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Summer Registration Opens May 18
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MEM 116 — The Self and Beyond: Memoir Workshop

Quarter: Summer
Instructor(s): Ruth Whippman
Duration: 6 weeks
Location: On-campus
Date(s): Jun 24—Jul 29
Class Recording Available: No
Class Meeting Day: Wednesdays
Grade Restriction: No letter grade
Class Meeting Time: 5:30—8:00 pm (PT)
Tuition: $655
   
Refund Deadline: Jun 26
 
Unit(s): 1
   
Enrollment Limit: 18
  
Status: Registration opens May 18, 8:30 am (PT)
 
Quarter: Summer
Day: Wednesdays
Duration: 6 weeks
Time: 5:30—8:00 pm (PT)
Date(s): Jun 24—Jul 29
Unit(s): 1
Location: On-campus
 
Tuition: $655
 
Refund Deadline: Jun 26
 
Instructor(s): Ruth Whippman
 
Grade Restriction: No letter grade
 
Enrollment Limit: 18
 
Recording Available: No
 
Status: Registration opens May 18, 8:30 am (PT)
 
 
The best memoirs use personal experience to illuminate larger questions, but there are different ways to construct a compelling personal story that resonates with readers. Some authors, like Elizabeth Gilbert, Joan Didion, and Paul Kalanithi, rely on intimate, voice-driven storytelling. Others, like Maggie Nelson, Melissa Febos, and Trevor Noah, braid in strands of research, reporting, or even cultural history. Both kinds of work will guide our discussions, helping you identify your most vivid material and how best to bring it alive on the page. Through lectures, conversation, and guided exercises, you will learn strategies for shaping narrative arcs, structuring a book-length project, and finding the universal themes within your experience. Students may workshop up to 2,000 words for supportive feedback and are welcome to submit memoir chapters or personal essays. You will leave with new pages, a clear sense of the shape your work should take, and confidence in the power of your story.

RUTH WHIPPMAN
Author

Ruth Whippman is the author of America the Anxious: How Our Pursuit of Happiness Is Creating a Nation of Nervous Wrecks and BoyMom: Reimagining Boyhood in the Age of Impossible Masculinity. Her work has been covered by outlets including NPR, the BBC, CNN, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and The New York Times. She is a regular contributor to radio, TV, and podcasts.