains, 2017 ): “each sign system makes available different potentials for meaning” (Short and Kauffman, 2000 , p. 44). Further, the digital writer is faced with technological and mechanical challenges in the construction of their texts, regardless of their level of experience, resulting in a “heightened awareness of the act of construction and an output that breaks from the writer’s familiar style…[encouraging] the kind of intentional thinking that is just as useful in traditional writing” (Reed, 2015 , p. 143). The digital medium engages writers in a metacognitive approach to the creation of narrative, pushing their writing practice to previously underexplored heights.

Also inherent in digital composition is a shifted focus to the reader (or generally, the reader-player). Many writers, particularly student writers, write mainly for themselves or for assessments; I’ve found it difficult for most to “put their work out there”: to submit for publishing, to share with friends and family, or even to submit to my department’s end-of-year “showcase”, even when urged by their tutors Footnote 2 . Writing digital fiction requires them to do more than just write: it requires them to design (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 ), to create a text and an interface that function in harmony for the desired reader experience. They have to consider what word, color, image, and/or sound choices might lead their reader to click one link over another—and what it may mean to the reader in terms of narrative interpretation when they do. They have to consider dead ends and broken links, timing of image downloads and volume (and potential for irritation) of background music. In digital texts, “the balance of agency in meaning construction has shifted in favor of the viewer” (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 , p. 181). This shift requires digital writers to focus on the audience experience of their texts from the very first stages of composition, rather than merely at the end when they want to send query letters out and need to identify their work’s genre and market for potential agents and editors.

If digital writers are engaging multiplicatively in their texts for the sake of their audience, they are certainly more engaged in the text overall. Perhaps because of the unfamiliarity of the composition space, or perhaps because of the novelty of doing something new, I find my digital writers working up drafts earlier in the semester, rarely leaving their creative assessment to the night before (as happens so frequently on other modules). It is a repeating refrain in the literature on use of digital storytelling in classrooms, from elementary school students to higher education: students working in digital media have significantly increased levels of engagement in their coursework (Hull et al., 2010 ; Ryan et al., 2010 ; Letter, 2015 ; Williams, 2016 ). My own students have successfully negotiated, as a class, higher word counts for their digital work, so they can do more and push their digital fictions further. Students are interested in doing something new with their writing, in playing with technology, in being original . Likewise, they are excited to create texts that resonate with their peers, with the digitally-integrated spaces they engage in outside of academic realms (Williams, 2016 , p. 127). They gain confidence in creating something new and interesting in the technological world they most connect to. They read Jennifer Egan’s short fiction and lament they’ll never be good enough to publish in The New Yorker ; they read her same work as a Twitter novel and think, hey, I can do that, and it will be fun.

Given these perceptions in our students, it is important that we as creative writing tutors maintain environments that encourage creative writers to express themselves in variety of ways to suit different orientations, styles, and audiences.

It is both fascinating and important to consider how the opportunity to multiplicatively combine and design image, color, and text on a page, thereby exercising one’s artfulness and imagination as communicator and creator, can expand meaning-making strategies, opportunities, and motivations for youthful authors (Hull et al., 2010 , p. 347).

Multimodality is a democratizing force (Hull and Nelson, 2005 , p. 253): it enables writers to play to different strengths, whether their own communicative or artistic strengths, or the strengths of a chosen medium or genre. It allows students of different backgrounds, cultures, linguistic levels, areas of interest, fandoms, genre preferences, and communication styles to compose texts in a wide variety of methods—a multiplicity that we as instructors could never strictly delineate and define (and should not , in the interests of developing multiliteracies in our students). It allows us as instructors to engage students not only in the genres and forms we want them to learn, but to engage them in genres and forms they already navigate on a daily basis (Williams, 2016 , p. 122).

This democratization occurs not only between tutors and students, whose mediatized environments can be enormously different (given factors such as age, education, political affiliation, social networks, etc.), but also between students of different backgrounds. The divides between student experiences and capabilities are factors of culture, education history, and, mostly, socio-economic background (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 ; Letter, 2015 ). At university level, most of our students are generally of a level, thanks to admissions procedures. As more and more (UK) universities, however, seek to expand admissions through international admissions, we find ourselves teaching increasing numbers of ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse students, as well as English as a Second Language (ESL) students. The latter in particular face significant communication and learning gaps, as they “must simultaneously learn both language and subject matter knowledge in a new sociocultural context” (Early and Marshall, 2008 , p. 378, emphasis original). Multiple studies have shown that multimodal analysis and assessment strategies not only connected better with these students, but also enabled more nuanced understandings of abstract concepts and theories (Early and Marshall, 2008 ; Skinner and Hagood, 2008 ; Ryan et al. 2010 ), as well as offering “psychological refuge” from the constant pressure and self-doubt that accompanies learning through an unfamiliar tongue (Choi and Yi, 2015 , p. 15).

Likewise, digitally-enabled multimodal practices offer students the opportunity for knowledge exchange on both cultural and informational fronts. The medium’s multimodality encourages expression through metaphoric and symbolic semiotics, which vary across cultures and backgrounds. By sharing works incorporating these various signs, not only amongst a classroom-based peer group but online as well, students “experience cross-cultural perspectives involving ‘cosmopolitan habits of mind’—the ability to recognize and negotiate differences between competing global cultural perspectives” (Beach, 2012 , p. 449; cf. Hull et al. 2010 ). In addition to this cultural sharing, students also engage in co-teaching (Short and Kauffman, 2000 , p. 56) as they turn to one another for operational or technical help with the software. Because an instructor leading a full class in unfamiliar skills development will necessarily have their attention divided, the students become active participants in trouble-shooting, teaching themselves how to solve a problem or accomplish a goal (through trial-and-error, tutorials, or web searches), then teach one another (Ryan et al. 2010 ; Beach, 2012 ; Letter, 2015 ). They become independent learners, “[participating] in the learning commons to share ideas and alternative perspectives for addressing problems leading to…an essential 21st-century digital literacy” (Beach, 2012 , p. 451).

Considerations for teachers

Multiliteracies, including digital literacy, are not yet standard pedagogical aims; we cannot expect our students to enter our classrooms possessing the necessary literacies to construct digital fiction in the same way we can for prose fiction. Even moreso, instructors are unlikely to possess these multiliteracies as a rule. I once had a workshop leader preclude science fiction submissions in her class—not necessarily because she looked down on the genre, but because, in her argument, she was not familiar enough with it to be able to comment on it or mark it. For teaching digital fiction, the problem is multiplied by the fact that not only may the instructors feel inadequate to teach it (Clancy, 2015 ), their students are unlikely to have much familiarity with it, either. With administrative pressures such as student evaluations, external examiners, Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) and the National Student Survey (NSS) in the UK, university instructors are understandably reluctant to embark on a situation wherein the blind may be leading the blind, as it were. Yet the numerous instances where digital storytelling and other multimodal methods have been employed in classrooms (Ryan et al. 2010 ; Choi and Yi, 2015 ; Clancy, 2015 ; Letter, 2015 ; Williams, 2016 )—even by instructors at least initially unfamiliar with the technology—demonstrate that these concerns can be mediated, and the benefits outweigh any stumbles that might occur.

Regarding students and the literacies they bring in to the classroom, many instructors overestimate their students’ capabilities. The “digital divide” places age-based expectations on so-called “digital natives” that do not actually bear out; as Amy Letter points out, “[t]he only divide that has proven genuine is a socioeconomic one” ( 2015 , p. 179). As digital interfaces have evolved toward consumer accessibility, users actually have less incentive to get into the guts of the digital media they participate in on a daily basis; most of the creative activity in any community comes from a relatively small proportion of “super-users”. In the area of digital fiction, particularly, given the form has not (yet) significantly entered the mainstream, students are generally largely unfamiliar with it. Thus the good news: our students are unlikely to enter our digital writing classrooms knowing more than we do about digital fiction. And the bad news: our students are not entering into our digital writing classrooms already armed with the skills they need to create digital fiction, despite our expectations of them as “digital natives”.

If we are to implement a multiliteracies approach in creative writing workshops, incorporating digital fiction and writing, then mitigating approaches to close the gaps in instructor and student knowledge are required. The first of these is the multiliteracies approach itself: by embracing a teaching model that is open, flexible, and iterative, the classroom becomes a cooperative teaching and learning space. The instructor is not expected to be a pinnacle of knowledge; rather, they serve as a guide and mentor for the student to develop that knowledge through their own activities (Cope and Kalantzis, 2009 ; Letter, 2015 ). If the students are engaged, interested in creating a work that they can compare to those on a reading list or even from their own digital interactions outside the classroom, “we can have them engaged in a digital writing process that focuses first on the writer, then on the writing, and lastly on the technology” (Hicks, 2009 , p. 8). The process of learning the technology for creative purposes teaches critical problem-solving skills, develops the task-switching required for working in digital environments, and can even serve as a form of artistic restraint, inspiring new directions for their work (Letter, 2015 ).

