You are beginning your college career in the middle of some of the most rapid technological change the world has ever known. Because of changing communication technologies (the internet, smartphones, social media like Facebook) your everyday experiences of reading and writing are different not only from your parents’ and professors, but even from those of the students who were taking English 101 four years ago. The skills that college English teaches––understanding and critically engaging with what we read, see, and hear, crafting arguments to get our point across––are still vital for academic, workplace, and personal success. But new kinds of media mean there are many new ways to practice these literacies.

In this composition class we’ll practice a range of writing genres, from personal essays and thesis-driven arguments to newer kinds of online writing (such as blogs and and Twitter) that have a huge influence in public life. Through classroom discussion, writing assignments, and online participatory learning, you will critically explore your personal experiences with digital media, while reading about its history, power structures, and possible futures. Together, we will work through the writing process to develop your ideas on these subjects from fleeting thoughts and opinions into persuasive, thoughtful arguments and analyses. The course doesn’t require or expect any technological know-how beyond the ability to send an email and create a Word document. But if that’s as far as you go at the moment, you’ll probably end up with a few extra skills.

This course is adapted / copied with permission from the Digital Literacies course taught by Dr. Alexis Lothian.