Caitlin Amaral

faculty

Caitlin Amaral she/her

Associate Teaching Professor

English & Communication

Contact

508-999-8393

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Liberal Arts 303

Education

1995Columbia UniversityMFA
1993Tufts UniversityBA

Teaching

Programs

Teaching

Courses

An introduction to the principles of journalism, news, and article writing. The course concentrates on reporting practice and techniques, information gathering, writing style, ethics, objectivity in reporting, and current trends in journalism.

Techniques of writing fiction. Guides students through writing and refining short fiction. This course develops students' abilities to create and revise short stories reflecting an understanding of the elements of fiction, including characterization, dialogue, plot, setting, point of view, and theme. In addition, students will analyze their own writing, peer stories, and model stories. Students will learn how to respond to the writing of their peers and offer helpful feedback. Workshop format.

An exploration of the problems and principles of such feature story modes as profiles, how-to articles, narrative adventures, humor, news features, investigative reporting, interpretive and analytic reporting, opinion columns, and editorials.

Exploration of the forms of fiction and how a writer's creative choices with regard to form determine characterization, dialogue, plot, and narration. Assignments will include writing various creative pieces. Forms include, but are not limited to, the paragraph, the short story, the novella, and the novel.

Internship opportunities in the public and private sector. Students will augment their internship with on­ campus seminar meetings and assignments designed to integrate the student's real-world experience with the academic discipline. Typical internships are with organizations in publishing, government, media, journalism, software, public relations, and a variety of public and non-profit areas.

Internship opportunities in the public and private sector. Students will augment their internship with on­ campus seminar meetings and assignments designed to integrate the student's real-world experience with the academic discipline. Typical internships are with organizations in publishing, government, media, journalism, software, public relations, and a variety of public and non-profit areas.

Teaching

Online and Continuing Education Courses

Internship opportunities in the public and private sector. Students will augment their internship with on­ campus seminar meetings and assignments designed to integrate the student's real-world experience with the academic discipline. Typical internships are with organizations in publishing, government, media, journalism, software, public relations, and a variety of public and non-profit areas.

Research

Research interests

  • Journalism
  • Creative Writing
  • Media
  • Communications

Select publications

Caitlin O'Neil came to UMass Dartmouth in Fall 2009. She teaches journalism and creative writing. She is the advisor to the student newspaper, The Torch, and the campus literary magazine, Temper. In addition, she is the director of The Student Media Collaborative, an independent, student-centered media initiative that works with community partners such as the New Bedford Light, WCAI, and The Public’s Radio (TPR) to create publication, internship, and mentorship opportunities for students.

Prior to joining the UMassD faculty full-time, she taught as a senior lecturer at Suffolk University. Prior to teaching, Caitlin was an award-winning writer and producer for WGBH Interactive in Boston, working on well-known PBS programs such as American Experience, Masterpiece Theatre, Mystery, Antiques Roadshow, and This Old House.

Her freelance work has appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Standard Times, Publishers Weekly, Budget Travel, and Poets & Writers magazine. Her short fiction has appeared in the Kenyon Review, Indiana Review, Tampa Review, the Massachusetts Review, Ninth Letter, The Masters Review, and Calyx and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She won the Tampa Review’s Danahy Prize, the Ninth Letter Prize in Fiction, the Women Who Write International Short Prose Contest, and received a Massachusetts Cultural Council individual artist grant. She has had residencies at the Vermont Studio Center, The Community of Writers at Squaw Valley, and MassMOCA. She is a current BookEnds Fellow at Stony Brook University.