What is required of the digital writing instructor, then, is not extensive knowledge of digital fiction softwares, but rather to serve a more Miyagi-like role: to ask analytical questions and pose creative challenges that encourage the students think more deeply about their work and approach it from relevant and fresh perspectives (Ryan et al., 2010 ). A first-person example: as a graduate teaching assistant in a media department, I was chosen to lead workshops on digital media modules merely because I had audited them the previous year; I barely managed to keep a week ahead of my students in terms of the skills I was teaching. Workshop sessions were a nightmare of trouble-shooting students’ issues with their work; if I could not suss the issue in-class, I worked on it on my own time and delivered the solution to the student in the next session. I spent many (unpaid) hours chasing down these issues, feeling inadequate and frustrated. In contrast, in my most recent Playable Fiction module, many of my students integrated elements into their digital fictions that I still have no idea how to do, and spent no time in learning. Instead, I created an expectation that their works only had to have the bare basics of digital fiction (hyperlinks); further functionality was via their own skills and intrepitude. As a result, they googled and followed tutorials and tested things out and shared amongst themselves. These students gained far greater abilities than my earlier students did, not only with the softwares, but also in problem-solving and cooperation.

Outside of the spheres of instructor and student literacies, a further constraint on the digital writing workshop remains: university infrastructure. As discussed above, digital fiction is intangible, evanescent, and appears in a wide array of forms, under just as many nomenclatures. Digital writers use any and every software platform available to them, from expensive professional creative suites to ubiquitous programs like PowerPoint. It is a form that cannot yet be cataloged and accessed via a library: as most is not commercial, it cannot be purchased; likewise, without commercial publishing streams, digital fiction is dispersed throughout the web, with no central distribution hub. Without these centralizing forces, digital fiction is difficult to track and archive: there is, as yet, no cataloging system such as ISBNs, and continually updating digital technology renders many works unreadable in devastatingly short periods. While groups such as the Electronic Literature Organization and the Electronic Literature Lab Footnote 3 are establishing archives and collections, these remain a small fraction of the wealth of digital fiction that exists, and rarely include the more “popular” forms that students are more likely to connect to in their introduction to digital fiction. Currently, the onus is on each individual instructor to construct and maintain an active reading list of digital fictions for students to engage with (suggestions for doing so are below).

As for platforms to use for creating digital fiction, these also have a quality of evanescence, depending on their cost, uptake, and, most importantly, continued development and support. Many that I employed in my digital media modules in the last few years have come and gone. On the upside, developers are continually introducing new platforms that make content creation ever cheaper (usually free) and ever easier; on the downside, technology is moving swifter than ever, as are user trends and habits. Even if a tech or platform remains, often our students perceive it as outdated and uninteresting (see their shift away from Facebook toward Instagram and SnapChat—which, by the time this article publishes, will likely be antiquated). Again, the onus is unfortunately on the individual instructor to find a platform that works best for their aims and students, and to seek out new ones on a regular basis (again, suggestions are below).

“Playable Fiction” as a model

In this section, I outline the digital fiction workshop that I teach regularly, offering it as a model (though not the model; many iterations are possible, of course). It is worth noting that I created this module for dual purposes: (1) to introduce a digital fiction workshop into my department’s undergraduate program, which had none at that stage, and (2) to conduct ethnographic research into the effects of digital composition on creative writers’ practice (Skains et al. 2016 ; paper in preparation). The structure of the module and its assessments are predicated upon this latter purpose.

Playable Fiction is a 12-week taught undergraduate module, taught in the spring semester of even-numbered years. It is designed as an exercise in experimental writing, aiming to “interrogate and analyze the effects of experimenting with unconventional/unnatural forms on conventional or commercial writing practices” Footnote 4 . As such, the first five weeks of the module focus on reading and writing Twine storygames; weeks 6–9 see the students transmediating their own storygames into prose; and the final three weeks are spent analyzing the process and narratives for insight into how writing in digital form affects the creative writer’s practice. The three assessments consist of a 2000-word “storygame” Footnote 5 , a 3000-word prose adaptation of the storygame, and a 2000-word analysis of the creative writing process. The module’s weekly meetings are split into a 1-hour lecture (incorporating theory from narratology, interactivity, and the evolution of narrative and play), a 1-hour study group session (collaborative discussion and exercises are given and recorded, usually relating the lecture discussion to their creative works), and a 1-hour seminar/workshop in a computer lab (for creative exercises, beta-testing, and workshopping). Creative readings include Twine games, hypertexts, interactive fiction, and print ergodic texts (e.g., Mark Danielewski’s 2000 House of Leaves ) (Aarseth 1997 ). Students complete weekly activities based on critical discussion questions and writing exercises, directed toward completion of their three assessments, and record them in research logs (Evernote notebooks shared with the instructor).

The digital fiction software I employ on this module is Twine ( http://twinery.org ). I have covered the history of this program elsewhere (Ensslin and Skains, 2017 ); the short version is that Chris Klimas created it expressly to compose digital fiction—unlike many other platforms that were appropriated from multimedia authoring tools—and indie game developer Anna Anthropy embraced it and promoted it ( 2012 ). The result was that a significant proportion of indie game developers who were under-represented in the games industry (LGBTQ+, women, religious and ethnic minorities) took up the platform for personal and portfolio development. Rather than letting it fade away into obscurity (as he nearly did), Klimas released Twine 2.0, which runs in any Internet browser and requires no download. As the Twine community grew, so too did its resources: it boasts extensive online tutorials, which grow all the time. It remains one of the simplest digital composition tools I have encountered to date, with the greatest capability for adding complexity and functionality (thanks to its JavaScript foundation). It outputs as HTML files, easily saved and easily published, with all the accessibility of the World Wide Web. At its most basic, it requires only two elements: passages and links. Passages form the text the reader will see, and links connect them together (see Figs. 1 – 3 ).

The Twine interface: Passages are represented as white boxes; links are represented as arrows between boxes

A Twine passage: users write their text in these passages. Links are created in this Twine “Story Format” by placing two square brackets around the text to be linked

The passage from Fig. 2 as displayed for a reader in an Internet browser

I have had elderly students create basic hypertext fictions using Twine 2.0 within 30 min, and teenagers create multimedia games over the course of a week. In their five weeks with the program, undergraduates on Playable Fiction go from complete unfamiliarity with it, to submitting a fully functional digital fiction:

Week 1: Introduction to Twine. Read a few Twine games, play with the software. Create a simple story, such as a joke or recent event, to get familiar with creating links and passages.

Week 2: Share and play your simple Twine games. Create a storygame “bible”, and “wireframe” your storygame (see Heussner et al., 2015 ).

Week 3: Share and discuss storygame bibles. Draft storygame.

Week 4: Beta-test storygame. Revise per feedback.

Week 5: Beta-test storygame. Revise per feedback. Submit final storygame in Week 6.

As noted, this module is designed as an experiment into practice; as such, digital writing occurs only in these five to six weeks. Without research constraints on a module, instructors can expand the workshop to include the full course of the term, incorporating further beta-tests, additional digital fictions, and alternative writing exercises.

One additional consideration to incorporate into any digital media module is that of intellectual property and copyright. Most students are immersed in their everyday lives in a culture of sharing and remix (Williams, 2016 , p. 120); the creation and sharing of memes and videos rarely entails proper attribution for creators of the various source materials. Yet proper assignment of intellectual property rights is a desirable learning outcome in academic settings. Integration of copyright discussions into digital writing classrooms is good practice, particularly as these students may move into professions where they are using digital materials, and need to use them appropriately, such as media creation, marketing, or creating web content. While using various materials for educational and/or transformative purposes typically constitutes “fair use”, students should develop a habit of checking the rights assigned to properties they access, save, and incorporate into their works, and using and attributing them appropriately.

Marking digital fiction writing

Unlike my old workshop leader, I embrace an open philosophy when it comes to student submissions; my concerns as a teacher are not that my students write what I know. Rather, I deem a work successful if it is meeting the needs of its (intended) audience. Students come to creative writing for many different purposes; the ones who seek out my classes are often those who, like Anna Anthropy and her community, feel shunted by the “literary” expectations of the Carver-modeled creative writing workshops (which often preclude writing outside of “literary fiction” and poetry) that dominate higher education programs. Frequently, my students are interested in or have already written fanfiction, comics, genre fiction, and scripts; most are also immersed in digital interactivity in some form, whether blogging, social media, or games. Attempting to dissuade them from these pursuits is not only disingenuous, it is detrimental to their futures as writers, whatever career path that may take.

Thus my marking model emphasizes the process of writing and design, rather than focusing solely on the end product. This is in line with Cope and Kalantzis’ Multiliteracies Pedagogy, which delineates a teaching model that guides students through the processes of experiencing (both the known and the new); conceptualizing (naming concepts and weaving them into interpretive frameworks); analyzing (both for functionality and for power relationships); and applying this experience, knowledge, and understanding to work (both appropriately for real world contexts, and creatively for innovation and new perspectives) ( 2009 , pp. 184–5). Shelley Tracey presents a very similar emphasis on process in her Model for Creative Reflection, with its four phases of preparation (enacting “threshold activities” that cross-reference between known and new experiences); play (encouraging creative thinking, interpretative approaches for new ideas); exploration (purposefully putting these interpretations into a new project); and synthesis (in which “experience and learning are synthesized into new understandings”) ( 2007 , p. 5).

