WCWP 10B: The Writing Course B

Professor Simrita Dhir

The world’s wealthiest one billion people are responsible for over 50% of the climate pollution, but it will be the bottom three billion, the most politically and economically vulnerable populations of the world, who will suffer the gravest consequences to climate change. Is it fair? In this writing course, students will think critically, read, and write about climate change and its impacts on the most politically and economically vulnerable populations of the world, to present climate hope.

Professor Tricia Ornelas

Hadley Clark, Sarah Stembridge, Sarah Callahan, Bibi Renssen, Sophia Zummo, Pedro Pimenta

The climate crisis is real, and the impacts of climate disruption are already being felt here in San Diego and across California. However, those impacts are not being distributed equally. Furthermore, according to recent studies, only 43% of Californians talk about the climate crisis with others on a regular basis. In other words, the problem is big. It is real. We need solutions. And we need hope. But we don't know how to talk or write in ways that spur action or inspire hope. So, what should we do?

For students interested in the intersections of environmental science, justice and communication, this 10B is for you. Our course explores these topics and tensions by asking big questions. How will the climate crisis impact people we love and care about in our local communities? What solutions are most needed in our cities and towns? How should we teach about the solutions in our local schools? In our favorite majors and classes? And how can we communicate to inspire action, change, hope in the face of challenge?

Professor Emma Uriarte

The idea “you are what you eat” has been around for centuries, traced back an 1825 book by French author Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin. The idea suggests that food is much more than a biological necessity: it is an essential piece of our identity. Eating, even if done alone, is an inherently social act influenced by family, culture, geography, status, and era. This class will explore our relationship to food—what and how we eat, who we eat it with, how we can think more critically about it.

Our study of food will be inherently interdisciplinary; we will look at it through varied lenses, from cultural shifts and historical events to environmental impacts and social justice. In thinking and writing about food this quarter, we will be considering various critical perspectives about what (and how) we consume.

Professor Walter Merryman

Economists and sociologists have noted a rise in wealth inequality in the United States since 1980. Research ties this inequality to changes in income among different socio-economic groups and to changes in social mobility across generations, a metric often used to capture the “American Dream.” However, wealth inequality is often measured at a very broad scale—nationally, globally, sometimes over decades—and it can be difficult to connect this to everyday life. Students in this class will research different scholarly interpretations of this inequality along with its circumstances, environment, and effects. Writing projects will include a personal narrative that connects personal experience with data and a research project analyzing wealth generation within a significant American industry.