Digital Storytelling and Poetics Minor

Department of English
1128 Tawes Hall
Phone: 301-405-3825
english@umd.edu
http://english.umd.edu

Director of Undergraduate Studies: Scott Trudell, Ph.D.

This minor prepares students to interpret, and to create, imaginative writing in digital and new media spaces. Students build the skills necessary to critically analyze digital culture, narrative, poetics, and rhetoric. They also learn how to craft creative expression in digital platforms. These skill sets are combined: a foundation in critical methods in English and new media studies provides a basis for the craft of digital writing and design. And understanding of the process of creating digital poetry and prose provides context and insight for effective critical analysis. During their coursework, students develop digital portfolios of critical and creative work as a means to showcase their career-facing knowledge and skills.

Program Learning Outcomes 

1. Define, describe, and produce examples of digital storytelling and poetics, such as combinatory poetry and interactive fiction.
2. Explain the functions, aesthetics, and cultural influences of your own creative media, and the broader uses of technology in crafting narratives.
3. Express the historical through-lines connecting the printed book—and specifically 20th-century avant-garde print literature—to more contemporary digital poetics, such as techniques of sampling, remixing, and the use of found media and aleatory methods.
4. Understand and analyze the kinship digital storytelling and poetics shares with games, narrative fiction, conceptual writing, and experimental and avant-garde literature.
5. Commit to the responsible use of AI in your creative practice and understand the environmental costs of digital storytelling and poetics.
6. Build on and apply the skills introduced in course lab sessions to create a final student portfolio showcasing proficiency, versatility, and point of view with regards to digital storytelling and poetics.

Successful completion of the Digital Storytelling and Poetics minor requires the following:

¹

See https://go.umd.edu/digitalstorytelling for an up-to-date list of approved courses.

²

Successful completion of the Digital Storytelling and Poetics minor requires the submission of a digital portfolio during a student's final semester. This portfolio must be submitted electronically to the minor advisor at english@umd.edu by November 1 for fall semester graduation, April 1 for spring semester graduation, or August 1 for summer graduation. The portfolio must contain, at a minimum, the following material:

1. A welcome page
2. Five finished, polished texts produced by the student in Digital Storytelling and Poetics minor courses, including a minimum of one critical essay and one creative work
3. A reflective essay that explains how these texts demonstrate the student's achievement of the minor's learning outcomes

The minor advisor will confirm that each portfolio meets these minimum requirements.

 Notes:

1. Following university policy, English majors may count two Digital Storytelling and Poetics minor courses toward both the requirements for the English major and the Digital Storytelling and Poetics minor.

2. Students must be accepted into the minor no later than the start of the semester before the semester in which they plan to graduate. 

3. All courses presented for the minor must be passed with a grade of "C-" or better. 

4. An overall GPA of 2.0 in the minor is required for graduation.