About This Course
What do we know and what are we still learning about writing and the human brain? Literacy has dramatically reshaped the human brain over millennia. Yet as literacy itself evolves, we still lack satisfactory data on how writing (and its counterpart, reading) affects our neurology and cognition--and therefore, how literacy affects who we are as humans.
In this reading- and writing-intensive course (ENWR 2520), we read a range of work on literacy and cognition, including technical and popular treatments of issues such as reading and neural development, brain function during writing tasks, brain activity connected to other creative tasks, and more. We read work from creativity experts, neurologists and cognitive scientists, psychologists, mental health practitioners, computer scientists, and professional writers and editors, all in trying to understand the relationship between literacy and our minds. Reading assignments include a series of “read-in” activities; writing assignments include a combination of creative, reflective, and research-based projects.
By the term’s end, students should have an enriched sense of themselves as readers and writers, and how their literacy practices play into their larger identity.