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Lorne Kotler, Kamala Anandam, A Partnership of Teacher and Computer in Teaching Writing, College Composition and Communication, Vol. 34, No. 3, Composing Processes: Assessments of Recent Research, New Research, Applications in the Classroom (Oct., 1983), pp. 361-367

Chapters on doing research in the library are the backwater of English handbooks and rhetorics. Even a cursory survey of the contents of these chapters reveals a strange combination of intimidating lists of indexes, vague-if hopeful-advice about the uses of the card catalogue, and caveats about choosing books carefully and remembering not to steal them. After reading through seventeen introductions to research in twelve currently marketed handbooks, a recently issued guide to the research paper, two popular textbooks, and two widely used technical writing handbooks, I am led to ask 1) what relation exists between what professional researchers do and what the handbooks recommend and describe? 2) what should be the pedagogical goals of these chapters? and 3) how might research writing be taught more effectively ? Professional researchers start with an hypothesis or an observation, not with a topic; they look for answers, not for an exercise in debate; and when they seek out information, professionals scope. They look for every conceivable way to save time and cut through the literature by finding a few trustworthy guides. First, of course, they turn to the telephone to network, to make contact with people who can recommend either experts or publications that present the most recent information. Second, researchers send letters of inquiry to concerned individuals and organizations, a strategy that recognizes that we live and work by committees, institutes, centers, associations, and lobbies that produce thousands of publications, many of which may never appear in traditional bibliographies. Professionals also use automated bibliographic searching, with all of the methods now available for selecting review articles and limiting the field in other ways. Finally, and most important for the purposes of composition teachers, professionals use selected bibliographic tools to find 1) recent studies, 2) review articles, and 3) recent publications that include annotated bibliographies. Here I would emphasize the word selected. It takes time to use

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tion in its own right. Many of us have sought to define it as an academic discipline not only by its special area of study, but also by means of its specific methodology. Our area of study may be located between that of the psychology of learning and that of traditional literature. Our methodology is distinguished, on the one hand, from that of cognitive science by an emphasis on pedagogical application; on the other hand, crucially, it is distinguished from most literary studies by an interest in an empiricism modeled on that of the social sciences. We have followed the usual procedure of an emerging specialist community in making these distinctions. The practice of the natural sciences, especially that of mathematical physics, is exemplary for all disciplines which have as their goal the achievement of objective knowledge. The great prestige of the natural sciences and, to a lesser extent, that of the older social sciences has repeatedly influenced scholars in the humanities to pattern their research on scientific models. We have seen this, for instance, in linguistics and history. History is now virtually two disciplines, one humanistic, the other social scientific. Linguistics is emerging from a long period of consideration of exactly what is necessary for the founding of a science of language. It is developing as a model for a discipline that has, in large part, crossed the line from the humanities to the social sciences. The reasons for these changes are not confined to the requirements of the search for pure knowledge, but often

questions are academic and he gets nowhere. When it is prescribed for him he runs around in dogmatic circles. But when he uses it boldly to ask questions, a flood of unexpected answers rises to tax his utmost capacity to understand.' I find this view of refreshingly different from that presented in other current psychologies. There, is viewed as the outcome, and one to be carefully controlled for at that. More importantly, Kelly's view of helps explain my own process of learning through experience. My teaching, in its evolutionary course, makes sense when construed from this perspective. Clearly, the significant changes in my teaching of writing, and of writing courses for teachers, began as experiments, with my as the experimental means. As Kelly said, behavior is indeed a question posed in such a way as to commit man to the role and obligations of an experimenter.2

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James L. Kinneavy's A Theory of Discourse: The Aims of Discourse (PrenticeHall, 1971) has contributed much to field of English. Evidence of its impact that it required reading for two NEH seminars-Edward P. J. Corbett's summer seminar at Ohio State and Dudley Bailey's year-long seminar at University of Nebraska. This evident concern and book's recent appearance in paperback (Norton, 1980) prompt a review of its strengths and limitations. Kinneavy clarifies need for order in English studies, but-to use his own term for characterizing field-his work preparadigmatic in that his categories are static and his approach too closely tied to literary criticism to be helpful in Though he intends to rescue from the present anarchy of discipline,' his theory unsatisfactory for many teach composition, largely because he fails to account adequately for rhetorical choices and composing processes. This review will focus on some of underlying reasons for limited success of Kinneavy's theory. Kinneavy seems aware of many of his presuppositions, including his assumption that he can side-step considering rhetorical processes. However, he does not always seem to be aware of implications of his methodological decisions. His decision to analyze the aim which embodied in text itself (49) based on a desire to concentrate on rather than composition. A theory of composition, he argues, would require attention to process of composing, a concern he concludes is not desirable for an analysis of aims (4). He prefers to deal with with the characteristics of text, with decoder, who primary element in any communication situation (49-50). Ironically, though he recognizes rhetorical significance of writer's audience, he fails to perceive that rhetoric, unlike discourse analysis, must deal with process by which texts come into existence. He thus sets out to establish the basic foundations of composition and to provide a framework of research for all areas of dis-

