Creative Formats Across Media and Disciplines: Assignments beyond the essay

Creative Formats Across Media and Disciplines guides instructors and students to examine how different formats shape meaning. Grounded in art and design practices while recognizing how disciplines from STEM to the humanities use formats to structure information, it bridges the divide between fields where format diversity is readily embraced and those where form and content remain separate concerns. Through concrete examples—video narratives, choreographed dance, quilted data visualizations—it illustrates possibilities for communication in varied contexts.

With teaching tools, expert-authored lesson plans, curated resources, and student stories, the book helps instructors design coursework that offers students options for exploring and expressing ideas creatively. It also serves as a practical resource for students who may not have the time, access, or resources to pursue formal art and design training, providing structured support for working intentionally across formats. Students learn when and why to select formats and how to work within each form's unique affordances and constraints. Where format experimentation often happens in silos, this book fosters shared language and transparent expectations that build format literacy throughout academia—from classrooms to writing centers and into students' creative and professional work.