I have transitioned my marking (on all modules, including Playable Fiction) from a model in which only the final creative artifact is marked, to one in which all of the activities leading up to that artifact are part of the marking scheme. This scheme is based in Linda Nilson’s Specifications Grading model ( 2014 ), which provides a useful framework for focusing on processes and activities rather than a single final project (without making the marking into an odious task). In my application, the final artifact is the minimum required element of any assessment: if a student submits only this element, regardless of how outstanding it may be, the highest mark it can receive is a D + (working on a letter-grade system in which A is the highest band and D is the minimum pass level). All of the weekly exercises I assign leading up to that artifact constitute pass/fail exercises that pop their scores up with each one that is successfully completed and presented—on time—in class (i.e., the exercises as noted above: [1] simple storygame, [2] storygame bible, [3] draft storygame, [4] beta-testing results and feedback, [5] revised draft). I design my contact time so that I review their exercises while they are doing in-class activities such as group work or creative exploration, eliminating the need for extra time spent marking outside of contact hours—a consideration sorely needed in these times of increasing faculty workloads and student numbers.

One amendment I have made to Nilson’s model is to the pass/fail binary. Instead, I use a system of marks 0–3, as shown in Table 1 , ranging from “not submitted” (0) to “satisfactory-plus” (3) for exemplary, A-level work. Students who consistently receive 2 s on their work will earn a B-band mark on their overall assessment; students who consistently receive 3s, including on the final artifact, will earn an A-band mark. I give all students Nilson’s recommended “tokens” (usually 2–3 per module), which they can trade in to me in order to resubmit an exercise for a higher score, to submit an exercise late, or even for more creative uses such as negotiating a higher word count allowance on creative assessments.

As this paper is focused on the Playable Fiction module as a model of teaching digital fiction writing, and not a model of specifications grading Footnote 6 , it does not have the scope to analyze and evaluate this approach fully. Suffice it to note that the results of this implementation have been very positive: student engagement has increased, in terms of attendance and completion of weekly exercises. The final artifacts the students submit, for those who have engaged in the entire process, demonstrate more cohesion and polish on average than those I received under the previous marking model. Student evaluations are generally very positive: students like knowing exactly what they have to do to earn the mark they want, and they like the opportunities presented by the tokens to improve upon previous work. The few negative evaluations are typically from non-attenders who are otherwise good writers, and have previously coasted on their abilities, rather than their engagement with individual modules and learning outcomes. As creative writers, most students appreciate the incentive to engage with their writing practice on a more regular basis; they know it is a necessary part of improving their writing, but most have not yet developed sufficient self-discipline or time management skills to maintain a steady practice. For myself as an instructor, the benefits are that I see the students’ work more frequently, and can gauge much earlier if they (either as a group or as individuals) are struggling. I spend less time outside of contact hours marking work; as the students are getting regular measures of their work’s standards and participating in far more peer feedback, their final artifact is not so heavily weighted, and thus needs less of my feedback. Finally, from an institutional standpoint, students’ average performance on these modules has increased: students who work hard through the process almost always achieve a B-band mark, rather than the lower scores they might receive based on only one piece of work. Thus scores improve without need for artificial grade inflation or marking on a “curve”.

A final note on marking for instructors unsure of where the lines between “unsatisfactory”, “satisfactory”, and “satisfactory-plus” may fall in works of digital fiction. An excellent starting place for marking rubrics is Troy Hicks’ MMAPS heuristic, which he presents thoroughly in The Digital Writing Workshop ( 2009 , pp. 57–8). The text is aimed at primary and secondary school educators, but the concepts are applicable to undergraduate classrooms, particularly the heuristic, which places the marking evaluation on choices the student has made in terms of Media, communication Mode, meeting the Audience’s needs, demonstration and accomplishment of the text’s Purpose, and how the work addresses both the writ er ’s and the writ ing ’s Situation (MMAPS). This heuristic allows the instructor to evaluate a work not by their own standards, but by the standards of the work itself: how successful it is in defining and meeting its creator’s and audience’s needs. Mapping these criteria against the learning outcomes defined on an individual module provides a robust marking rubric that can be adaptable to any instructor’s level of knowledge and familiarity with their students’ chosen genres, audiences, and purposes.

Resources for teaching digital fiction writing

As discussed above, I (currently) recommend Twine as a software platform for creating digital fiction, particularly for the uninitiated. Twine has numerous qualities recommending it: it is free and open source, qualities not only in keeping with Internet culture and Creative Commons, but which make it cost-effective for any classroom regardless of budget. Twine 2.0 is browser-based, which makes it absolutely platform-independent, so no matter what machines are available to instructors or students, as long as they have internet access, they will be able to run it (it also has a desktop version for those without reliable internet connections). It has extensive online tutorials and communities, enabling students to seek out instructions for functionality they want, rather than relying on instructor know-how. It is extremely simple to use in its most basic functions (passages and hyperlinks), but its JavaScript foundation presents almost unlimited possibilities for media interactivity for the more advanced (a factor in the indie games scene’s approbation of it). Further, both the working files and the output files are HTML, making them easily sharable and readable on any machine (a relief for instructors like me, who prefer one platform or OS, while having to teach on another).

Nonetheless, Twine might not be for everyone. At its core, it is a hypertext machine, and not all digital fictions must be hypertexts. Because it is so user-friendly, little to no programming is required, leaving out a very useful literacy for today’s students. Depending on instructor preferences, program and module learning outcomes, and various other factors, other platforms may be more appropriate. Twine is certainly not the only tool available or already in use in classrooms; Table 2 outlines those that are (currently) most prominent, with a few of their features and considerations Footnote 7 .

Those most commonly used in undergraduate classrooms to create digital fiction (and games) include Inform7 (Reed, 2015 ), Quest (Ballentine, 2015 ), and Adobe Animate/Flash; the latter is frequently used for wider purposes, including animation, games development, and interactive websites, as it is an industry standard. Its costs, however, and high level of skill required, not to mention its deprecation on most mobile operating systems and many Internet browsers, put it at the bottom of the list for most digital fiction scenarios. Adobe Flash was the height of technology for digital fiction in the 2000s; once Apple announced it would not be supporting Flash on its platforms, however, digital writers turned to more open platforms based on HTML/CSS/JavaScript and HTML5. So while many students aiming for careers in media development may benefit from skills on this program, as a basic tool for digital fiction it is not worth the high cost, steep learning curve, and frequently buggy functionality in university IT infrastructures.

In terms of reading lists for students, there are many options, but as yet no definitive guides for selection. The AHRC-funded Reading Digital Fiction project has published a “Resources for Readers” page ( https://readingdigitalfiction.com/resources-for-readers/ ) ( 2016 ) that offers a few suggestions for starter readings in various digital fiction forms and genres, and includes a link to a “Beginner’s Guide”. The Electronic Literature Organization maintains a three-volume collection of e-lit (also including digital poetry) accessible at http://collection.eliterature.org/ . While this collection continues to grow, it is a “mirror of a specific moment in time occurring across continents, languages, and platforms” (Boluk et al., 2016 , p. np); as such, it lends itself to browsing rather than offering an easily searchable and filterable database for selection of works. The Interactive Fiction Database ( http://ifdb.tads.org/ ), on the other hand, is just that: a database of mostly parser-based and hypertext interactive fictions (built with Inform7, TADS, and Twine), though it is open to all forms of digital fiction. It includes a tagging and review system that better enable searching and selecting items for reading lists. Its limitations are in its community: it is far more populated by those creating puzzle-based games, interactive fictions, and Twine games than other forms of digital fiction. Nonetheless it is a solid option for seeking out texts to read. Other options include lists of winners and nominees for digital fiction prizes such as the New Media Writing Prize ( http://newmediawritingprize.co.uk/ ) and the Opening Up Digital Fiction Competition ( http://openingup.wonderboxpublishing.com ). Branching further out, itch.io is a publishing site for indie games, many of which are constructed with Twine and cross boundaries between games and digital fiction, as do “walking simulator” games that are frequently published through Steam.

There is a general attitude around digital media that they are “killing” the book, or that they herald “a movement away from the traditional text-based methods of teaching and executing creative writing. The shift is unsettling for many instructors” (Clancy, 2015 , p. 165, emphasis original). Yet Donna Alvermann urges us to let go of this worry over the (perceived) loss of print culture, lest we risk short-changing the education and lives of our students ( 2009 , p. 23). Engaging in multimodal, digital creativity is just the sort of multiliteracies education we should be striving for—not the least of which is because it inevitably leads our creative writing students back to written text (Hicks, 2009 ; Clancy, 2015 ; Koehler, 2015 ) that enables continued renewal of print fiction, while also inspiring them to explore new territory and experiment with fresh techniques and perspectives.

Shifting our own pedagogical perspective to appreciate the meaning-making opportunities that have expanded beyond the page, thanks to digital media, enables a focus on design-centered narrative storytelling. It emphasizes attention to the reader and their experience, to the modes and methods of conveying meaning, and generates a naturally iterative and reflective practice. The Playable Fiction model described in this paper offers a holistic, multiliteracies approach to the creative writing workshop. It strengthens students’ communication, writing, and storytelling skills, as well as giving them a framework to deepen their creative practice. A marking scheme that centers on process rather than final artifact engenders a reflective, creative, developmental atmosphere that improves student work while relieving pressure on them to have a single high-earning performance.

