The Writing Department offers a variety of courses to help students become powerful communicators and thinkers. Apart from dedicated writing courses, we also offer electives that make an excellent addition to any program and General Education courses that focus on the process and practice of writing.
Browse through the database below to explore courses that will fulfill certain degree requirements in our programs. Use this handy flow chart to navigate your course selection. Please note that not all courses are offered each term.
To register for classes, be sure to use the Course Timetable website, and carefully read through the "Notes/Additional Fees" section of each course you select.
Course Search
Professional Writing: An Introduction
Required Course
Introduces the concepts, fields, and practices of professional writing. Concepts considered include creativity and the idea of writing, composition theories and practices, writing for different ...
Research for Writers
Required Course
A practical introduction to research demands, strategies, and ethics in today’s digital professional writing environment. In a digital writing project, students will develop and use ...
A Writer's Introduction to Literary Forms
Elective Course
An introduction to the fundamental principles governing the production and reception of four principal literary forms in English: poetry, prose fiction, prose non-fiction and drama. ...
Writing: Process and Practice
General Education Course
This course considers a wide range of written expression including fiction, nonfiction, poetry and other genres, with an emphasis on the theory and practice of ...
Becoming a Better Writer: Methods & Models
General Education Course
This course combines practical strategies for writing improvement in academic and professional contexts by having students study the diverse social, political and cultural challenges writers ...
Writing Process: Invention, Originality, and Ethics
General Education Course
In this course, students develop social science research, writing, and critical thinking skills through the study of writers in the act of writing. How do ...
Genres for Professional Writers
Required Course
Since genre determines most of the essential elements that a writer must consider and apply, including purpose, audience, form, style, voice, evidence, methodology, ethics and ...
Writing in Digital Cultures
Required Course
This course develops students' critical writing, analysis, design, and implementation abilities in the digital world. Students will analyze the impact of digital products through current ...
Fundamentals of Editing
Required Course
The course addresses the problems of sorting and arranging information and of writing it up in a manner that is clear and comprehensible in limited ...
Rhetoric: Strategy and Application
Required Course
Examines classical forms and expanded contemporary views of rhetoric. The course establishes as its basis four categories of rhetoric: gestural, verbal, textural and visual, and ...
Ethics in Action for Professional Writers
Required Course
Professional writers make conscious and unconscious choices with ethical significance on a daily basis. In this course, students learn about contemporary ethical issues for professional ...
Studies in Non-Fiction
Elective Course
This course considers the history and practice of several nonfiction genres, from the personal essay to travel writing and investigative journalism.
Effective Writing and Research in Information Technology
Non-program Course
This course develops fundamental research and technical writing capabilities needed to clearly describe and document IT-related problems and solutions. Students develop these capabilities by working ...
The Grammar Course
Elective Course
A strict, prescriptivist approach to the fundamental rules and protocols of Standard Written English (SWE)
Intermediate Digital Authoring
Keystone, Required Course
The course considers authoring in the context of online environments and theories of such work. It introduces strategies for composing, editing, and promoting one's writing ...
Introduction to Periodical and Publishing Writing
Keystone, Required Course
Offers an introductory survey of the primary genres involved in periodical publication, both newspapers and magazines. Genres addressed include news and investigative reports, commentary, reviews, ...
Introduction to Corporate/Organizational Writing
Keystone, Required Course
This course familiarizes students with the expectations,requirements, and conventions of corporate/organizational communication, and develops the skills needed to become a successful writer in a public ...
Books and Bookmaking in the 21st Century
Keystone, Required Course
This course considers the role of books in our culture now and in the future. Through lectures, workshops, and simulations, students learn how publishers affect ...
Practical Studies in Damage Control
Elective Course
A problem-based capstone course in which students work in teams to develop and construct institutional responses, both internal and external, to extraordinary circumstances. PRIOR TO ...
Reading the News: Examining the Rhetoric of the Press
Elective Course
This course examines not only what is "news" but how the press presents news stories to the reading public. Issues in bias, spinning and framing, ...
Writing, Creating, and Thinking with Code
Elective Course
This course considers the intersections between computer programming and writing. It explores what understanding code as a creative, expressive, social, and rhetorical practice means for ...
Race and Culture in Professional Writing
Elective Course
This course explores best practices for writing with and about communities defined by cultural identities like race, ethnicity, disability, gender, and sexuality. Course activities and ...
Rhetoric of Beer, Food, and Beyond
Elective Course
This course focuses on the professional writing and rhetorical practices of drink and food culture in the Greater Toronto Area, emphasizing the work of breweries. ...
The Materiality of the Word
Elective Course
The course examines the sundry technologies that govern and regulate the production and reception of human language as it is ordered into speech, writing, print, ...
Special Topics
Elective Course
This course provide students in Professional Writing and when possible, students in other programs, with specialized approaches to a special topic by exploring research, pursuing ...
Fundamentals of Editing
Non-program Course
The course addresses the problems of sorting and arranging information and of writing it up in a manner that is clear and comprehensible in limited ...
Substantive Editing
Elective Course
The course addresses the problems of developing a text to the point at which it is deemed publishable. It trains students to diagnose problems with ...
Professional Writing for Nurses
Non-program Course
Develops writing skills appropriate to the professional needs of nurses. Focus on university research papers and health educational materials using nursing curriculum-appropriate materials. Open to: ...
Principles of Style and Design
Elective Course
Introduces students to print protocols, explores fundamental problems in book and other print formats and considers the adaptations of these protocols to and in the ...
Effective Writing and Research
Non-program Course
Develops research and writing skills appropriate to university-level work in both liberal arts and professional studies. Skills include clarifying information needs, formulating research questions, using ...
Writing in the Workplace
Non-program Course
Examines various types of workplace related writing and oral communication; for example, report writing, executive summary, business plan, presentation. Focus on helping students develop clear ...
Writing, Rhetoric, and Social Action
Elective Course
Students in this course analyze various activist rhetorics from around the world, engage with critical theory about the forms and functions of politically effective discourses, ...
Digital Authoring Practicum
Capstone, Required Course
This practicum allows fourth year students in PRWR to design and implement online writing and marketing campaigns for community organizations.Community service learning is central to ...
Periodical Writing and Publishing Practicum
Capstone, Required Course
The course provides students with advanced instruction in periodical writing styles and craft with a goal to publish their own material in a course-run digital ...
Organizational Writing Practicum
Capstone, Required Course
This practicum offers students direct experience applying rhetorical theories and concepts to writing for businesses/organizations requiring new or improved documents, newsletters, promotional literature, etc. Students ...
Book Publishing Practicum
Capstone, Required Course
This Practicum allows students in their 4th year to participate in the publication of a book of short fiction. Manuscripts are chosen from submissions to ...
Video Game Rhetorics
Elective Course
How do video games make arguments, and what arguments are they making? These two questions guide the set-up of this course, where students will examine ...
Visual Information and Document Design
Elective Course
The course considers various strategies for the visual representation of information. What sorts of figures and illustrations aid communication and what sorts obscure? What visual ...
Multimedia Practices
Elective Course
The course addresses the challenges and opportunities offered by the hardware and software involved in net-based communications. It considers the advantages and drawbacks of recent ...
Special Topics
Elective Course
This course seeks to provide students pursuing the Honours Major with specialized approaches to a special topic by exploring research, pursuing advanced methods of inquiry ...