TR 1:25-2:40

6583

Instructor: Anum Asi

Campus mail: English Department, 250 Hall

Email: aa2649@cornell.edu

The personal essay can be a powerful tool with which to excavate and examine our lives. Writers have used it to center and communicate lived experience from the margins, dealing with themes of empire, sexuality, race, gender and class made personal and specific. In this course students will be inspired by classic and contemporary writers like Gloria Anzaldúa, James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, Rachel Cusk, Kiese Laymon, Leslie Jamison and Carmen Maria Machado. The class will be generative and skill-based. Students will learn how to harness introspection, develop their own voice, observe vivid detail, discover their themes and characters, and use structure, setting, expressive language and research to communicate their stories.