This intimate and innovative creative writing program combines imagination, practical skills, and professional savvy to empower writers to share their creative vision with the world.
Potential Career Paths Include:
- Editor
- Copy-editor
- Literary agent
- Literary magazine/press editor
- Working writer
- Any field that involves creative communication (advertising etc.)
- Teaching (K-12, higher-education)
- Non-profit advocacy and outreach
- Game writer/designer
As a creative writing major, you will commit yourself to learning what kind of writer you want to be and what kind of writing matters to you. Towards this end, you will take writing and literature courses that will ground you in the work of those who came before you and help you master the techniques necessary to develop the strongest version of your voice. Along the way, you will work closely with faculty who are published authors and with peers who will become trusted readers of your work.
You will learn creative processes from first drafts to revision to publication that you can utilize the rest of your writing life and wherever you go in life that requires creativity and discipline.
Creative writing majors take workshops and craft classes geared towards exposing up-and-coming writers to a variety of published voices. Students master creative writing techniques such as building compelling conflicts, immersive settings, and complex characters, as well as creating memorable images and musical rhythms. All creative writing majors will practice writing in different genres, including fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, and playwriting. Within these broad genres, students are also invited to explore sub-genres such as fantasy, science-fiction, graphic narratives, and game design.
Enhance Your Experience:
- Work with faculty who are award-winning, nationally published working writers and editors
- Participation in the Humanities Salon, a monthly event to share creative work on campus
- Publication and work opportunities with the VORTEX, Blackburn’s student literary magazine
- An annual Creative Writing contest which awards at least a $1,000 in prizes a year
- Small, workshop-style classes where you bond with your peers and develop close relationships with faculty
- Special topics classes based on student interest; recent offerings have included Speculative Fiction (science fiction, fantasy, weird fiction and horror) and World-building (the construction of immersive fictional worlds)
- Senior Seminar, in which you complete a full manuscript in your chosen genre in one-on-one work with a faculty member, and then present your finished work in a public reading and presentation
- Professionalization: learning how to publish and promote your writing
