57145 Critical Writing
UTS: Communication: Creative PracticeCredit points: 8 cp
Result Type: Grade, no marks
Requisite(s): 57041 Advanced Narrative Writing OR 57031 Non-fiction Writing OR 57142 Writing for the Screen OR 50359 Screenwriting OR 50309 Advanced Screenwriting
These requisites may not apply to students in certain courses.
There are also course requisites for this subject. See access conditions.
Handbook description
This subject addresses the theoretical and practical aspects of critical writing in the key creative and professional genres: literary journalism, essay writing, reviewing (particularly book reviewing) and literary criticism. Students are introduced to examples of critical writing in magazines and journals as well as in the major newspapers, and are encouraged to engage with the nature of informed critical reading in relation to contemporary writing.
The subject aims to increase understanding of how appropriate critical writing responds to significant literary issues, and how it may usefully contribute to debate over these issues.
This subject includes examination of significant literary or cultural topics, focusing on specific texts or authors and the writing of a profile, essay or review article demonstrating an understanding of and engagement with the institutional, publishing and media context in which critical writing is produced.
Subject objectives/outcomes
At the end of this subject students will be able to:
- appreciate the requirements of critical writing for different contexts
- compose book and/or film reviews for a variety of publications
- produce a longer piece of professional critical writing on a subject of their own choice
- understand and apply research skills to professional critical writing
- apply constructive criticism to their own work and that of their peers
- prepare and present their work in accordance with industry standards and expectations.
Contribution to graduate profile
This subject:
- increases understanding of critical essay writing/reviewing/profiling
- enhances specific skills in critical writing
- encourages students' critical and creative thought
- encourages practical understanding of literary and cultural criticism
- provides a basis for the development of professional writing skills.
Teaching and learning strategies
Classes will consist of informal lectures and discussion of a topic based upon readings provided in class handouts and in the set texts. All students will be required to participate in these discussions. In addition, students will undertake class exercises and participate in workshopping to develop specific skills in the field of critical professional writing, initially concentrating on literary journalism and book reviewing from a number of different perspectives. By the mid-semester break students will have produced some draft work for the major project in their Assessment Portfolio, which will be handed in for assessment and feedback. The second part of the semester will broaden to include music, television and film criticism and will continue with workshopping of students' portfolio of work, especially their major projects.
Attendance at the Sydney Writers' Festival may replace the class for the corresponding week and will in any case be requested; this will be followed up by informal class presentations and 'debriefing' the next week.
Content
Critical Writing provides a context in which cultural and literary theories may be examined and furthered, and it extends the critical and nonfictional writing skills that have been established in the core subjects. This emphasis upon the nexus between theory and practice is reflected in the class exercises and the Assessment Portfolio, which require students' written work to be responsive to ideas regarding the place and production of literary and cultural debate. Students will be encouraged to conceive, structure and direct their assignment work in accordance with the wider literary context and also in a manner that might lead to publication. Assignment work will consist of a number of different tasks.
Short tasks
- short book reviews (100-200 words)
- standard book/film reviews (800 words)
- review articles (1200-1500 words)
- cultural or literary essay writing (2000-3000 words)
- literary profiles of authors/creative producers (1500-2000 words)
- cultural/literary case studies (2000-3000 words)
Assessment
Assessment item 1: Assessment Portfolio Stage 1
| Objective(s): | a, b, d, e |
| Weighting: | 35% |
| Task: | To select a task or tasks from the overall assessment requirements and submit approx 1500-1800 words of work in progress. |
| Assessment criteria: | Demonstrated ability to:
|
Assessment item 2: Assessment Portfolio Stage 2
| Objective(s): | a, b, c, d, e, f |
| Weighting: | 65% |
| Task: | To submit a portfolio of work totalling approx 5000 words, containing one longer piece as outlined above and based upon class workshopping and discussion with the lecturer. This will include work already submitted as work-in-progress (and revised) for Assessment item 1. |
| Assessment criteria: | Demonstrated ability to:
|
Minimum requirements
Students are expected to read the subject outline to ensure they are familiar with the subject requirements. Since class discussion and participation in activities form an integral part of this subject, you are expected to attend, arrive punctually and actively participate in classes. If you experience difficulties meeting this requirement, please contact your lecturer. Students who have a reason for extended absence (e.g., illness) may be required to complete additional work to ensure they achieve the subject objectives.