These adaptations offer positive approaches to teaching creative writing, particularly given current pressures higher education instructors face. We are asked not only to engage our students in a basic learning process, to help them meet the learning outcomes of individual modules and programs, but also to earn positive feedback on module evaluations, to consistently return excellent NSS and TEF results, to maintain high levels of retention, to graduate students with competitive degree results, and to imbue our students with qualities that ensure job and career success. All the while facing higher workloads, more job insecurity, and greater pressures in other aspects of our roles. The model offered here is not a total solution to these pressures, of course, but it can alleviate some issues, such as the pressure to (sometimes artificially) inflate student marks, to offer the same level of instruction to more and more students (thus increasing time spent marking), and to better engage students in their modules—and, indeed, their own learning process.

Data availability:

All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this published article.

This paper focuses on digital fiction, as opposed to electronically published prose fiction (such as ebooks), as the creative writing practice that leads to electronically published prose fiction is not fundamentally different from that leading to printed prose fiction.

Many, however, are more than happy to post fanfiction online. It is worth noting, however, that most fanfiction is posted under anonymizing pseudonyms.

Respectively, https://eliterature.org/electronic-literature-archives/ and http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/ .

The fully validated module description can be found at https://www.bangor.ac.uk/ar/gazettes/module?gazyr=201718&module=UXS-2412&lang= .

I initially set the storygame to 1500 words; students overwhelmingly begged for more space to explore these texts, so it was rounded up to 2000. As the second assessment is a transmediation rather than a new assessment, most of those 3000 words are taken from the first assessment.

I maintain a full breakdown of my specifications grading module model, including links to sample module documents, here: http://lyleskains.blogspot.com/2018/09/my-take-on-specifications-grading-or.html .

Any list of digital technologies is obsolete almost as soon as it is composed; to produce one for a journal article is almost folly. Once this table is out of date (so…now), readers may turn to the online version I maintain for digital writers, where you may also make suggestions for additions or edits: http://wonderboxpublishing.com/news_reviews/df-resources/ .

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Short KG, Kauffman G (2000) Exploring sign systems within an inquiry system. In: Gallego MA, Hollingsworth S (eds) What counts as literacy: challenging the school standard.. Teachers College Press (Language and literacy series), New York

Skains RL et al. (2016) Gaming the composition: an ethnographic study on composing ergodic fiction. In: International Society for the Empirical Study of Literature, Chicago, 6-9 July 2016

Skains RL (2017) The materiality of the intangible: literary metaphor in multimodal texts. Convergence https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856517703965

Skinner EN, Hagood MC (2008) Developing literate identities with english language learners through digital storytelling. Read Matrix 8(2):12–38

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What can I do with a creative writing degree? (2018) Prospects.ac.uk. https://www.prospects.ac.uk/careers-advice/what-can-i-do-with-my-degree/creative-writing . Accessed 23 Sep 2018

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Acknowledgements

The research element of the Playable Fiction module was made possible, in part, by the AHRC-funded Reading Digital Fiction project (AH/K004174/1).

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Skains, R.L. Teaching digital fiction: integrating experimental writing and current technologies. Palgrave Commun 5 , 13 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-019-0223-z

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Elements of Creative Writing

J.D. Schraffenberger, University of Northern Iowa

Rachel Morgan, University of Northern Iowa

Grant Tracey, University of Northern Iowa

Copyright Year: 2023

ISBN 13: 9780915996179

Publisher: University of Northern Iowa

Language: English

Formats Available

Conditions of use.

Learn more about reviews.

Reviewed by Robert Moreira, Lecturer III, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley on 3/21/24

Unlike Starkey's CREATIVE WRITING: FOUR GENRES IN BRIEF, this textbook does not include a section on drama. read more

Comprehensiveness rating: 4 see less

Unlike Starkey's CREATIVE WRITING: FOUR GENRES IN BRIEF, this textbook does not include a section on drama.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

As far as I can tell, content is accurate, error free and unbiased.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

The book is relevant and up-to-date.

Clarity rating: 5

The text is clear and easy to understand.

Consistency rating: 5

I would agree that the text is consistent in terms of terminology and framework.

Modularity rating: 5

Text is modular, yes, but I would like to see the addition of a section on dramatic writing.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

Topics are presented in logical, clear fashion.

Interface rating: 5

Navigation is good.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

No grammatical issues that I could see.

Cultural Relevance rating: 3

I'd like to see more diverse creative writing examples.

As I stated above, textbook is good except that it does not include a section on dramatic writing.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Chapter One: One Great Way to Write a Short Story
• Chapter Two: Plotting
• Chapter Three: Counterpointed Plotting
• Chapter Four: Show and Tell
• Chapter Five: Characterization and Method Writing
• Chapter Six: Character and Dialouge
• Chapter Seven: Setting, Stillness, and Voice
• Chapter Eight: Point of View
• Chapter Nine: Learning the Unwritten Rules
• Chapter One: A Poetry State of Mind
• Chapter Two: The Architecture of a Poem
• Chapter Three: Sound
• Chapter Four: Inspiration and Risk
• Chapter Five: Endings and Beginnings
• Chapter Six: Figurative Language
• Chapter Seven: Forms, Forms, Forms
• Chapter Eight: Go to the Image
• Chapter Nine: The Difficult Simplicity of Short Poems and Killing Darlings

Creative Nonfiction

• Chapter One: Creative Nonfiction and the Essay
• Chapter Two: Truth and Memory, Truth in Memory
• Chapter Three: Research and History
• Chapter Four: Writing Environments
• Chapter Five: Notes on Style
• Chapter Seven: Imagery and the Senses
• Chapter Eight: Writing the Body
• Chapter Nine: Forms

Back Matter

• Contributors
• North American Review Staff

Ancillary Material

• University of Northern Iowa

About the Book

This free and open access textbook introduces new writers to some basic elements of the craft of creative writing in the genres of fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction. The authors—Rachel Morgan, Jeremy Schraffenberger, and Grant Tracey—are editors of the North American Review, the oldest and one of the most well-regarded literary magazines in the United States. They’ve selected nearly all of the readings and examples (more than 60) from writing that has appeared in NAR pages over the years. Because they had a hand in publishing these pieces originally, their perspective as editors permeates this book. As such, they hope that even seasoned writers might gain insight into the aesthetics of the magazine as they analyze and discuss some reasons this work is so remarkable—and therefore teachable. This project was supported by NAR staff and funded via the UNI Textbook Equity Mini-Grant Program.

About the Contributors

J.D. Schraffenberger  is a professor of English at the University of Northern Iowa. He is the author of two books of poems,  Saint Joe's Passion  and  The Waxen Poor , and co-author with Martín Espada and Lauren Schmidt of  The Necessary Poetics of Atheism . His other work has appeared in  Best of Brevity ,  Best Creative Nonfiction ,  Notre Dame Review ,  Poetry East ,  Prairie Schooner , and elsewhere.

Rachel Morgan   is an instructor of English at the University of Northern Iowa. She is the author of the chapbook  Honey & Blood , Blood & Honey . Her work is included in the anthology  Fracture: Essays, Poems, and Stories on Fracking in American  and has appeared in the  Journal of American Medical Association ,  Boulevard ,  Prairie Schooner , and elsewhere.

Grant Tracey   author of three novels in the Hayden Fuller Mysteries ; the chapbook  Winsome  featuring cab driver Eddie Sands; and the story collection  Final Stanzas , is fiction editor of the  North American Review  and an English professor at the University of Northern Iowa, where he teaches film, modern drama, and creative writing. Nominated four times for a Pushcart Prize, he has published nearly fifty short stories and three previous collections. He has acted in over forty community theater productions and has published critical work on Samuel Fuller and James Cagney. He lives in Cedar Falls, Iowa.

9 Media writing skills and characteristics

Writing for the media can be difficult, especially for beginners. Practicing the following skills will help you improve the quality of your work.

Knowledge of AP Style

Most media outlets use AP style—the style established and constantly updated by the Associated Press—as the foundation for basic news and media writing. AP style provides consistency in writing across media outlets and publications. You should purchase the latest edition of the AP stylebook and familiarize yourself with it because you will be required to write in this manner for messages intended for media outlets. The stylebook is available both online and in hard copy. In general, AP style has evolved to ensure that media writing is accurate, impartial, and clear to the audience.

Knowledge of grammar and punctuation

Audiences hold media and strategic communication professionals to a high standard when it comes to knowledge of grammar and punctuation. To assist you in learning how to write for the media, here are a few basic grammar and punctuation rules:

• Use simple sentences that follow the subject, verb, object order (example: Maria attended the press conference).
• Use active, not passive voice. Active voice helps with clarity and concise writing. (Passive voice: The press release was completed by Brian. Active voice: Brian completed the press release.)
• affect, effect
• they’re, their, there
• accept, except
• Set off modifiers (words or clauses that provide further description) The publicist, who works for Ogilvy, arrived late to the meeting.
• Separate an introductory phrase or word While studying, I listened to music.
• Before a conjunction I want to go, but I have to study.
• When writing a series of items (three or more) She bought shoes, food, and a movie.

Watch the video below of Jenny Patton, senior lecturer in the English department at The Ohio State University. She discusses common grammatical errors and tips to improve your writing.

Grammatical Errors with Jenny Patton

Ability to simplify information

As a media or strategic communication professional, you will need to synthesize and make sense of a great deal of information for your audience, often under a strict deadline. This takes strategy, good storytelling skills, and the ability to focus on the essential information. Audiences respond better to information that is presented in a logical order that supports the overall narrative.