Preface 1. THE CONTEXTS OF TEACHING PERSPECTIVES Richard Fulkerson: Four Philosophies of Composition James Berlin: Rhetoric and Ideology in the Writing Class Edward P.J. Corbett: Rhetoric, the Enabling Discipline Min-Zhan Lu and Bruce Horner: The Problematic of Experience: Redefining Critical Work in Ethnography and Pedagogy TEACHERS Peter Elbow: Embracing Contraries in the Teaching Process Donald M. Murray: The Listening Eye: Reflections on the Writing Conference Lad Tobin: Reading Students, Reading Ourselves: Revising the Teacher's Role in the Writing Class Dan Morgan: Ethical Issues Raised by Students' Personal Writing STUDENTS Mina P. Shaughnessy: Diving In: An Introduction to Basic Writing Vivian Zamel: Strangers in Academia: The Experiences of Faculty and ESL Students Across the Curriculum Todd Taylor: The Persistence of Difference in Networked Classrooms: Non-Negotiable Difference and the African American Student Body LOCATIONS Hephzibah Roskelly: The Risky Business of Group Work Gail E. Hawisher and Cynthia L. Selfe: The Rhetoric of Technology and the Electronic Writing Class Muriel Harris: Talking in the Middle: Why Writers Need Writing Tutors APPROACHES Min-Zhan Lu: Redefining the Legacy of Mina Shaughnessy: A Critique of the Politics of Linguistic Innocence Mariolina Salvatori: Conversations with Texts: Reading in the Teaching of Composition Gary Tate: A Place for Literature in Freshman Composition Carolyn Matalene: Experience as Evidence: Teaching Students to Write Honestly and Knowledgeably about Public Issues 2. THE TEACHING OF WRITING ASSIGNING Mike Rose: Writing Courses: A Critique and a Proposal David Peck, Elizabeth Hoffman, and Mike Rose: A Comment and Response on Remedial Writing Courses Richard L. Larson: The Research Paper in the Writing Course: A Non-Form of Writing Jeanne Fahnestock and Marie Secor: Teaching Argument: A Theory of Types Catherine E. Lamb: Beyond Argument in Feminist Composition RESPONDING AND ASSESSING Brooke K. Horvath: The Components of Written Response: A Practical Synthesis of Current Views David Bartholomae: The Study of Error Jerry Farber: Learning How to Teach: A Progress Report COMPOSING AND REVISING Nancy Sommers: Between the Drafts James A. Reither: Writing and Knowing: Toward Redefining the Writing Process David Bleich: Collaboration and the Pedagogy of Disclosure AUDIENCES Douglas B. Park: The Meanings of Lisa Ede and Andrea Lunsford: Audience Addressed/Audience Invoked: The Role of Audience in Composition Theory and Pedagogy Peter Elbow: Closing My Eyes as I Speak: An Argument for Ignoring Audience STYLES Robert J. Connors: Static Abstractions and Composition Winston Weathers: Teaching Style: A Possible Anatomy Elizabeth D. Rankin: Revitalizing Style: Toward a New Theory and Pedagogy Richard Ohmann: Use Definite, Specific, Concrete Language

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Jack E. Tohtz, John L. Marsh, Student as Staff Writer, Instructor as Editor: A Situational Context for Teaching Writing, College Composition and Communication, Vol. 32, No. 3, Instruction: Problems, Techniques, Programs (Oct., 1981), pp. 327-329

Neman's extensive revision of the first edition, (published by Merrill in 1980) takes into account the recent explosion of scholarly inquiry and research composition while remaining focused on the basic substance of pedagogy - the nurturing of the student mind. Her approach is student- centred , based on twenty-five years of classroom experience, and will both train its readers to teach writing and tactfully provide an opportunity for them to master writing skills themselves, Covers process, structure, grammar, documentation, narrative, poetry, and stylistic problems from nonstandard dialects.

