This course introduces critical reading and writing as essential skills for engaging with contemporary sociocultural issues. Drawing on methods from literary and cultural studies, students analyze how cultural meanings are produced, circulated, and contested in social contexts. Through essays, fiction, academic articles, and films, the course examines sociocultural issues related to language and representation, identity and subjectivity, and media and popular culture, with attention to their cultural politics. Emphasizing humanities-based inquiry, the course helps students develop their ability to evaluate arguments, analyze competing perspectives, and produce evidence-based writing that expresses informed positions on current sociocultural topics.