University of Minnesota
Department of Writing Studies
612-624-3445
writ@umn.edu


Department Name

Department of Writing Studies

Students on the East Bank Campus

Welcome to the web site for the Department of Writing Studies. Part of the University of Minnesota’s College of Liberal Arts, we are an academic department with nationally recognized strengths in teaching and scholarship in rhetoric, writing, and technical communication. With 13 tenured or tenure-track faculty, over 20 non-tenured instructional staff, and degrees from the bachelor's to the doctorate, we offer a diverse set of research, teaching, and learning opportunities.

The department touches the lives of every undergraduate on campus, teaching over 170 sections of first-year writing as well as courses in technical writing and communication, rhetorical theory, composition, and environmental communication. Graduates from our B.S., M.S., and certificate programs are prepared for successful careers in scientific and technical communication and are in high demand by companies both local and national. Our M.A. and Ph.D. graduates pursue careers primarily in academic settings, becoming college professors and instructors.

We are also the administrative home of the Center for Writing, which provides face-to-face and online writing assistance as well as other programs of interest. Faculty and staff in both the center and the department enjoy many collaborative relationships including funded research to study how writing is most effectively taught in different academic disciplines.

We hope you find what you are looking for on our web site. If you have any questions, please email or call us. Or stop in and visit us in Wesbrook Hall, located on the Minneapolis campus.

Sincerely,
Laura J. Gurak, Ph.D.
Professor and Chair

Featured Items

  • Prof. Richard Graff to Present at CNES Colloquium

    'Vocal Stylings: The Orator's Voice in Classical Typologies of Prose Style'
    presented by Professor Richard Graff
    Department of Writing Studies

    ***Friday, November 20th, 3:30pm***
    110 Nicholson Hall

    Abstract: In this presentation, Professor Graff will discuss the close linkage between (verbal) style and voice in Greek and Roman treatises on rhetoric and literary criticism. This linkage takes two main forms. First, several authors (e.g., Aristotle, "Demetrius", Dionysius of Halicarnassus) remark on how certain stylistic features of the written oratorical text compel an animated (or monotonous) vocal presentation in reading or recitation; here, the text's style controls its manner of vocal delivery (speaking rate, intonation, etc.). Second, the style of individual orators was regularly characterized in terms of its fullness or weakness of "voice". Although this is a metaphorical use of the term, often such characterizations appear to project known (or presumed) qualities of a given speaker's actual, physical voice back onto the style of his texts. This latter procedure, though suspect on several levels, contributed both to the hardening of a traditional evaluation of the styles of Isocrates, Demosthenes, and other Attic orators, and to the evolution of the theory of style-types (kharakteres lexeôs, genera dicendi).

    This event is free and open to the public.

    Sponsored by:

    Classical and Near Eastern Studies
    University of Minnesota
    245 Nicholson Hall
    216 Pillsbury Dr SE
    Minneapolis, MN 55455

    P: 612-625-5353
    F: 612-624-4894

    cnes@umn.edu
    http://cnes.cla.umn.edu

     November 18th, 2009

  • Writing Studies Parlor: November 23rd

    Speaking Across the Disciplines:
    What Speech Pedagogy Can Teach Us About Writing

    Presented by Timothy Oleksiak

    A Department of Writing Studies Parlor Event
    Monday, November 23, 2009
    12.30 Nicholson Hall 345

    Please join us for discussion and refreshments

    November 17th, 2009