ARU Writers Guild Manifesto

Anglia Ruskin University Writer's Guild Manifesto

The aims and objectives of the Writer's Guild society are as followed:

To provide an online community for ARU members to submit, participate, and workshop creative ideas for writing, film, and other literacy-based creative endeavors. This includes anything that contains written work, or a narrative structure.

To host regular society events. These events include, but are not limited to; Workshops, guest speaking, book/film discussions, writing talks and tools, writing challenges and competitions, and other assorted events.

To create an active writing scene, and provide our community with challenges, competitions, writing prompts, and other stimulating writing possibilities.

To host & create a dedicated publishing space for society members to submit their work too, for others to see, read, and interact with.

What events and/or activities will the Writer's Guild Provide?

Here is a list of all the activities that our society aims to provide:

Writing workshops

Guest speaker talks

Writing challenges

Writing competitions

Writing/film discussions

Dedicated writing time

Creative feedback sessions

And more...

We hope to provide these events via two methods:

A bi-weekly event hosted in Cambridge

Through our online presence, such as Discord & Instagram

How and what does Society Membership provide?

In order to be a recognized ARU society, we must have a minimum of 10 fully-paid members by the end of the first two months of our society activity including committee members. Otherwise, we lose funding and recognition from ARU.

Membership must be a minimum of £3.60, this is a once-off payment, and all funds go to running the society.

In accordance with ARU societal rules, only paid members can run to be part of the committee. This means any member wishing to run for president or for any other role, must be a paid member.

Are paid members treated any differently? - The only difference is they can't run for office, we hope to only establish membership for the benefit of getting the society recognized by ARU and receive things like funding, room space, and connections to bring in guest speakers.

Community Guidelines on allowed and prohibited content:

We believe in freedom of expression, and encourage our members to discuss a wide range of topics. However, there are some areas that are either prohibited or will be placed behind explicit tagged warnings.

When posting material, our committee review members will check to see if it follows our community guidelines and may take your work down, or provide tags based on their judgments.

Content that must be tagged for viewers:

Adult/explicit content (This includes themes such as sexual activity)

Self-harm and suicide (This will be labeled based on context)

Politics and political views (It must be clearly stated that this work is intended to provide context on a political state to remove reader bias)

Disturbing or unsettling themes (Such as intense horror or work meant to initiate a strong emotional response.

Banned content includes the following;

Radicalization or terrorism (This refers to work that incites radicalization or terrorism, and not the idea as a concept.)

Hate speech (Work that is directed at a specific person(s) or group)

Defamatory work in the form of slander or libel. (Providing false or character-damaging writing or words against an individual or group.)

Plagiarism (Passing other people's work off as your own.)

How often do I need to participate in society activities?

You can participate as little or as much as you like. Outside of our bi-weekly sessions, we will be running online events such as writing competitions and discussions, as well as providing things such as publishing space and writing tools.

We hope all members feel welcome and interested in participating, even if you are not a society regular. Our sessions will be open to all ARU student members, teachers, and other writing enthusiasts outside of the University.