That the English language is male-oriented can scarcely be denied. For centuries the human race has been called man, the individual he, everyone himself-with the constant reassurance that of course man, he, his, him, and himself are generic terms which include women as well as men. But do they? Although the sentence Every student should bring his book to class does not necessarily evoke mental picture of thirty uniformed boys, I believe that such sentences subtly reinforce the sex role stereotype that most students (writers, readers, professors, doctors, executives, individuals-persons worthy of note) are male. Such linguistic bias should be of particular concern to teachers of composition, whose job it is to emphasize the subtle rhetorical powers of language, the connotative complexities of the words we use. main concern in this paper is the way sexist language manifests itself in the college classroom, particularly in freshman composition courses. In 1976 H. Lee Gershuny conducted detailed investigation of dictionaries and textbooks to determine the extent to which they reinforce sexual stereotypes. Gershuny concluded that although sexist language was common in dictionaries and public school textbooks, it was not as prevalent in recent college composition manuals: My own informal examination of representative sample of college English handbooks and rhetoric texts published after 1972 indicated that English language texts are far ahead of other disciplines in 'de-sexing' illustrative sentences and prose passages.' Yet while praising number of these texts for specific achievements in reducing or eliminating sexist offenses, Gershuny also asserts that have way to go. Many texts fail to depict women in traditionally male roles and professions, and when they do, Gershuny suggests, a woman's work is often trivialized or described as dependent on that of others (p. 157). Also, Gershuny mentions only one work, Suzanne E. and Roderick A. Jacobs' The College Writer's Handbook, as alternating she and he each time in generic use; presumably most of the rely upon the more conventional generic he. In similar study, Candace Helgeson refuses to give authors of freshman composition texts as

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Ruth will labor over the first paragraph of an essay for hours. She'll write a sentence, then erase it. Try another, then scratch part of it out. Finally, as the evening winds on toward ten o'clock and Ruth, anxious about tomorrow's deadline, begins to wind into herself, she'll compose that first paragraph only to sit back and level her favorite exasperated interdiction at herself and her page: No. You can't say that. You'll bore them to death. Ruth is one of ten UCLA undergraduates with whom I discussed writer's block, that frustrating, self-defeating inability to generate the next line, the right phrase, the sentence that will release the flow of words once again. These ten people represented a fair cross-section of the UCLA student community: lower-middle-class to upper-middle-class backgrounds and high schools, third-world and Caucasian origins, biology to fine arts majors, C+ to Agrade point averages, enthusiastic to blase attitudes toward school. They were set off from the community by the twin facts that all ten could write competently, and all were currently enrolled in at least one course that required a significant amount of writing. They were set off among themselves by the fact that five of them wrote with relative to enviable ease while the other five experienced moderate to nearly immobilizing writer's block. This blocking usually resulted in rushed, often late papers and resultant grades that did not truly reflect these students' writing ability. And then, of course, there were other less measurable but probably more serious results: a growing distrust of their abilities and an aversion toward the composing process itself. What separated the five students who blocked from those who didn't? It wasn't skill; that was held fairly constant. The answer could have rested in the emotional realm-anxiety, fear of evaluation, insecurity, etc. Or perhaps blocking in some way resulted from variation in cognitive style. Perhaps, too, blocking originated in and typified a melding of emotion and cognition not unlike the relationship posited by Shapiro between neurotic feeling and

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make use of it and what aspects are outside its scope. Let us suppose that composition teachers were invited to present a program for the development of a theory and method of teaching writing. What might be included in such a program? Would linguists be willing and able to help toward its fulfillment? For various reasons, we are confronted with a student population which has very limited skills in writing. I would cite here only two factors. Since reading has become a rare pastime, many young people are not aware of how to arrange a text so that readers can readily follow it. Also, mass media entertainment, which has supplanted reading, instills very different perceptive habits, regardless of content. Camera perspective and sound track serve to sort out visual and auditory perception in advance, so that the viewer can remain entirely passive, performing only elementary intellectual tasks in response. I would conclude that a writing program is needed which compensates for

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signed to teach composition, but few are trained to do it. Composition involves things like grammar, rhetoric, and logic, but often composition teachers have not formally studied those things. People applying for positions in composition programs sometimes submit transcripts listing English courses only in literature and literary criticism. If they are hired, they probably are very much at home, since often the people already teaching in those programs have similar backgrounds. Someone who has earned a degree in one of the programs created recently to train college English teachers, rather than to give traditional advanced degrees, is probably somewhat different. Those programs give some attention to composition teaching but often less than you might guess. Recently, there has been some resistance to the apparent excess of literature courses in the preparation of people who become composition teachers. Consequently, a real conflict between Lit and Comp has developed within the discipline of English. Because advocates of traditional literary training for all English teachers have long had command of the English profession, those in the relatively new resistance movement have had trouble

Here, then, are six different reasons students are drawn to writing classes. Some students may be touched by only one, others by a combination. They lead to different types of creativity, but each can serve as a dynamic catalyst. 1. Partially conscious therapy: Of course the protagonist isn't really my father but .. . Such writers may be highly neurotic and aware of it, struggling perhaps with a vague angst. Or they may be relatively stable but working with a difficult personal problem: a separation, a rejection, a death in the family. Vague and ill-defined moods often take on the distortion and lack of co-

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