Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in Creative and Professional Writing

Programme Director: Mr SHEA, James

The Creative and Professional Writing Programme of the Hong Kong Baptist University is the first UGC-funded undergraduate programme in Hong Kong tertiary institutions dedicated to creative and professional writing learning in both Chinese and English languages. It is committed to a distinctive mission of higher education in providing an interdisciplinary and bilingual writing programme that develops and sustains the Role Statement of the University that "Hong Kong Baptist University aspires to be a premier institution of higher learning providing broad-based, creativity-inspiring education with distinctive contribution to the advancement of knowledge through research and scholarship." Apart from cultivating students to write in creative and professional fields, the Creative and Professional Writing Programme also aims to nurture students’ academic potential, cultural dimensions and sense of creativity, and to enhance their professional value.

To pursue these goals, the Programme carries certain distinguishing characteristics:

1. Bilingual Teaching and Learning: Students will read, write and speak in Chinese as well as English, developing their skills in both languages. Bilingual ability enables students to respond to Hong Kong’s specific linguistic environment.
2. Interdisciplinarity: All the Creative and Professional Writing courses are designed to ensure that students are exposed to the writing demands and strategies of diverse disciplines, including art criticism, language, literature, history, philosophy, media studies, business and science.

The Programme emphasises the following general aims:

1. To provide students with a vigorous curriculum to develop creative and professional writing skills in Chinese and English languages;
2. To develop students’ abilities when writing professionally in different genres and contexts to enhance students’ career opportunities;
3. To cultivate students to produce original works of fiction, poetry, or nonfiction;
4. To enhance students’ cultural literacy which would act as a solid basis for their creative and professional writing; and
5. To build up their knowledge for self-directed and life-long learning in the world of professional writing and publishing.

The practicum of the Creative and Professional Writing Programme has two focuses: one is on creative writing while another one on professional writing. Not everyone can become a great creative writer, but professional writing always includes a significant creative component. Our society urgently needs writers of all kinds. The professional writing portion of the curriculum, with good infusion of the creative side, can prepare students to work for a great variety of future careers. It goes without saying that graduates with excellent writing skills, both in English and Chinese, are of great demand. It not only meets the demand of the market in creative industry, news media, publishing houses, editorship of journals, government offices, non-profit and charity organisations, education sector, etc., but also in business sector, industrial sector, and financial sector. There would be a strong demand for the graduates of this Programme from the education sector that increasingly emphasises the writing education. The interdisciplinary approach would also build a solid foundation for students to pursue postgraduate studies.

The 60 major units of the Programme consist of 42 units of Required Courses and 18 units of courses from the two Major Electives of English and Chinese writing. The Required Courses provide fundamental learning in writing and concepts in aesthetics, theories and ideas in creativity, and cultural differences, in order to enhance students’ intellectual cognition and skills. Each of the two Major Electives consists of two Modules—one in creative writing and one in professional writing. There are four Modules altogether. Students are required to select at least one course from each of the four Modules, so that they will be trained both in Chinese writing and English writing, and be skilled both in creative and professional writing.

The structure of the curriculum is as follows:

Requirements