EL7025 - Writing Research

What will I learn on this module?

The module develops the students’ understanding of the relationship between writing and research,preparing them towards doctoral study.

The aim of this module is to introduce and explore key theoretical approaches to writing creatively, enabling you to begin talking about your craft in critically engaged ways. You will also be introduced to the idea of contextualising your work in relation to both creative and critical traditions, and encouraged to formulate research questions in order to clarify and direct your projects. You will engage creatively and critically in appropriate independent research.

Topics covered include:
concepts and methods of advanced research in creative writing
planning and carrying out a postgraduate-level literature review
contextualising creative work in relation to creative and critical traditions
writing effective and critically engaged creative work
understanding the purpose of a research question and literature review
contextualising work with reference to a range of other critical and creative texts
understanding a chosen field of creative and/or critical literature.
producing creative work which engages productively with literary, theoretical, and critical contexts

How will I learn on this module?

The module will be taught through seminars and two individual tutorials. Seminars will introduce you to key concepts and practices of research in Creative Writing, with particular focus on the research question and literature review. You will study examples of creative and critical contexts for writing and seek to develop suitable research questions, literature reviews and contexts for your own projects. Workshop sessions will provide opportunities to gain peer and tutor feedback on proposals and creative work. Individual tutorials and advice on independent learning will support the development of effective research questions and creative projects.
The module will also make appropriate use of the Virtual Learning Environment to provide you with module material.

How will I be supported academically on this module?

You will receive support from the module tutor, and can also seek support from the programme director and your guidance tutor.
Advice and support will be provided in lectures, seminars and individual tutorials and through tutor and peer feedback in groups on the development of creative and critical projects. You also have access to specialised services provided by central university departments and close and effective links have been developed with student’s services, the career service, the library and information services and the students union. You are encouraged to meet and discuss your work outside the programme.

What will I be expected to read on this module?

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. The reading list for this module can be found at: http://readinglists.northumbria.ac.uk
(Reading List service online guide for academic staff this containing contact details for the Reading List team – http://library.northumbria.ac.uk/readinglists)

What will I be expected to achieve?

Knowledge & Understanding:
• To refine students’ understanding of concepts and methods of advanced research in creative writing
• To develop students’ ability to contextualise their work in relation to creative and critical traditions
• To equip students to develop their capacity for effective and critically engaged creative work

Intellectual / Professional skills & abilities:
• To develop students’ ability to plan and carry out a postgraduate-level literature review
• To develop a reflective approach to the art and process of composition that understands it as capable of being explored, investigated and articulated

Personal Values Attributes (Global / Cultural awareness, Ethics, Curiosity) (PVA):
• develop a range of cognitive abilities related to the aesthetic, ethical and social contexts of human experience.
• foster the ability to see the world from different perspectives, both as a life skill and as an essential part of artistic practice.
• In the making of new work, recognise the role both of deliberate, conscious decisions and of the unconscious impulses and recognitions that underlie and energise composition.

How will I be assessed?

Formative
Formative feedback is offered in two individual half hour tutorials as well as through seminar and written feedback on draft materials.

Summative
The module will be assessed by a portfolio with three elements (100%):
• A research question with accompanying rationale (1,000 words)
• A literature review which provides a context for the student’s creative work (2,500 words)
• A piece of creative work which reflects the student’s engagement with critical materials (2500 words of prose or equivalent
• A single mark will be given for the full portfolio.

1,000 words of prose will be treated as equivalent to 5 pages of script or 40 lines of poetry.

The standards of the academic argument, research, originality, scholarship and presentation in the research question and rationale and the literature review must be the same as those required of any other literary/critical module.

Feedback on summative work will be delivered according to the existing protocols of the Department of Humanities: all assessments are anonymized and double-marked with both sets of feedback (with comments on feedback sheets) returned to the student with the final moderated grade. Feedback will encourage and facilitate reflective learning through the feedback sheet grid which pinpoints particular areas of strengths/weakness and the narrative comments which encourage students to consider how they have succeeded and how they can improve.

Pre-requisite(s)

none

Co-requisite(s)

none

Module abstract

Please find details of this module in the other sections provided.

Course info

Credits 30

Level of Study Postgraduate

Mode of Study 1 year full-time
1 other options available

Department Humanities

Location City Campus, Northumbria University

City Newcastle

Start September 2024

Fee Information

Module Information

All information is accurate at the time of sharing. 

Full time Courses are primarily delivered via on-campus face to face learning but could include elements of online learning. Most courses run as planned and as promoted on our website and via our marketing materials, but if there are any substantial changes (as determined by the Competition and Markets Authority) to a course or there is the potential that course may be withdrawn, we will notify all affected applicants as soon as possible with advice and guidance regarding their options. It is also important to be aware that optional modules listed on course pages may be subject to change depending on uptake numbers each year.  

Contact time is subject to increase or decrease in line with possible restrictions imposed by the government or the University in the interest of maintaining the health and safety and wellbeing of students, staff, and visitors if this is deemed necessary in future.

 

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