ENGL 599 A: Special Studies in English

“The hardest thing about writing is writing.”

                                                Norah Ephron, I Feel Bad About My Neck and Other Essays

This course in professionalization for English and humanities graduate students is intended to make the academic imperative to “publish or perish” less daunting and to help students begin building a career dossier. Participants will start with a substantial piece of writing—a seminar or conference paper, for instance—and will develop two publications: one for an academic journal and one for a venue with a non-academic readership.  In addition to covering “best practices” for publication and professionalization, the course will include workshops in which students will read and respond to others’ writing. Seminar meetings will cover questions such as: what are the pros and cons of publishing in scholarly versus non-academic venues? How are different kinds of publications weighted in the academy? How does academic peer-review work and why is it so highly valued in academia?  How can you improve the chances that your work will be accepted for publication? What should your CV look like? What conferences should you attend and when? Where are the funding opportunities and how do you position yourself for fellowships, grants, or other awards?

Keywords: publishing, professionalization, writing workshop, careers