Critical Reading and Writing

This is a course in advanced composition and rhetoric, in which students will develop skills in complex critical analysis and interpretation by analyzing and evaluating materials from a variety of discourses or genres, including visual, online, and print; developing and writing essays, including critiques and research papers; applying and discussing principles of rhetoric and critical theory; examining and using methods of interpretation and analysis from the humanities and social sciences; evaluating the credibility of primary and secondary sources, including as it applies to media literacy, and for the purposes of academic research; situating discourses within their historical context and relevant to rhetorical theories of different periods (for example, Aristotle in the ancient world and Bakhtin in the twentieth century).

The course format will include lecture, discussion, and both individual and group activities.