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Creative Writing Dissertation

Module description

This module is designed to enable you to operate independently and responsibly, and to take a positive and active role in your learning, in the service of the production of a sustained piece of creative and critical work. The module enhances the creative writing skills and practices you develop during the Short Fiction module. Your writing skills—including narrative structures, voice, character, thematic meaning, and the role of conflict—will be extended to suit longer, more sustained pieces of fiction. Your critical awareness of genre will be sharpened with the completion of a self-reflexive essay, which will help you gain a deeper understanding of the way in which your work falls within a wider literary context.

Module aims - intentions of the module

The module aims to:

• Develop an increased ability to create and understand the elements of fiction
• Fiction in English and in translation will be used as models to give students a broad knowledge of various components of the form
• Develop students' awareness and understanding of textual forms, content, and style
• Continue to enhance the appreciation of the processes involved in writing short fiction, including drafting, revising, editing, developing ideas, and publishing toward a particular audience

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Informed appreciation of a broad range of fiction
• 2. Demonstrate an understanding and appreciation of the technical qualities of long form fiction, including narrative structures, voice, character and the role of conflict
• 3. Demonstrate a capacity for independent study and self-directed inquiry and research, and develop both imaginative and critical abilities

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Advanced appreciation of formal techniques and imaginative expression in creative writing
• 5. Produce pieces of creative writing, in agreement with specified forms and genres taught on the module
• 6. Analyse and critically examine, at an advanced level, diverse forms of creative writing
• 7. Present persuasive written and oral arguments concerning your own creative writing and the work of other authors, both peers and published authors
• 8. Demonstrate an advanced understanding of a variety of theoretical positions and articulate a broad range of appropriate critical and professional terminology

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 9. Advanced creative writing skills
• 10. Demonstrate appropriate research and bibliographic skills, an advanced capacity to construct a coherent, substantiated argument, advanced skills of creative expression, and a capacity to write clear and correct prose
• 11. Write fiction toward publication

Syllabus plan

The creative writing project will be individual to the student; therefore a significant component of the teaching sessions take the form of one-to-one supervisions consisting of discussion, for which the student is expected to have made serious preparation beforehand.

Alongside the supervision process is an 11-week programme of 1-hour lectures and workshops designed to reinforce and extend students’ key skills as writers and researchers. Some lectures currently offered on the English Dissertation module cover subject-specific topics of shared concern to both English and Creative Writing students.

Whilst the content may vary from year to year, it is envisioned that it will cover some or all of the following topics:

• Choosing and Refining a Creative Writing Project
• Outlining a Plot
• Conducting Theoretical Research (Critical essay)
• Conducting Material Research (Critical essay)
• Writing a Literature Review (Critical essay)
• Characterisation and the Function of Secondary Characters
• Workshop
• Editing and Revising Your Creative Work
• Mastering Critical Apparatus (Critical essay)
• Publishing Your Creative Work
• Portfolio Feedback Session (with individual supervisors)

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE – https://vle.exeter.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=6054

Key words search

Creative writing, short fiction, fiction, short story