Writing in the Humanities

Students within the Writing in the Humanities discipline will learn and practice the techniques that humanities scholars use to collect, organize, analyze, and present their research findings and to justify the significance of their research goals. Students will also practice conducting research, discussing and presenting research-based arguments, composing written, oral, and multimedia modes, and completing reflective writing tasks that are used effectively in the humanities. 

In addition to writing and researching skills, students can expect to:

• Utilize conventions, genres, and rhetoric practiced in the humanities
• Conduct research using a variety of methods, databases, and sources
• Identify how best to use research and evidence in discipline-specific compositions
• Review and revise your own work and assist others in revising their work

Related Majors

105i Spotlight: Gabby Hubert

Gabby Hubert, a double major in Public Policy and English Comparative Literature, came out of her English 105i Humanities class with the research knowledge that she now professionally incorporates into her position at the Asia Foundation. She works as the gender research intern and continuously utilizes what she learned in her 105i class “to get publications and co-authorship of reports” of her data on gender disparity analysis. Coming to UNC, Gabby says, “I definitely really knew I wanted to go into the humanities and I thought it made sense to develop specifically those writing skills,” so the English 105i Humanities course was the clear choice. 

For Gabby, the most important thing 105i taught her was the drafting process. She reflects, “I feel [as though] I really made it through high school without ever learning how to outline and I think that 105i [corrected] bad habits that I [used to have,] like not doing full drafts and procrastinating until the last minute. 105i has made it so much easier now that I feel like I do a way better job.” The peer review process was especially helpful with this, “If you are in a 105i Humanities class, pay attention to your drafts [and] the peer reviews. They will be so helpful when you have accurate drafts to present.”

Still deciding what ENGL 105 class to take? Gabby has some advice, “For people thinking about doing a 105i class versus a 105, if you have any sense of what field you want to go in, [the class] makes a big difference to only be working on developing those skills that are gonna be relevant in that field.”