Focus on accuracy and details

When you write for the media, you represent not only your personal brand but also the broader organization for which you’re producing content. Precise writing and transparency give newsrooms credibility; misinformation can severely diminish the integrity of the media outlet. Selecting appropriate sources and verifying information obtained from those sources, referred to as fact checking, can help minimize inaccurate writing. Accuracy also means using proper grammar and language appropriate to the audience.

Ensuring accurate reporting and writing can be challenging. Fast-paced media environments make it tremendously difficult to thoroughly gather information and fact check it in a short amount of time. For example, in 2013, during coverage of the Boston Marathon bombings, reports of five additional explosives found in the area were later found to be false. In addition, the  New York Post  ran a photo on its front page of two men that it alleged were the suspects that federal investigators were searching for at the time. The men were innocent, and while the Post  apologized for the error, the men later sued the media outlet for defamation (Wemple, 2014).

Outstanding attention to detail is necessary in order to catch errors in content, grammar, and punctuation. Taking the time to slowly review your message will save you from the consequences of misinformation or careless errors. Similarly, a big part of the writing process involves editing and revising your work, either by you or by an editor. Few writers can produce material that cannot be improved or does not need to be altered for style or content reasons.

Objectivity

Objectivity is one of the principles of journalism, according to the code of ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists (2014). Media writing should provide well-rounded analyses and stories that include all major perspectives. If you present one organization’s point of view, you should also quote one of its competitors or discuss the contrarian perspective for balance. With the exception of opinion columns and blogs, writers should not express their personal opinions on a story or event. Instead, they should write objectively, presenting the facts and leaving it up the audience to decide how to feel about the information.

Some professionals believe that objective journalism does not exist because humans are innately biased creatures (Hare, 2013). It is true that a writer’s biases can become apparent in his or her writing. However, media professionals should aspire to absolute objectivity. To achieve this, it helps to have a third party read your article or message to minimize biased writing.

Media professionals generally write for a large, mainstream audience. Clear and concise writing makes it easier for a wide variety of groups to understand the core message. Complex sentence structures and jargon that you might find in traditional academic writing are not appropriate for diverse populations. Use simple sentences to get your point across.

Writing for Strategic Communication Industries Copyright © 2016 by Jasmine Roberts is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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2.4: Media writing skills and characteristics

• Last updated
• Save as PDF
• Page ID 25124

• Jasmine Roberts
• The Ohio State University

Writing for the media can be difficult, especially for beginners. Practicing the following skills will help you improve the quality of your work.

Knowledge of AP Style

Most media outlets use AP style—the style established and constantly updated by the Associated Press—as the foundation for basic news and media writing. AP style provides consistency in writing across media outlets and publications. You should purchase the latest edition of the AP stylebook and familiarize yourself with it because you will be required to write in this manner for messages intended for media outlets. The stylebook is available both online and in hard copy. In general, AP style has evolved to ensure that media writing is accurate, impartial, and clear to the audience.

Knowledge of grammar and punctuation

Audiences hold media and strategic communication professionals to a high standard when it comes to knowledge of grammar and punctuation. To assist you in learning how to write for the media, here are a few basic grammar and punctuation rules:

• Use simple sentences that follow the subject, verb, object order (example: Maria attended the press conference).
• Use active, not passive voice. Active voice helps with clarity and concise writing. (Passive voice: The press release was completed by Brian. Active voice: Brian completed the press release.)
• affect, effect
• its, it’s
• they’re, their, there
• accept, except
• Set off modifiers (words or clauses that provide further description) The publicist, who works for Ogilvy, arrived late to the meeting.
• Separate an introductory phrase or word While studying, I listened to music.
• Before a conjunction I want to go, but I have to study.
• When writing a series of items (three or more) She bought shoes, food, and a movie.

Watch the video below of Jenny Patton, senior lecturer in the English department at The Ohio State University. She discusses common grammatical errors and tips to improve your writing.

Grammatical Errors with Jenny Patton

Ability to simplify information

As a media or strategic communication professional, you will need to synthesize and make sense of a great deal of information for your audience, often under a strict deadline. This takes strategy, good storytelling skills, and the ability to focus on the essential information. Audiences respond better to information that is presented in a logical order that supports the overall narrative.

Focus on accuracy and details

When you write for the media, you represent not only your personal brand but also the broader organization for which you’re producing content. Precise writing and transparency give newsrooms credibility; misinformation can severely diminish the integrity of the media outlet. Selecting appropriate sources and verifying information obtained from those sources, referred to as fact checking, can help minimize inaccurate writing. Accuracy also means using proper grammar and language appropriate to the audience.

Ensuring accurate reporting and writing can be challenging. Fast-paced media environments make it tremendously difficult to thoroughly gather information and fact check it in a short amount of time. For example, in 2013, during coverage of the Boston Marathon bombings, reports of five additional explosives found in the area were later found to be false. In addition, the New York Post ran a photo on its front page of two men that it alleged were the suspects that federal investigators were searching for at the time. The men were innocent, and while the Post apologized for the error, the men later sued the media outlet for defamation (Wemple, 2014).

Outstanding attention to detail is necessary in order to catch errors in content, grammar, and punctuation. Taking the time to slowly review your message will save you from the consequences of misinformation or careless errors. Similarly, a big part of the writing process involves editing and revising your work, either by you or by an editor. Few writers can produce material that cannot be improved or does not need to be altered for style or content reasons.

Objectivity

Objectivity is one of the principles of journalism, according to the code of ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists (2014). Media writing should provide well-rounded analyses and stories that include all major perspectives. If you present one organization’s point of view, you should also quote one of its competitors or discuss the contrarian perspective for balance. With the exception of opinion columns and blogs, writers should not express their personal opinions on a story or event. Instead, they should write objectively, presenting the facts and leaving it up the audience to decide how to feel about the information.

Some professionals believe that objective journalism does not exist because humans are innately biased creatures (Hare, 2013). It is true that a writer’s biases can become apparent in his or her writing. However, media professionals should aspire to absolute objectivity. To achieve this, it helps to have a third party read your article or message to minimize biased writing.

Media professionals generally write for a large, mainstream audience. Clear and concise writing makes it easier for a wide variety of groups to understand the core message. Complex sentence structures and jargon that you might find in traditional academic writing are not appropriate for diverse populations. Use simple sentences to get your point across.

Writing for Social Media in 2024: Tips and Tools

Writing for social media takes talent, creativity, focus, and a deep understanding of your audience. Here are a few tips to help you get started.

Writing for social media: 7 tips for 2024

Writing for social media is not an easy job. 

You work with strict character limits and tight turnarounds. You speak the language of memes and microtrends that your boss and coworkers might not understand. You have to quickly — and wittily — react to trending topics. And, if you ever publish a post with a typo, people will notice and call you out. (Looking at you, Twitter meanies.)

But it’s also fun and rewarding. Great content can help you start inspiring conversations, build engaged communities, create buzz around your brand, and even directly influence sales.

Keep reading for expert tips and tools that will help you become a more confident and effective social media writer in no time .

OwlyWriter AI instantly generates captions and content ideas for every social media network. It’s seriously easy.

What is social media content writing?

Social media content writing is the process of writing content for social media audiences, usually across multiple major social media platforms . It can include writing short captions for TikTok or Instagram Reels, long-form LinkedIn articles, and everything in between. 

Writing for social media is different from writing for blogs and websites — it requires expert knowledge of social platforms and their audiences, trends, and inside jokes. 

Social media writing is a crucial element of any brand’s social presence. It can make or break a campaign or your entire social media marketing strategy. When done right, social writing directly influences engagement and conversions, and contributes to strategic business goals.

7 social media writing tips for 2024

The tips below will help you create content that will inspire your target audience to interact with you, take action, or simply spend a few seconds contemplating what they just read. 

Try some (or all) of these in your next 10 social media posts to build good habits and strengthen your writing muscle. You’ll be amazed at how clear you’ll write, and how you’ll zero in on your voice.

Bonus: Download The Wheel of Copy , a free visual guide to crafting persuasive headlines, emails, ads and calls to action . Save time and write copy that sells!

1. Just start writing (you’ll edit later)

Writer’s block is real, but there’s an easy way to blast past it: Just start writing without overthinking it. 

Start typing whatever comes to mind and forget about sentence structure, spelling, and punctuation (for a moment). Just keep your fingers moving and power through any blockages. Editing will come later. 

This is how John Swartzwelder, legendary Simpsons writer, wrote scripts for the show : 

“Since writing is very hard and rewriting is comparatively easy and rather fun, I always write my scripts all the way through as fast as I can, the first day, if possible, putting in crap jokes and pattern dialogue […]. Then the next day, when I get up, the script’s been written. It’s lousy, but it’s a script. The hard part is done. It’s like a crappy little elf has snuck into my office and badly done all my work for me, and then left with a tip of his crappy hat. All I have to do from that point on is fix it.”

2. Speak the language of social media

This, of course, means different things on different platforms.

Eileen Kwok, Social Marketing Coordinator at Hootsuite thinks it’s absolutely crucial to “have a good understanding of what language speaks to your target audience. Every channel serves a different purpose, so the copy needs to vary.”

Wondering what that looks like, exactly, on Hootsuite’s own social media channels? “LinkedIn, for example, is a space for working professionals, so we prioritize educational and thought leadership content on the platform. Our audience on TikTok is more casual, so we give them videos that speak to the fun and authentic side of our brand.”

But this advice goes beyond picking the right content categories and post types for each network. It really comes down to the language you use. 

