Writing Studies: Fall 2026
| Course | Course Description |
|---|---|
|
ENGL 4030: Perspectives in Writing and Rhetoric: Writing Reality: Persuasion and Public Trust |
This course explores how writing shapes what we believe, trust, and share in public spheres. Focusing on everyday writing—from news headlines and social media posts to advertisements and public messaging—students will examine how word choice, style, and voice influence perception and credibility. Through hands-on activities, students will analyze and produce persuasive and misleading texts, experimenting with how language can frame reality in different ways. The course emphasizes practical skills in critical reading, rhetorical awareness, and public engagement, helping students become more effective and responsible writers in a media-saturated world. |
|
ENGL 2160: AI and Writing: Cultural and Historical Perspectives |
In this course, students explore the evolving world of artificial intelligence and its collaboration with human writers, starting with the advent of the printing press and moving to the sophisticated machine learning models of the 21st century. You will use varying LLM’s to explore multidisciplinary writing as an iterative process and examine the implications of these models in a fast-changing landscape. This is the first course toward earning USU's AI and Writing Certification. |
| ENGL 3170: Legal Writing (Plaizier: Virtual) |
We have more access to information about legal issues occurring in the United States and globally than ever before. It can be difficult to read and understand legal texts when they randomly show up in your social media feed as part of an influencer’s rant on a current event. It can be even more challenging to figure out how we want to respond to or engage with legal texts and topics. This course helps students from a variety of majors read and write about legal issues that are important to them. Students will learn to inform, persuade, and advocate for legal topics that they truly care about in a way that uses their writing to augment their understanding, knowledge, experiences, and points of view. |
| ENGL 3240: Writing Family Stories (DHA) (Engler: In-person) |
Students learn how to discover, develop, and craft compelling stories from their own family histories. Using interview, archives, and professional storytelling techniques, they produce written and oral accounts while sharpening skills in research, narrative theory and methods, and real-world communication. |