Indicative references
Texts and bibliography (to be finalised)
Readings will be available on UTSOnline and the lecturer will indicate further reading from newspaper and other sources as well as distribute handouts in class consisting of samples of reviews, essays, articles, etc. In addition students will choose titles from a list of set texts for the purposes of reviewing.
Books for review will be recent titles and widely available, e.g.:
- Grenville, Kate. 2005, The Secret River, Text Publishing, Melbourne.
- Sherbourne, Craig. 2005, Hoi Polloi, Black Inc, Melbourne.
- Coetzee, JM, 2007, Diary of A Bad Year, Random House, Sydney
- Graham, Jorie, Sea Change, New York, Farrar Strauss and Giroux, 2008
- Kundera, Milan, The Curtain: An Essay in Seven Parts, New York, HarperCollins 2007
- Sebald W.G., Vertigo, London: Harvill 1999,
- Tan, Shaun, Tales from Outer Suburbia, Sydney, Allen and Unwin, 2008.
- Australia (2008)
- Wild Strawberries (1957)
- ed. Becket, Fiona and Gifford, Terry, Culture, creativity and environment: new environmentalist criticism, Amsterdam and New York, Rodopi, 2007.
- Bennie, Angela (ed & intro). 2006, Crème de la Phlegm, Miegunyah Press, Melbourne
- Cixous, Hélène, Stigmata:Escaping Texts,London and New York, Routledge Classics, 2005
- Curthoys, Anne & Docker, J. 2006, Is History Fiction?, UNSW Press, Sydney
- Fletcher, Angus, A New Theory for American Poetry: Democracy, the Environment, and the Future of Imagination, Cambridge Mass. and London, England, Harvard university Press, 2004
- Garrard, Greg, Ecocriticsm, London ; New York, Routledge, 2004.
- Harrison, Martin. Who Wants to Create Australia?, Halstead, Sydney, 2004
- Hoy, David Couzens, Critical Resistance : From Poststructuralism to Post-critique, Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, 2004.
- Jameson, Fredric, The Modernist Papers, London, Verso, 2007
- ed Knellwolf, Christa and Norris, Christopher, The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism: Twentieth-Century Historical, Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives (Vol 9), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007
- Macintyre, Stuart & Clark, A. 2003, The History Wars, MUP, Melbourne
- Righter, William, The Myth of Theory, Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2009
- Saluszinsky, Imre, Oxford Book of Australian Essays, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1997
- Salusinszky, Imre, Criticism in Society : Interviews with Jacques Derrida, Northrop Frye, Harold Bloom, Geoffrey Hartman, Frank Kermode, Edward Said, Barbara Johnson, Frank Lentricchia, and J. Hillis Miller, New York : Methuen ; Routledge, 2003
- Sebald, W. G., On the Natural History of Destruction, New York, Random House, 2003
- ed Simons, Jon, Contemporary Critical Theorists : from Lacan to Said, Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press, c2004.
- Australian Book Review (published monthly)
- Quarterly Essay: www.quartlerlyessay.com
- Griffith Review (published quarterly)
- Meanjin (published quarterly)
- Southerly (published quarterly)
- Sydney Morning Herald Spectrum (published weekly)
- Weekend Australian Review (published weekly).
- Australian Literary Review (first Wednesday each month in The Australian)
- The Book Show (ABC Radio National)
- London Review of Books
- Times Literary Supplement
- New York Review of Books
- The New Yorker
Other resources
- DVD/video facilities
- UTS website and Library Catalogue/Databases
- UTSOnline facilities