Eileen says: “On most channels, you’ll want to spell-check everything and make sure you’re grammatically correct — but those rules don’t apply for TikTok. Having words in all caps for dramatic effect, using emojis instead of words, and even the misspelling of words all serves the playful nature of the app.”

You can go ahead and show this to your boss the next time they don’t want to approve a TikTok caption mentioning Dula Peep or using absolutely no punctuation.

3. Make your posts accessible 

As a social media writer, you should make sure that everyone in your audience can enjoy your posts.

Nick Martin, Social Listening and Engagement Strategist at Hootsuite told me: “When writing for social media, accessibility is something you should be keeping in mind. Some of your followers may use screen-readers, and a post that is full of emojis would be nearly unreadable for them.”

Unintelligible posts won’t help you reach your social media goals. In fact, they might turn people away from your brand altogether. 

“The same goes for when you share an image that has text on it,” Nick adds. “You’ll want to make sure you write alt-text for that image so all of your audience can enjoy it.” 

Here’s a great example of how you can have fun writing creative and entertaining alt-text for your social post’s accompanying images:

Self-care routines and bear encounters both start with setting boundaries pic.twitter.com/reul7uausI — Washington State Dept. of Natural Resources (@waDNR) September 20, 2022

4. Keep it simple

Imagine you’re writing to an 8th grader. Like, actually .

This is a simple but super effective exercise that will force you to write clearly and ditch any unnecessary jargon that would likely only confuse your readers.

“Drive innovation.”

“Become a disruptor.”

LinkedIn, in particular, is home to some of the most over-used, under-effective statements of all time. And sure, it’s a “businessy” social media channel. But business people are, well, people too. And people respond well to succinct, clear copy — not overused buzzwords with little to no real meaning behind them.

To connect with your audience, you have to speak a language they understand. Say something real. Use plain language and short sentences. Practice on your niece, mom, or friend, and see if they get your message.

5. Write to the reader

Your social media audience isn’t dying to find out what your company is up to or what’s important to you (unless it’s super relevant). They want to know what’s in it for them. That’s why you should always write from the readers’ perspective. Make them the hero.

So, instead of posting a boring list of features that have just been added to your product, tell your audience how their life will improve if they use it.

Sometimes, “standing out” is nothing more than writing from the reader’s point of view — because most of your competitors don’t.

6. Have a clear purpose

… and write that purpose down at the top of your draft to keep your mind on the target while you write.

What action do you want the reader to take? Do you want them to leave a comment or click through to your website? Whatever it is, make it clear in a CTA (call to action). 

Note that a CTA doesn’t have to be a button or any other super explicit, easily identifiable element within your post. It can be as simple as an engaging question within your caption, or a sentence telling your audience why they should click on the link in your bio. 

7. Use (the right) pictures to enhance your words

This one speaks for itself. (One image is worth a thousand words, anyone?)

We’ve already talked about the importance of adding alt-text to images for accessibility, but the images you pick are very important. 

Some networks rely on words more than they do on images and videos. But whenever possible (and relevant), you should try to include visuals in your posts — they’re much more effective at grabbing the attention of scrollers than words. And without that attention, your words won’t get a chance to shine. 

Everything you need to make engaging content. AI support for captions, an AI hashtag generator, and access to Canva in Hootsuite.

3 writing tools for social media

1. hootsuite’s owlywriter ai.

Good for: Generating social media posts and ideas, repurposing web content, and filling up your social media calendar faster.

Cost: Included in Hootsuite Pro plans and higher 

Did you know that Hootsuite comes with OwlyWriter AI, a built-in creative AI tool that saves social media pros hours of work?

You can use OwlyWriter to:

• Write a new social media caption in a specific tone, based on a prompt
• Write a post based on a link (e.g. a blog post or a product page)
• Generate post ideas based on a keyword or topic (and then write posts expanding on the idea you like best)
• Identify and repurpose your top-performing posts
• Create relevant captions for upcoming holidays

To get started with OwlyWriter, sign in to your Hootsuite account and head to the Inspiration section of the dashboard. Then, pick the type of AI magic you want to see in action.

For example, if you’re not sure what to post, click on Get inspired . Then, type in the general, high-level topic you want to address and click Get ideas .

Start your free 30-day trial

OwlyWriter will generate a list of post ideas related to the topic: 

Click on the one you like best to move to the next step — captions and hashtags.

Pick the caption you like and click Create post . The caption will open in Hootsuite Composer, where you can make edits, add media files and links, check the copy against your compliance guidelines — and schedule your post to go live later.

And that’s it! OwlyWriter never runs out of ideas, so you can repeat this process until your social media calendar is full — and sit back to watch your engagement grow.

2. Hemingway app

Good for: Writing anything succinctly and clearly.

Cost: Free in your browser, one-time $19.99 payment for the desktop app.

The Hemingway app will make you a better, more engaging writer. It flags over-complicated words and phrases, long sentences, unnecessary adverbs, passive voice, and so much more. It also gives you a readability score. 

Pro tip: On the Hootsuite editorial team, we always aim for grade 6 readability. Some topics are simply a bit complicated, so stay flexible and don’t beat yourself up if you’re not always able to reach this benchmark — but it’s a good score to shoot for.

Here’s how it works:

• Write your copy.
• Paste it into Hemingway’s online editor .
• Visually see what works and what doesn’t.
• Make your changes.
• Watch your score improve!

Good for: Distraction-free writing.

Cost: Free.

There’s plenty of clutter in life. ZenPen is one small corner of the distraction-free-universe to help you write without outside interference.

• Go to zenpen.io .
• Start writing posts for social.
• Enjoy the noise-free editor until you’re done.

Compose, schedule, and publish your expertly written posts to all the major social media channels from one dashboard using Hootsuite. Try it free today.

Get Started

Save time and grow faster with OwlyWriter AI, the tool that instantly generates social media captions and content ideas .

Become a better social marketer.

Get expert social media advice delivered straight to your inbox.

Karolina Mikolajczyk is a Senior Inbound Marketing Strategist and associate editor of the Hootsuite blog. After completing her Master’s degree in English, Karolina launched her marketing career in 2014. Before joining Hootsuite in 2021, she worked with digital marketing agencies, SaaS startups, and international corporations, helping businesses and social media content creators grow their online presence and improve conversions through SEO and content marketing strategies.

Nick has over ten years of social media marketing experience, working with brands large and small alike. If you've had a conversation with Hootsuite on social media over the past six years, there's a good chance you've been talking to Nick. His social listening and data analysis projects have been used in major publications such as Forbes, Adweek, the Washington Post, and the New York Times. His work even accurately predicted the outcome of the 2020 US presidential election. When Nick isn't engaging online on behalf of the brand or running his social listening projects, he helps coach teams across the organization in the art of social selling and personal branding. Follow Nick on Twitter at @AtNickMartin.

Eileen is a skilled social media strategist and multi-faceted content creator, with over 4+ years of experience in the marketing space. She helps brands find their unique voice online and turn their stories into powerful content.

She currently works as a social marketer at Hootsuite where she builds social media campaign strategies, does influencer outreach, identifies upcoming trends, and creates viral-worthy content.

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University of Missouri-Kansas city

School of Humanities and Social Sciences Department of English

Department of english, master of fine arts - creative writing and media arts.

In our MFA in Creative Writing and Media Arts program, you will discover and master the art of creative writing through intensive workshops and literature and craft classes. With award-winning faculty, nationally recognized visiting writers and partnerships with literary magazines and community organizations, our program promotes lifelong learning and community engagement.

Emphasis areas

• Creative nonfiction
• Playwriting
• Screenwriting

Meet the Creative Writing Faculty

Hadara Bar-Nadav

Mitch brian.

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Application Requirements

• a B.A. in English is recommended, but not required

Application deadline

• January 15 for admission the following fall semester

Provide this information with your application

• Academic information, including institutions attended, degrees earned, GPA, foreign language experience, honors and awards and relevant work experience
• Writing sample that demonstrates your writing abilities. Six to 10 pages for poetry and no more than 30 pages for fiction, creative nonfiction, playwriting and screenwriting
• Statement of purpose   that describes your academic and professional objectives. In a 500- to 600-word essay, discuss in detail your interest in your emphasis area and your experience and goals in the area
• Email addresses for three references who can evaluate your readiness for graduate study
• Mail: UMKC Office of Admissions Administrative Center 5115 Oak St., Room 120  Kansas City, MO 64112
• Via secured email to:  [email protected]  
• Graduate Teaching Assistantship application materials, if applying, including a 250- to 500-word teaching statement addressing your interest in and qualifications for teaching and an academic writing sample from an upper-level college course

Allow enough time for all of the materials to arrive by the deadline. 

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Writing Majors, Minor, Concentration

The Program in Writing offers introductory writing as well as advanced coursework in the areas of Creative Writing, Nonfiction Writing, and Science Writing.

Students with questions about the Writing majors, how to declare a major, or how its requirements can be fulfilled, should make an appointment with any of following individuals.

http://catalog.mit.edu/degree-charts/writing-course-21w/

Choose at least two subjects in the major that are designated as communication-intensive (CI-M) to fulfill the Communication Requirement.

Take two required subjects

Take one of the following subjects, and select nine subjects, one of which is normally introductory, that form a cohesive unit. up to six subjects may also count toward the institute hass requirement., joint degree programs in writing.

