I want to let you know about the “Great Books of Journalism” class I’ll be teaching in the spring. It’s an unusual class in that it is structured like a book club. We read eight books over the semester and one night a week we sit down in a comfortable seminar setting and talk about them—how they are structured, reported, narrated, written. The books are all classics of journalism and nonfiction. They range from books about political power and corruption, to endemic poverty, to oranges, to front-line soldiers in Iraq, to traveling the back roads of America, to living with the poorest of the poor in India. They range from investigative historical narrative, to first-person poetic documentary, to matter-of-fact third-person descriptive, to deep personal reporter immersion, to combinations of all of these approaches. They reveal journalism on a far wider and grander stage than most ever imagine. You’ll write a 700-word essay on each book. No final exam. You’ll write a longer final essay on all the books. Students have ranked the class as excellent each time I’ve taught it. It’s listed as a 460 course in the Department of Journalism, although you don’t need to be a journalism major (or even a College of Media student) to take it or enjoy it. There are no prerequisites.
I love teaching this class and hope you’ll give it consideration.
Of course, I’ll be glad to answer any questions you might have about it.
Best,
Walt Harrington
Professor
Department of Journalism
wharring@illinois.edu
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