Exploring the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Social Justice Writing Prompts

This collection of social justice writing prompts introduces students to the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). The UDHR can serve as the course theme for a whole term or the inspiration for an individual assignment. Students can read the UDHR in both English as well as their first language. Students then explore topics of their choice from the UDHR in a variety of essay formats. Through these writing prompts, students gain a general understanding of the purpose and content of the UDHR. They identify political and social tensions around human rights, and they draw connections between lofty aspirations and real-world situations, not only in the U.S., but in their home country and the various cultures of their classmates. Students learn to express in writing their ideas about issues that are important to them, while also contextualizing the issues that impact their classmates. In other words, these writing prompts help students to think more about themselves and their relationship with the world around them.

NOTE: This series of writing prompts are also available as part of the full writing/grammar textbook Coalescence.