Interdepartmental 290 - Lakes Writing Workshop: Writing for Change: Community Engagement, Activism and Social Justice

Same as ENG 291. An intermediate-level workshop in which writers develop their skills through intensive reading, writing, revising, and critique. Topic changes annually. Emphasis on narrative writing, broadly defined to include a variety of genres, depending on the interests of the current holder of the Lakes writing residency. Enrollment limited to 12: This interdisciplinary course explores community-engaged scholarship connecting marginalized communities with academics to jointly address our world's complex social problems. We consider the moral and other key psychosocial issues, tensions, and possibilities arising from these research, practice, and advocacy encounters. We will read works by community psychologists and other scientists, philosophers, and scholars across fields of study. Foregrounding voices of environmental justice, Indigenous, disability, and other activists, we will grapple with questions of power, justice, expertise, alliance-building, and social transformation. Students will write weekly reflections and develop a position statement making the case for a justice-centered ethic in 21st-century community engagement. (E)