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Home College of Arts and Humanities Master of Fine Arts in Writing (MFA) Curriculum

College of Arts and Humanities

Curriculum

MFA in Writing Curriculum

Students in the  complete 48 credit hours, including an orientation class, a craft foundations class, and a two-course, 6-credit thesis sequence: IMF65001 and IMF65002, which must be taken sequentially. The remaining coursework is chosen from our MFA curriculum.

Students who choose to declare an emphasis in Fiction, Poetry, Creative Nonfiction, or Young Adult/ Middle Grade must take at least 27 credit hours in the emphasis area, including at least one Foundational course in that genre, and their final Thesis must focus primarily on that genre. 

During their first eight-week term, students should sign up for IMF50000 Lindenways, which serves as an orientation to our program. It is also highly recommended成人视频攖hough not required成人视频攖hat students enroll in their first foundations course in the first eight-week term (or, if they plan to only take one course at a time, their second eight-week term). However, students do not have to take a foundations course before enrolling in other courses.

The final course requirement for all students is the MFA Thesis class sequence.

Types of Courses

The MFA program offers workshop classes, literature classes, and craft classes in a wide variety of genres and focus areas. Students may take all coursework fully online, or they may choose to include up to one hybrid class per term (which is offered both on-campus and virtually; see our Local Students page for more info). More information on each course type is available below.

Craft courses, particularly those that serve as foundations in each of our genres, will focus on discussing techniques and approaches to that particular genre. These courses serve to provide a strong fundamental possession over a genre成人视频檚 key components, tools, and strategies. Typically, these courses成人视频� primary materials will likely be craft books and other writing about writing rather than, say, stories, essays, poems, etc., though you will likely encounter some model materials by way of examples of craft deployment.

Any course not overtly marked 成人视频淟成人视频� or 成人视频淲成人视频� (or 成人视频淟W成人视频�) after its title is a craft-oriented course, though all of our courses involve the study of craft, either (or both) directly or indirectly.

All students in the program are required to take one of our Craft Foundations courses, but it is highly recommended, for the purposes of being a well-rounded writer sharpening the tools of craft from different angles, that students take at least two of these courses.

All courses, but especially craft courses, focus on our first program learning objective, emphasizing craft, by which students will be able to define craft in creative work and articulate the reasoning behind the craft choices in their own creative work.

Example courses include (but are not limited to):

Literature courses成人视频攖hose with an L designated at the end成人视频攆ocus on either a writer, a movement, a period, or a style, and are going to place greater emphasis on studying and improving craft by studying model texts. There may be workshopping of your work in these courses, but a greater emphasis will be placed on examining the writing of successful, published authors, and workshops will usually be of shorter exercises or take place in small groups rather than be structured as full-class workshops. If you aren成人视频檛 sure if a literature course includes workshopping, please review the description of that class; if you成人视频檙e still not sure, feel free to contact the instructor to ask, if this has bearing on your interest in taking the course.

Because the best writers are the best readers, it is recommended, but again not required, that students take at least two literature courses as part of their program, preferably at least one of which focuses on a writer outside of their genre of emphasis, if the student is pursuing an emphasis area.

These courses place emphasis on our second program learning objective, literature, by which students will be able to articulate their creative lineage, connecting creative production of their own to a larger literary tradition either within their genre or across several.

Example courses include (but are not limited to):

Workshop courses成人视频攄esignated with a W at the end成人视频攁re exactly what they sound like: courses focusing primarily on workshopping your, and your peers成人视频�, writing. There will usually (though not always) be discussion of model texts, but most of the work of these courses will be production and discussion of student writing. Consider these an inverse, of a kind, of the literature courses.

Sample courses include (but are not limited to):

Some courses are marked as both L and W. These will be a combination of workshop and literature. How does this differ from craft courses? Generally, rather than serving to look broadly and fundamentally at a genre of writing from a techniques perspective, these courses will use the form or author(s) selected as the looking glass for the production and study of one成人视频檚 own work in that form or style. These courses seek to balance the study of master texts and the application to your own craft.

These courses focus on our third program learning objective, workshop, by which students will hone their skills in giving and receiving creative feedback in a productive and respectful manner and in revising creative work to better meet their artistic objectives.

Sample courses include (but aren成人视频檛 limited to):

Finally, we also offer a number of professional courses that look at the industry itself, from both the perspective of the writer trying to publish work and from the side of the editors, agents, and publishers who put said work out into the world.

Sample courses include (but aren成人视频檛 limited to):

MFA Courses 成人视频� By Course Number

MFA Courses 成人视频� By Instructor

To supplement the catalog descriptions with more details for our students, our instructors have also provided personalized descriptions for the classes they teach. Click the class titles linked below to view course descriptions, class types, and textbook information.

  • IMF51665 Fiction: Ways of Looking at the Novel W
  • IMF51686 Fiction: Writing Interconnected Stories W
  • IMF51687 Fiction: Ecofuturism LW
  • IMF51696 Fiction: Contemporary Fantasy LW
  • IMF60110 Teaching Creative Writing
  • IMF52337 Nonfiction: Writing Great Characters W
Joe Baumann

Department Head
Writing (MFA)

(636) 287-7346

[email protected]

Shenika Harris, Ph.D.

Interim, Associate Dean
College of Arts and Humanities

(636) 949-4183

[email protected]