For students in the Writing, Rhetoric, and Discourse department it comes as no surprise that the act of writing carries social power. That power can be used for good or for ill. For Dr. Maria Prikhodko that strength in writing as a social activity is what drives her course WRD 377: Writing and Social Engagement which is being offered in the Spring Quarter. In Dr. Prikhodko’s class students aren’t just invested in their own classroom community, they are connected with students in Brazil.
According to Dr. Prikhodko, starting in Week 4, students will have weekly collaborations with students from Unichristus University in Fortaleza, Brazil as a means to “strengthen their intercultural rhetorical competencies and global citizenship skills.” In total students will collaborate with their Brazilian peers 6-7 times. These collaborations are designed around activities that are extensions or more practical applications of knowledge students gain in the previous week’s class. For example, students will have readings on the concept of intersectional identities on local and global scales before collaborating on an essay and watching a short video during their next collaboration.
Plus, the class fulfills the Experiential Learning requirement of the Liberal Studies Program. What excites her most about teaching this course is that it gives space to “problematize issues of colonial perspectives attached to English learning or history.” WRD students know how frequent those kinds of problems are in our work, so these kinds of classes are paramount to toppling those issues.
Moreover, this class excites Dr. Prikhodko because she is a second language speaker/writer with English as she was born and raised in Russia. So having an opportunity to confront issues of linguistic power is important to her. “Given my background in foreign philology and applied linguistics, conversations around systems of power attached to English in the US and globally (Brazil as an example) allows me to feel [a sense of belonging.” She also recognizes that courses like WRD 377 are important for the ever-changing student body that reflects a need to change up the rhetorical Canon.
“I am also tuned with how culturally diverse the US already has been,” she said. “From year to year, teaching at DePaul proves this observation – I adjust my definition of diversity seeing the changing demographics of every class. WRD 377 is not an exception. However, frequently WRD 377 student[s] lament about little exposure, not to just rhetorical tools or practice but rather knowing how to utilize them. They are diverse and have their own rhetorical practices to appeal to their audience or just construct knowledge. However, this class allows [them] to bring more patience and empathy into this dialogue and [adjust] their voice to be heard by a culturally diverse audience.”
A course like WRD 377 is increasingly vital for well-rounded students. It gives them a chance to learn outside of the more traditional rhetorical texts in a more globally focused context. It provides students with a more “non-essential (holistic)” way of looking at writing, language, and culture. It’s about gaining a comprehensive understanding of how different places encounter issues without being simply a comparison between the United States and another country. A greater awareness will help students “communicate more meaningfully with other cultures, ethnicities and genders, and just other realities.”