The Writing Seminar: Word and Act: Writing as Performance

In this graduate writing workshop, we will explore writing as speech act and performance. Topics will include role-playing, performance poetry, immersive journalism, war declarations, manifestos, masquerade, exorcism, gender performance, curation, and dramatic interpretation. The following is a tentative booklist: The Pure and the Impure by Colette, Slave Play by Jeremy O. Harris, Audition by Katie Kitamura, When it All Burns Down: Fighting Fire in a Transformed World by Jordan Thomas, Ghostroots by ‘Pemi Agunda, We by Layli Long Soldier, Stag Dance by Torrey Peters, and selected poems by Tyehimba Jess and Patricia Smith. Students will write an introductory meditation and a mid-semester experiment on the theme of the course in addition to two standard workshop submissions on topics of their own choosing.