Creative Writing, M.F.A.

Vision:

Reading and writing are acts of love and survival pursued for the intense pleasures of creativity and imagination, and for the human need to communicate. The Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at Belmont University calls students to explore the written word as practitioners in order to better understand the means by which we know ourselves, our communities, and our empathy for others. Our faculty members, all working writers themselves, through teaching, mentoring, and collaboration, seek to expand students’ knowledge and understanding of writing and literature by aiding their developing abilities in the formal, structural, historical, and aesthetic ideals of effective creative writing for the reading public.

Purpose:

In the MFA in Creative Writing at Belmont, courses are designed to build on strengths and knowledge from students’ undergraduate experiences, to broaden their awareness of literature and writing, and to prepare them for the life of a writer. The graduate faculty is committed to fostering the skills of critical reading as well as creative writing, and to increasing student expertise in their chosen genre of study: fiction, poetry, or creative nonfiction. The program engages students in studying the craft of each creative writing genre, in reading literature from different cultural traditions, and in participating in intensive writing workshops to hone their imaginations and aesthetics. The program encourages students to develop professionally through sharing their work repeatedly with their peers, compiling reflective portfolios, and submitting their work for publication at leading literary journals. The MFA in Creative Writing at Belmont prepares students for Ph.D. programs in creative writing, but it will also prepare them to teach writing at the post-secondary level and to live their lives as working writers.

Goals:

The Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing:

1. promotes effective, creative, and reflective reading, writing, and imaginative thinking;
2. presents literature and the craft of writing within historical and cultural contexts;
3. introduces students to diverse strategies for interpreting literature of others and of their own;
4. explores with students the structures, complexities, and development of creative writing genres;
5. integrates local and global learning experiences into the curriculum taught by working writers;
6. requires students to develop the skills necessary to be a working writer by employing current professional standards and emerging technologies-and to think critically about these resources and tools;
7. engages students in independent research and long-term writing projects, such as a thesis.