Humanities and Engineering (21E) degree and Humanities and Science (21S) degree : Joint degree programs are offered in Writing in combination with a field in engineering or science (the 21E and 21S degrees). Students completing a joint degree are required to complete 7 Writing subjects (with a focus on creative, science or nonfiction writing), a Writing Pre-thesis and Thesis, and 6 subjects in an engineering or science major.

Minor in Writing

The Minor in Writing consists of six subjects focusing on one of the three areas mentioned above, arranged into two tiers of study as follows:

Take one subject from the following

Five subjects from among the remaining writing subjects.

Concentration in Writing

The Concentration in Writing consists of four subjects chosen in consultation with the Concentration Advisor.  Ordinarily, of these four, no more than one will be at the introductory level (21W.0xx). In addition, of the four, three will form a coherent group within one of the major categories of the curriculum.

A student may choose to go beyond the Concentration requirement, and build a Minor in the field. It is not then necessary to complete a separate Concentration, but the student must still fill out the Concentration Proposal and Completion forms.

You may see a list of Writing subjects offered this semester here: cmsw.mit.edu/education/subject-lists/writing/ and a full list of subjects in the Writing program here: student.mit.edu/catalog/m21Wa.html .

Apr. 22, 2024

Empowering voices: the future of creative writing at rice university.

Creative writing transcends conventional academic boundaries, serving as both a discipline and a practice that invites diverse perspectives and influences. According to Ian Schimmel, associate teaching professor of English at Rice University, creative writing is characterized by its openness to exploration and expression.

“It does not define the scope of what a thought project should be,” Schimmel said, adding that creative writing encompasses a wide range of forms and styles, from traditional genres like fiction, poetry, nonfiction and drama to emerging mediums that shape contemporary discourse. “It’s very permeable to other parts of the university that want to participate in it.”

Extending beyond mere poetic imagery or storytelling, creative writing delves into the depths of human experience, capturing the rhythm, themes and pauses that define individual narratives.

“We’re all an amalgamation of stories,” said Kiese Laymon, the Libbie Shearn Moody Professor of English. “The rigor of having to explore your imagination and memory with these tools we have is hard work. We try to make it enjoyable work, but it’s definitely hard work.”

Creative writing plays a pivotal role in understanding and interpreting societal narratives, Schimmel pointed out, highlighting the significance of studying hybrid forms that blend elements of journalism, memoir and personal reflection, reflecting the multifaceted nature of contemporary storytelling.

“I prefer the term ‘imaginative writing’ or ‘public writing,’” said Justin Cronin, writer-in-residence in English. “‘Creative writing’ pays less attention to the idea that this is a discipline. It really is a very particular kind of discipline that you need to learn to do.”

At its core, creative writing is about having something to say — a point of view or an urgency that compels expression.

“We are equipping students with the tools to say what they feel is most important and urgent,” Schimmel said. “That’s where the fulfillment comes from.”

For Cronin, teaching creative writing is a dynamic process of self-discovery and exploration.

“Anyone who teaches creative writing is teaching themselves, full stop,” Cronin said. “We are doing both all the time.”

He emphasized the interdisciplinary nature of the discipline, drawing connections between literature, film and societal trends. Cronin’s spring 2024 course titled “The End of the World as We Know It: Writing (and Reading) Apocalypse” exemplifies this interdisciplinary approach, blending literary analysis with creative expression to explore existential themes.

“There is a lot to learn about craft, about how to make a good sentence, how essays really work, how stories or novels work,” Cronin said. “But then there are also the broader questions: Why do we do this? Where does it come from, and where does it go?”

‘It feels like home’

It’s worth reflecting on the latter question in relation to Rice’s creative writing program. Of the current faculty, Cronin has the longest institutional knowledge. He came to Rice in 2003, effectively doubling the program’s full-time faculty.

“It was just me teaching fiction and one poetry professor,” Cronin said. “That was creative writing in 2003.”

A couple of years later when he sold a partial manuscript of what evolved into his trilogy “The Passage,” Cronin stepped down from his full-time teaching role to focus on the series.

Schimmel later joined Rice during a two-year fellowship starting in 2011. After his first year, the two other creative writing faculty members retired.

“I was one of only one or two other people teaching creative writing at Rice in 2012,” Schimmel said.

Associate professor Amber Dermont joined the faculty followed by assistant professor Paul Otremba then Lacy Johnson in 2016, which is when Cronin returned to teach at Rice.

“We made a strategic plan that involved investing in creative writing, trying to make Rice the best undergraduate creative writing program in the country,” said Lacy Johnson, associate professor of creative writing and director of undergraduate studies in English. “We proposed hiring a few more writers so that we could continue to grow.”

And they did, adding Laymon, professor in the practice Andrea Bajani, assistant professor Bryan Washington and associate professor Tomás Q. Morín.

“When I saw the job posting at Rice, every writer I knew was applying for the job,” Morín said. “Every writer I knew wanted to work at Rice because it was a dream job.”

Morin said his desire to join the faculty only grew after visiting the campus during the interview process when he got to meet the people he’d be working with and the students he’d be teaching.

“I felt like this job could be my last stop in terms of my academic career,” Morín said. “This is a place where I could retire. Once I actually did start teaching here, all of that was affirmed. I don’t want to ever teach anywhere else again. This doesn’t feel like a job. It feels like home.”

“With Lacy Johnson, Ian Schimmel, Kiese Laymon, Bryan Washington, Tomás Morín, Amber Dermont, Andrea Bajani and Justin Cronin, Rice boasts some of the most significant writers in the United States,” said Kathleen Canning, dean of the School of Humanities, in sharing her assessment of the creative writing faculty she calls “amazing.”

“Spectacular” is the word Cronin choses to describe his colleagues.

“The amount of raw achievement in so many areas is unparalleled,” Cronin said, pointing to Laymon’s selection as a MacArthur Fellow and Johnson’s creation of the Houston Flood Museum. “We have short story writers, essayists, novelists, poets, screenwriters. We have it all.”

Laymon, who started teaching at Rice in January 2022, expressed that he’s been impressed by how dynamic and thoughtful his colleagues are.

“Our ability to work together is one of the reasons why the creative writing program is growing at such an incredible rate,” Laymon said.

"The learning and the doing"

The program’s not growing just in terms of faculty; the academic powerhouse has captured the imagination and enthusiasm of students, sparking a surge of interest that far exceeds available capacity. Most creative writing classes have waitlists at least 20 students deep, while the waitlists for intro workshops are closer to 75.

“I’ve never worked anywhere where there was such a tremendous curiosity, passion and interest in creative writing at the undergraduate level,” Morín said.

“The desire on the part of these students to use creativity to explore critically and intellectually, I’ve never seen anything like this in my life,” Laymon said, adding that he believes the interest is connected to the strength of the faculty. “You don’t find creative writing programs with any sort of growth unless the students are being taught well.”

Laymon suggested the program’s success also lies in its ability to attract students from diverse disciplines, including computer science, biology and engineering.

“There is such a hunger on our campus to make things and to take what you learned in the classroom and apply it,” Schimmel said. “There’s often a gulf between the theoretical and the practical in an education setting. What’s powerful about creative writing, and the arts in general, is the connectivity between the learning and the doing.”

Faculty members say they appreciate the diverse perspectives and interdisciplinary collaborations that emerge from such a dynamic student body.

“There are so many different kinds of expertise for students to use Rice and Houston as a laboratory to think about the issues that are facing us today,” Johnson said. “Thinking about climate, about science, about community, about culture, where better than Houston to come to learn to write about those things?”

"Experimenting with words"

The creative writing program is a catalyst for that exploration and discovery, empowering students to engage with a myriad of topics and formats while honing their skills as storytellers.

For example, on the nonfiction side, Laymon’s spring 2024 course titled "Verses/Versus: Miseducation of Lauryn Hill v. good kid m.A.A.d. city (or 1998 vs. 2012)” allows students to reflect on how music influences their lives, whether through personal experiences or the albums discussed in class. “Nonfiction Nature Writing,” taught by Johnson, merges writing and environmental philosophy.

“We’re giving consideration to the ways that we think about and talk about the environment as well as practicing writing about our relationship to the environment,” Johnson said. “Students often come to that class from the sciences. I have a lot of students from environmental sciences, geology, physics, ecology and evolutionary biology.”

The class is a different application of science, Johnson added, explaining that it provides students an opportunity to apply and translate what they’ve learned in their other classes in creative ways.

Schimmel, meanwhile, teaches podcasting courses, challenging students to report on stories beyond the hedges of Rice. By interviewing real-life characters and crafting compelling narratives, students gain valuable storytelling skills while exploring the power of audio storytelling.

“We deconstruct the narrative structures of radio storytelling to understand how a large amount of material can be condensed into something that is manageable, enjoyable and informative for an audience,” Schimmel said.

Central to the creative writing experience at Rice is the workshop. Through peer critique and experimentation, students refine their writing and gain insights into audience engagement and narrative structure.

“A workshop environment helps you compare your intentions with the realities of your audience,” Schimmel said. “It pulls you out of yourself. It makes you conscious of how form and technique affect your reader’s desire to interact with your work.”

Laymon underscored the importance of experimentation in creative writing. By encouraging students to explore literary traditions and experiment with language, the program fosters a culture of innovation and self-expression.

“We all have these 26 letters. How do we create a story with them?” Laymon said. “We need young people out there experimenting with words and to be encouraged to do that.”

