Critical Literacies

Winner of a 2006 CCCC Writing Program Certificate of Excellence

The First-Year English Program at Marquette University is designed to help students learn to communicate effectively. To that end, the program develops students' reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills via critical literacy, which is the ability to express ideas, values and beliefs effectively in a variety of situations. To foster Critical Literacy, the FYE Program offers a two-course writing sequence: Rhet/Comp 1, Academic Literacy, and Rhet/Comp 2, Public Sphere Literacy.            Note: In Fall 2009, when the university changes to a four-digit numbering system, these courses will become English 1001 and English 1002. But we'll keep using their nicknames, Rhet/Comp 1 and 2, aka RC 1 and 2.

Learning Outcomes

• Recognize & analyze literacy practices in academic disciplines
  
• Assume the ethos of a university student who can enter academic conversations and assert his/her own stance
  
• Employ strategies of exposition, analysis, argument, & interpretation
  
• Write academic essays that are well organized, well reasoned, and well supported with evidence
  
• Address academic audiences
  
• Find, evaluate, & integrate sources into papers
  
• Document sources according to Modern Language Association citation conventions
  
• Write clear, concise sentences in appropriate academic style

• Recognize & analyze multiple literacy practices in the public sphere
  
• Assume the ethos of a citizen who can engage in public debates for the greater good of all
  
• Write in multiple genres (e.g., thesis-support essays, journalistic essays, business documents, oral presentations) that are well organized, well reasoned, and well supported with evidence
  
• Address non-academic audiences (e.g., general readers of Newsweek and workplace supervisors)
  
• Find, evaluate & integrate sources into papers, using American Psychological Association citation conventions (required starting 2006-07)
  
• Write clear and concise sentences in a style appropriate to public contexts and audiences
  
• Compose and deliver oral presentations for a listening audience

Writing Resources

• Norman H. Ott Memorial Writing Center
  Marquette University
  Raynor Library 240, 288.5542

• The Signpost
  Raynor Library First-Year English Research Site
  

• Writing Across the Curriculum at MU
  Get tips about writing in different disciplines and in the workplace, including tips for ESL writers.
• Purdue University On-line Writing Lab
• Univ. of Wisconsin Writing Center Writer’s Handbook

Jesuit Mission

Contact Information:

Dr. Virginia Chappell, Director of FYE
Virginia.chappell@marquette.edu
Coughlin 330; 414.288.6859

Christina Williams, Assistant Director of FYE
Christina.Williams@marquette.edu
Coughlin 329; 414.288.1553