Abstract

Even before the Research Network was called to order during the 1988 Conference on College Composition and Communication, we as organizers had become aware that we had tapped into a strongly felt need. As Charles Bazerman recounted in his opening remarks that morning, response had been overwhelming. Not only had we been impressed with the number of people willing to travel early to CCCC to talk about their work in progress, but we had been unprepared for the number who wanted to listen and respond. This deeply felt need, as Bazerman suggested, was a sign that we had come of age as researchers. No longer exhausted with the task of defending our projects to outsiders, we sought the time and space to talk among ourselves. Ironically, much of the morning talk was given over to expressions of good will and pluralism that initially obscured rather than furthered this dialogue. It was as if we had to assure ourselves that no one was going to walk out the door before we could get down to work. The tone of the meeting changed by the afternoon, however. In small groups the participants quickly ignored the global questions we had formulated over lunch (What do we need to know?; How will we know it?; What do we do with it when we get it?) and turned with more relish to the work-in-progress presentations. In these, researchers from strikingly different perspectives attempted to explain their current projects in terms the others could understand. Now, instead of speaking of our global pluralism, we more frankly admitted our ignorance in the face of each