Rethinking Travel Writing
Saturdays: September 6 - October 4
1 - 3 p.m. EST
Led by FAITH ADIELE
with guest authors Carey Baraka, Pier Nirandara, Bani Amor, & Noo Saro-Wiwa
$400 $340
(early bird pricing until June 2)
Travel writing is transforming. We’re finally seeing narratives questioning the environmental and human impact of tourism and hearing from those who’ve been shut out for centuries—global majority, queer, and disabled voices. But publishing still privileges leisure travel, and narratives perpetuate imperialistic language and imagery.
Led by award-winning travel writer Faith Adiele, this course invites us to develop our “craft” while updating the genre to challenge Western fantasies of travel as freedom and discovery, include involuntary travelers and native hosts, and reject acquisitional impulses.
Over the five sessions of this course, we’ll turn to experts in the field and learn from conversations with guest speakers Bani Amor, Pier Nirandara, Carey Baraka, and Noo Saro-Wiwa. We will discuss:
key components of literary travel writing like voice and identity when writing as insiders and/or outsiders
creating characters while writing about others vs. The Other
using the senses and research to write about place, especially “zones” mythologized, demonized, or romanticized in the West
revision techniques for decolonizing language and structure
the complications of making a living by looking at the impact of blogging, social media, and visual storytelling on service travel
Each session will include a “craft” discussion, core text reading (enhanced by a class visit from the author!), suggested further readings, and writing assignments. You’ll leave with prompts to complete on your own. As this is a generative class, there’s no workshop component; however, there’ll be opportunities to ask questions, talk through writing challenges, and share briefly. This class is suited for those with some experience writing personal or travel narratives who are looking to add to their tool belt and are excited at the prospect of engaging with these complications and/or those who have felt shut out of the travel writing world.
About the Instructors
Faith Adiele
Carey Baraka
Noo Saro-Wiwa
Bani Amor
Pier Nirandara
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Faith Adiele is a memoirist, essayist, travel writer, and speaker. She is author of Meeting Faith, an award-winning account of becoming Thailand’s first Black Buddhist nun, and recently, experimental chapbooks Her Voice: Hänen Äänensä: A Hybrid Memoir and Voice/Over: A Memoir Breakout in 7 Movies. Media credits include A World of Calm (HBO-Max), Sleep Stories (Calm App), and the documentary My Journey Home (PBS) about finding her family in Nigeria. Her award-winning journalism appears in Alta, Smithsonian, Hyperallergic, Miami Herald, and others. Faith teaches in the MFA Writing Program at California College of the Arts and chairs Writing & Literature.
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Carey Baraka has written for The Atlantic, The New York Review of Books, Guardian Long Reads, Vogue Business, Financial Times, Literary Hub, The Johannesburg Review of Books, 1843 Magazine, The New York Times, Serious Eats, Foreign Policy, Lonely Planet, and Gay Magazine, among other places. He is the recipient of a Miles Morland Fellowship, an Iowa Writers Fellowship, and a Macdowell Fellowship, and is the recipient of grants from the Pulitzer Centre for Global Reporting, and the Silvers Foundation. He is guest editor of Off Assignment.
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Noo Saro-Wiwa is an author and freelance journalist. Her first book, Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria has won numerous accolades, including being selected as BBC Radio 4’s Book of the Week in 2012, named The Sunday Times Travel Book of the Year, 2012. National Geographic and Oprah magazine also listed it among their top travel books. It has been translated into French and Italian. She writes book reviews, travel and opinion articles for publications including Condé Nast Traveller, The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, Prospect, and City AM.
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Bani Amor is a genderqueer travel writer who explores the relationships between race, place, and power. Their work has appeared in CNN Travel, Fodor’s, Teen Vogue, and Lonely Planet, among other outlets, and in the anthology Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity. Bani is a four-time VONA/Voices Fellow who leads workshops and gives lectures on decolonization and travel culture.
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Pier Nirandara is an award-winning author, travel writer, film producer, and underwater photographer. A multi-TEDx speaker and former literary ambassador for the Bangkok Metropolitan/UNESCO, Pier has written for BBC, AFAR, Lonely Planet, Condé Nast Traveler, Off Assignment, Catapult, Oceanographic Magazine, Adventure.com, among others. Her words have won at the Lowell Thomas Awards from the Society of American Travel Writers, the Solas Awards for Best Travel Writing of the Year, and at the Book Passage Travel Writers & Photographers Conference awards. She has represented literary clients at ICM Partners, served as Director of Development at Sony Pictures, and as VP of Film & TV at A-Major Media, Hollywood’s first Asian American-driven production company.
Class Schedule
We'll be joined by Bani Amor on September 6; Noo Saro-Wiwa on September 13; Carey Baraka on September 20; and Pier Nirandara on September 27.
Details
This course will take place on Zoom on Saturdays September 6 - October 4 from 1-3 p.m. EST. Participants will receive a Zoom link prior to the course as well as a recording of the course afterward.
There is a 10% cancellation fee if you cancel your enrollment more than 1 week before the start of the course. No refund will be given if cancelling within less than a week of the course start date (or after the course has begun).
Please email courses@offassignment.com with any questions.
FAQs →
Financial Aid
The full price for this course is $400, with early bird pricing at $340 available until June 2.
A limited number of scholarships for this course are available. Please fill out this form by August 15, and we’ll get back to you within a week.
Off Assignment’s Masters’ Series courses are unique five-session courses that delve deep into a specific writing topic by harnessing the expertise and craft tactics of a renowned writer in a particular niche, plus four celebrated authors. Participating writers gain a wealth of advanced techniques while benefiting from a cohesive community of disciplined writers.