E N G 5X X X : E N V IR O N M E N T A L WR IT I N G

[Semester and Year]

[Meeting time and Location (if face-to-face)]

Instructor Information
Instructor Email Office Location & Hours
[Instructor Name] [Email address] [Location, Hours, Days]

General Information
Course Description
This course focuses on the intersections between environmental issues, contemporary modes of writing and
communicating, new media, and social change while examining the ways in we write and talk about these
relationships in both public and private forums. The course is designed to introduce you to a variety of
environmental writing genres to understand the rhetorical decisions that inform these compositions and
influence citizens’ decision-making processes about their environmental positions. By analyzing existing
works of environmental writing and also producing pieces environmental writing, you will work with a
range of topics such as climate change, rhetorics of risk, environmental advocacy, social media and
grassroots movements, and corporate “greenwashing.” In the course, you will be exposed to a variety of
interdisciplinary readings, films, popular press articles, and other multimedia materials. At the completion of
the course, you will have a theoretical, methodological, and practical understanding about how
environmental writing functions to influence both public and private spheres as well as the ability to
produce effective works of environmental communication.

Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of this course, you will be able to

✓ Critically analyze the role of media in the formation of public opinions and behaviors regarding the
relationship between human beings and the natural world

✓ Articulate environmental concerns in the medium most appropriate for the message

✓ Reflect on the ways in which the environment is written and talked about in both public and private
discourse

✓ Design effective documents for both digital and print compositions

✓ Develop the ability to engage in research, analysis, and action regarding environmental
sustainability.

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Required Texts
Environmental Communication and the Public Sphere (4th ed.) by Robert Cox and Phaedra Pezzullo

Rhetoric of Risk by Beverly Sauer

All other readings, listed in the schedule below, are available electronically through the Wayne State
Libraries’ digital collections and linked in the “Readings” folder on our Canvas site.

Course Policies
Attendance/Participation
Attendance is mandatory. If you need to miss a class session for any legitimate reason, please negotiate with
me in advance to ensure you have access to those materials. In class, your full attention to the material is
expected. This course will be approached as a workplace environment and your participation and behavior
should match those expectations.

Academic Dishonesty
According the the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences policy on plagiarism, instructors are required to
report all instance of academic dishonesty and have the responsibility to notify the student of alleged
violations and the action being taken. Both the student and the instructor are entitled to due process in all
such cases. Acts of dishonesty may lead to failure in a given course, suspension, or expulsion.

Other Campus Specific Policies

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Assignments
Weekly Reading Responses (20%): Almost every week of the course, you will be asked to produce a 2-3
response to the assigned readings. Each response will be guided by a series of questions.

Popular Culture Review (10%): You will select a popular culture representation of an environmental issue
(movie, television show, work of fiction, etc.). You will produce a 750-1000 word review that summarizes
the issue represented, describe its accuracy, and make predictions regarding how this popular culture
representation influences public opinion.

Risk Communication Memo (10%): You will produce a 1-2 page, single-spaced memo that outlines a
potential environmental risk and, based on your chosen audience, produce a series of recommendations for
either preventing, mediating, or surviving that risk.

News Writing Report (15%): You will produce a 1,000-1,500 word press release or popular news article
that reports on an environmental issue.

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Conflict Management Report (15%): You will produce a 2-3 page, single-spaced recommendation report
that outlines an environmental conflict and suggests potential ways to resolve or mediate the conflict.

Environmental Campaign Proposal (10%): Leading up to the final, you will produce a 500-700 words
proposal to either produce a full environmental campaign.

Final Environmental Campaign (20%): You will produce a full environmental campaign, including press
releases, news articles, social media materials, field reports, and a 3-4 page rationale for your campaign
choices.

Course Schedule
Week Topic Reading/Watching Assignments

1 Introductions/Definitions Cox and Pezzullo, Introduction and Introduction Blog Post

Part I Reading Response 1

2 News, Entertainment, and the Cox and Pezzullo, Part II Reading Response 2
Construction of Environment

3 News, Entertainment, and the Watch The 11th Hour Popular Culture Review
Construction of Environment Read Solnit, “Detroit Arcadia”

4 Multiple dimensions of climate Cox and Pezzullo, Part III Reading Response 3
change communication

5 Multiple dimensions of climate Watch “What is climate change?” Reading Response 4

change communication Read Nisbet, “Communicating
Climate Change: Why Frames
Matter for Public Engagement”

6 Risk communication Read Sauer, Rhetoric of Risk Risk Communication Memo

7 Environmental Campaigns and Read Cox and Pezzullo, Chapter 8 Reading Response 5
Movements and 9

8 Environmental Campaigns and Read Carli, “Is Digital Media Reading Response 6
Movements Worse?”
Watch, “Media and the
Environment”
Read “Corporate Greening”

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9 Environmental Campaigns and Read Cox and Pezzullo, Chapter 10 Reading Response 7
Movements and 11 News Writing Report

10 Public Deliberation on Read Cox and Pezzullo, Chapter 12 Reading Response 8

Environmental Decision Making Read *article here*

11 Environmental Conflict Read Cox and Pezzullo, Chapter 13 Conflict Management Report
Management and 14

12 Designing Effective Reading Response 9

Environmental Campaigns

13 Campaign Analysis Campaign Proposal

14 Responsibility in Environmental Read Cox, “Nature’s ‘Crisis Reading Response 10

Communication Disciplines;” Heath et al.,
“Response to Cox;” Plec “Response
to Cox;” Senecah “Impetus,
Mission, and the Future of
Environmental Communication”

15 Final Due

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