Writing Cultural Criticism is a five-week course that will cover the fundamentals of cultural criticism from review writing to feature writing (and how to craft a pitch too). During the course, we will read critics from wide backgrounds (covering a variety of topics) and apply what we’ve learned to our own writing and workshop feedback.

We’ll spend the first meeting going over the basic structure of mainstream cultural criticism, reading some works, and chatting best practices for pitching. In the following weeks, we will be splitting our time with a seminar-style discussion of the week’s reading and student workshops (each student will have their writing workshopped once).

There will be weekly assigned readings (no more than 4 pages a week). On top of those readings, students will be expected to read and respond to each other’s work prior to workshop in class.

Each student can also sign up for an individual 20-minute session with the instructor outside of class time to discuss their work.

About the Instructor

Tiffany Babb (she/her) is deputy editor of pop culture site Popverse. Outside of Popverse, her criticism can be found in the Observer, Chicago Reader, The Comics Journal, and The AV Club. Her collection of poetry A list of things I’ve lost was is available from Vegetarian Alcoholics Press.

Writing Cultural Criticism, 5 Sessions with Tiffany Babb