"A unique opportunity"

As Rice’s creative writing program has evolved, its faculty have remained dedicated to fostering a culture of creativity, expression and intellectual inquiry, shaping the next generation of writers and thinkers.

“One of our goals is to broaden the public’s understanding of what creative writing is and how it can serve as a public utility for all,” Schimmel said.

The next step for the program, according to Cronin, is to elevate from a strong program to a national leader in undergraduate creative writing education.

“We want to be the best undergraduate creative writing program in the country, which means students come to Rice specifically for that,” Cronin said. “We want to build the kind of program that people deliberately seek out. Students apply to a university for a thing, and we want to be that thing.”

Faculty members are exploring the possibility of establishing a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in creative writing, which reflects the program’s commitment to furthering its impact and engaging with a broader community of writers.

“There’s a lot of interest,” Johnson said. “We have a really unique opportunity at Rice to build something from scratch.”

“That feels incredibly exciting to me,” Morín said, explaining that the goal is to create a program that addresses the shortcomings of the traditional MFA model while offering a fresh and dynamic approach. “It gives me a lot of energy, because as a group, we can offer the kind of experience that a graduate student in creative writing can’t find anywhere else.”

For more information about Rice’s creative writing program, click here .

• Our Mission

Setting Up a Student Media Program in Your School

High school students can benefit from learning how to create different media in a responsible way.

Given its ubiquitous nature, media plays a pivotal role in the day-to-day education of students. Media consumption by teens has been linked to declining mental health , raising the need for us to empower students as critical media consumers.

Jeremy Murphy, a multimedia teacher at San Jacinto High School, in San Jacinto, California, notes, “Students are constantly exposed to media messaging on all platforms, so understanding the decisions, processes, and ethical guidelines for effective media development can make them more discerning media consumers.” 

Moreover, let’s empower them to create meaningful, relevant media that tells their stories in positive ways. Beyond using media as texts or embedding media-making tasks , classrooms and schools can embrace student-led media programs. Doing so equips students with marketable, real-world skills for their future while helping them build critical thinking and media resilience skills today.      

Why Student-Led Media

David Gamberg, former superintendent of Southold and Greenport Schools in New York, says that while student TV broadcasting certainly gives students a voice in their high school, it does “so much more in the way of storytelling, digital citizenship, and even the civic engagement of any school community.”

The authentic skills that media courses build cannot be replicated in other classes, in part because media is meant to be shared. And when students know their work will be shared as part of the course objectives, the authentic audience infuses the project with more relevance: Real people—not just a teacher—will see this. It has to be good. Murphy explains that “by design, media courses require students to create products for public consumption. These are not just assignments that will only be seen by the teacher, but creative products that will be made available for public viewing. Publishing student media products requires students to approach projects responsibly and consider their audience during the development process.”  

Gamberg and Murphy both observe that student-led media encourages collaboration with the campus and local community, telling the stories of students, clubs, and other school organizations. Murphy expanded on this point, noting that student media teams may also “live stream athletic events and co-curricular activities, practicing all skills required of live broadcast event coverage” and allowing people in the community who cannot physically attend events to participate. 

How to get started

While creating a media course used to be a journey into expensive cameras and elite training, resources abound to help nearly anyone launch a media course or unit. With as little as a cell phone, you can support students in their quest to tell their stories and connect with relevant, meaningful content. 

A veteran of teaching media who has launched several student-led media programs, Murphy explains that more than money, you need “a group of students who are invested in starting a professional-level program. With a dedicated group of students, an effective media program can be established with little startup costs.” Many students have devices with high-quality video and audio, allowing anyone to capture pictures, audio, and video. 

Local and national media organizations provide primers and support to help any teacher—even those with little to no experience—support student media. PBS’s Student Reporting Labs hosts Storymaker , replete with how-tos, lesson plans, and advice for starting a media program. These tools allow any teacher to embed media-focused project-based learning into their curriculum or create a full media course from the ground up, no matter their personal level of expertise

Tap into existing school sites and social media accounts to share student-created content. Free sites such as Adobe Creative Cloud, YouTube, and Weebly also allow groups to post their media and share with their community.

While students are digital natives, they may be naive about digital citizenship. “The most important step is to help students navigate the ethical guidelines and legal responsibilities of media development,” Murphy says. “Once they have a good understanding of their media group mission, students can start telling the awesome stories around their campus and sharing those stories with the community.”  

Authentic Tasks, Authentic Feedback

The relevance of making media is matched by the authenticity of feedback that students receive on their work. “Since student products are available for public consumption,” Murphy says, “they will usually receive feedback on some of their projects during the course of the school year. The positive feedback is saved and shared with the whole group to help reinforce the validity of their student media program.” 

Since one goal of student media programs is creating authentic engagement, criticism and positive or negative feedback provide real-world opportunities to reflect on the work: Is the praise or criticism warranted? Why or why not? Is the criticism or praise specific? Does the feedback provide actionable changes or growth we can incorporate in the future? What makes the piece resonate (or not) with the audience? Overall, what type of feedback are we receiving? What pieces garner the most comments? The most positivity? The most negativity? Why?

Media organizations also offer opportunities for students to compete for recognition and air time. Student Reporting Labs airs student submissions on the PBS NewsHour ; NPR hosts an annual podcasting challenge ; and numerous local and regional student broadcasting competitions help honor and celebrate student media makers.

Broadcast Awards for Senior High ( BASH ) gathers submissions from student news broadcasts and provides feedback from media experts. Hosted by Hofstra University, BASH not only celebrates student work in multiple categories, but provides educators with training and support. For those without a broadcast course, the Student Television Network Challenge engages students in a weeklong challenge to produce content. 

Some takeaways

Reading and creating media are fundamental life skills that help students think and analyze information critically. Murphy has seen the power of media in his students: “Throughout their involvement in a student media program, students learn the value of storytelling, accurate reporting, clear messaging, and audience engagement.”

Former Superintendent Gamberg agrees: “Media programs are wonderful opportunities to give students the chance to learn hands-on in a real, authentic way. It’s consequential. It’s impactful. It gives them the chance to do something that’s meaningful to them.”

Students are awash in media, and AI promises to make the media landscape more difficult to traverse. We can let students drift and fend for themselves, or we can equip them with skills and teach them how to read and create media. We can give them the skills to discern and discriminate media and provide positive outlets for them to connect to their community. We can honor their stories and elevate their voices. Given the wealth of free resources and support systems available to all educators, the time to dive in and make media-making happen is now. 

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‘wednesday’ adds thandiwe newton to season 2 cast.

• ‘Baby Reindeer’ Star Jessica Gunning Talks Mastering Accents & Her Debut Writing Credit On ‘The Outlaws’

By Max Goldbart

Max Goldbart

International TV Co-Editor

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Baby Reindeer star Jessica Gunning has been generating headlines aplenty for her creepy turn as Martha in Netflix’s stalking thriller series, but she’s imminently set to return to screens on both sides of the pond in the third season of the BBC /Amazon’s The Outlaws .

Gunning talked the Creative Cities Convention through her role as community services officer Diane in Stephen Merchant ‘s hit dramedy.

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“I love working with Stephen and he does let us add bits [of writing] here and there,” she said. “I was lucky enough to be in the writers room for Season 3 and I learned so much behind the scenes. I was honored to be a part of that.”

In Season 3, Gunning’s character returns with new sidekick Stan, played by Ten Percent’s Harry Trevaldwyn, who Diane is training up while doing a night class in criminology.

Gunning’s role as Martha in Netflix chart-topper Baby Reindeer about comedian Richard Gadd’s real-life experience of being stalked has dominated the cultural zeitgeist over the past few days. Gunning has garnered plaudits aplenty for her performance including her Scottish accent, and the Pride and Back star detailed today how she has mastered a strong Bristol accent in The Outlaws, which is set in the English city in the south west.

“I work with an accent coach and try and do as much work as I can,” she said. “And it’s amazing having so many crew from Bristol, so I would ask them, ‘How do you say this?’ or, ‘How do you say that?’.”

When she was first given scripts to The Outlaws several years ago, Gunning said she had thought it was a straight drama and had performed her audition in this vein.

“I said, ‘Oh, I wasn’t trying to be funny’ and the people auditioning me were in fits,” she added. “The way Stephen writes his comedic voice is so familiar to me and I knew what he wanted from [the character].”

Gunning was joined on stage by fellow Outlaws cast members along with EP Kenton Allen, who runs Big Talk Studios.

‘The Offenders’ in LA

The show swiftly moved to Bristol, drawing on The Office co-creator Merchant’s experience, before picking up a big financial contribution from Amazon, which allowed for the casting of the likes of Christopher Walken .

Allen said the city of Bristol, which is playing host to the Creative Cities Convention this year, “had not really been filmed contemporarily in drama for a long time.”

“ Bridgerton is shot here but there are lots of amazing locations, stories and characters so that was part of the sell,” he added. “And the BBC likes to spread its tentacles far and wide to represent different parts of the country.”

Allen scotched the notion that the cast’s strong Bristolian accents bemuse U.S. viewers, pointing out that global audiences are “becoming more used to leaning into the specifics of a story” and that subtitles are more commonly used in the streaming era.

The Outlaws team were speaking at the Creative Cities Convention after a talk from Mr Bates vs the Post Office director James Strong.

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