Englwrit 111: Writing, Identity, and Power provides students the opportunity to:

  • Build awareness of different disciplinary perspectives on writing, identity, and power.
  • Understand how writing is socially and culturally situated, and how the ways in which writing practices are valued are tied to larger systems of power and privilege.
  • Explicitly include and sustain culturally and linguistically diverse approaches to writing.
  • Develop effective composing and reading practices to use in future contexts, including College Writing 112.
  • Implement strategies to develop complex ideas while discovering new ones in the composing process.
  • Take part in composing projects which cross traditional disciplinary borders of argumentation, language use, and genre.
  • Become familiar with composing technologies (word processing, digital publication, etc.) available to UMass Amherst students. 

By writing, reading, and engaging in discussion across the semester, you will be able to:

  • Use terms and concepts related to linguistic diversity to analyze personal experience as well as primary and secondary sources. 
  • Use the writing process to substantially develop and revise your thinking, in which your understanding of an idea evolves or extends.
  • Identify and apply writing and research practices used across academic disciplines.
  • Synthesize ideas and claims across a range of texts and sources.
  • Use citation practices that represent diverse sources of information and acknowledgement of intellectual property.
  • Show in written reflection which writing strategies you will develop and apply beyond the course.

These courses use Open Educational Resources and/or library content.

For assistance enrolling in Writing, Identity, and Power or more information about this course, please contact Anne Bello, Deputy Director of the Writing Program.

Writing, Power, and Identity FAQs