Social Media Writing
English 178: Digital Media Literature, Culture: Social Media Fiction
Take a deep dive into the literary universe of digital culture! Why are social media users hooked on emojis? Why is #love the most used hashtag on Instagram? What does cancel culture teach us about emotion, imagination, and writing?
This course focuses on the dynamics of social media platforms as spaces for writing and communication. Social media can seem like pointless babble, but it is not. There is logic to how we write on social media. Emojis, typos, misspellings, hashtags, abbreviations, all-caps, and memes are part of a complex language system with quite a few rules and lots of interesting patterns. Focusing on Tik Tok, Instagram, and Facebook, we take a deep dive into the literary universe of digital culture to uncover the order behind the chaos of expressing ourselves on social media.
This course is a hands-on approach to the analysis of social media and creation of content with the objective of getting a better understanding of how social media works on and for us. Our objective is to find the language to talk about what we love but also find unsettling about social media while exploring its creative possibilities.
English 178: Digital Media, Literature, Culture: Social Media Fiction
Class Number: 78486
3 Credits, Lecture: MW 11-11:50am, plus discussion
Requisites: None
Course Designation: Literature
Level: Elementary
L&S Credit: Counts as Liberal Arts and Science credit in L&S
Mode of Instruction: In Person
Will be offered again in SPRING 2026
PATHWAY TO THE DIGITAL STUDIES CERTIFICATE
Constellations and the Digital Studies Certificate are two separate, but highly-related programs: the Social Media Writing course can be a starting point for students interested in pursuing the Digital Studies Certificate. Students who take Social Media Writing earn 3 credits toward the total 16 credits needed to complete the certificate. The Digital Studies Certificate is offered through the Communication Arts Department.
Professor Edoro-Glines is a Nigerian academic of Esan descent. She is an Assistant Professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, specializing in African literature with a focus on the history and theory of the novel in Africa. She also works on digital culture, particularly social media, as it relates to literary form. Additionally, she holds a joint faculty appointment in the African Cultural Studies Department. Beyond her academic role, she is the founder and editor of Brittle Paper, a prominent online platform dedicated to promoting African writing and literary culture. Her work as the editor of Brittle Paper extends beyond academia and involves active engagement with mainstream literary communities and industries, intersecting with digital culture and the global African literary scene.
Her 2023 Constellations course is titled Social Media Writing and examines social media through the lens of literary imagination and creativity.