21st Century Literary Genres

Vocabulary flashcards covering the major 21st-century literary genres and related concepts discussed in the lecture notes.

21st Century Literary Genre

Works commonly published and shared on the web that employ multimedia features not possible in traditional print literature.

Wattpad

A website and app where readers and writers publish user-generated stories in numerous genres such as fiction, poetry, fan-fiction, and more.

Battle Rap

Competitive rap battling featuring boasts, insults, and freestyle verses delivered live or on recordings to determine who has the superior lines.

Spoken Poetry

Performance-based poetry that often addresses social justice, politics, race, and community, using elements like music, sound, and movement to engage audiences.

Textula

A poem created and shared via mobile phone messaging; chapters are 70-100 words due to character limits and often follow the tanaga form.

Tanaga

A traditional Filipino poem of four lines with seven syllables each (7-7-7-7); rhyme schemes vary but the poem is usually untitled.

Hyperpoetry

Also called cyberpoetry or graphic poetry; digital poetry presented on a computer screen, using visuals and graphics to enhance meaning.

Chick Lit

Light-hearted, often humorous fiction portraying modern womanhood; protagonists are career-oriented women in their 20s or 30s, usually set in urban environments and ending with romance.

Speculative Fiction

Umbrella genre that explores the human condition through imaginative lenses such as fantasy, science fiction, horror, dystopia, and alternate history.

Flash Fiction

Extremely brief fictional prose (6–1,000 words) that still provides character and plot; forms include six-word stories, dribbles (50 words), drabbles (100 words), and sudden fiction (750 words).

Doodle Fiction

Literary work that replaces traditional fonts with doodles, handwritten graphics, and drawings integrated into the narrative.

Manga

A general English term for comic books and graphic novels originally published in Japan.

Graphic Novel

A complete narrative told through comic-style images, dialogue bubbles, and narration boxes; longer and more self-contained than serialized comic books.

Illustrated Novel

An extended narrative where multiple images combine with text to generate meaning, rather than relying on a single decorated cover or frontispiece.

Digital Fiction

Storytelling that merges three media—book, film/video, and website—into a single, interactive narrative experience.

Science Fiction (Sci-Fi)

Speculative fiction focused on futuristic science, advanced technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel universes, or extraterrestrial life.

Blog

An online journal where an author regularly shares thoughts or information on specific subjects with readers.