The Literature of Fact: Reporting the Anthropocene

This course will introduce students to the climate crisis and how journalists tell its stories. The topic subsumes traditional beats-politics, science, business-energy, and its urgency stress-tests the boundaries between activism and journalism. Students will reverse-engineer classic environmental texts, translate scientific reports, and, in their own work, link climate to individual lives. Through readings, discussion, guest speakers, newsroom visits, and writing assignments, students will learn to report on climate and write about it at a professional level.

Distribution Area: LA

Prerequisites and Restrictions

If the course fills, you may email Jeannine Matt Pitarresi, Journalism Program Manager, at jp16@princeton.edu to be put on a waitlist. Please include a paragraph explaining your interest in the course.

Other Information

Carolyn Kormann is a writer at The New Yorker whose recent work includes an investigation into the devastating 2023 Maui fires, a profile of the chef Sean Sherman, a series on the pandemic, and other pieces focused on climate change, energy, and the environment. Her writings have also appeared in New York, Harper’s, Porter, NPR Music, and VQR, and have been selected three times by the Best American Series.

Sections

S01 — Carolyn Kormann

Wednesdays, 1:30-4:20 PM

Instructor(s)

Staff