Feature Writing for the 21st Century

Syllabus created by Jamie Lauren Keiles
Journalism + Design, Eugene Lang College, The New School
2020

Course Description 

This course is a bold dive into feature writing — a form of journalism that combines research and reporting with narrative nonfiction storytelling techniques. Students will read and analyze a broad selection of magazine features from throughout the last hundred years including but not limited to celebrity profiles, idea-driven stories, reported personal essays, and works of “new journalism.” (Writers will include Truman Capote, Susan Orlean, Vinson Cunningham, and Jia Tolentino). Through a historical understanding of the form, students will write features of their own, suitable for publication in today’s complex media ecosystem. Visiting writers will speak to the class about their own feature writing strategy. Students will emerge with a good draft of at least one feature and an understanding of feature writing skills like scene construction, quote selection, tone, pacing, and point of view.

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Grading

Line item	% of grade
Attendance	10%
Assignment Completion	40%
Midterm Portfolio	25%
Final Feature	25%

Course Readings

• No Regrets: Three Discussions
• Tricks of the Trade by Howard S. Becker (PDF available here)

Materials

Recording interviews with a digital voice recorder instead of your phone is strongly recommended. The Sony ICD-PX470 Stereo Digital Voice Recorder works well. There are many secondhand digital recorders available cheaply on Ebay.