Publication Studies

Publication studies courses and projects focus on the process of text production—writing—but extends that process to include considering how to make that writing public. Publication pedagogy encourages students to imagine their work as potentially public early in the process of development, and thus includes critical audience awareness and rhetorical decision making, and provides many opportunities for collaborative work—although collaborative publishing is not a necessary condition of successful publication. There are potential intersections between publication pedagogy and service learning, civically engaged learning, and other high impact practices.

Examples of potential applications of publication pedagogy include:

• Students take a piece they have written for the class and reimagine it as a public piece—a booklet, a chapbook, a broadside, a web text.
• Students work collaboratively to revise and publish an anthology or journal, designing, laying out, and producing a short book.
• Students make handmade books of their learning work—crystallizing critical concepts into a flip book, for instance.
• Students stage an exhibit of their work, laid out and produced for display.
• Students adapt written work into multimedia work—podcasts, video essays, or digital stories—to be housed on a class website.

For information on and resources for Publication Studies & Projects, contact Lisa Bickmore ( lisa.bickmore@slcc.edu ) or Charlotte Howe ( charlotte.howe@slcc.edu ).