Reflections: A Journal of Community-Engaged Writing and Rhetoric Sep 2008 Open Access

Window Washing or War and Peace: Critical Rhetoric, Critical Revision, and Critical Discourse Analysis in Student Writing

Gae Lyn Henderson

Abstract

Writing assignments carry political ramifications even when they attempt neutrality; students should learn that all writing occurs within larger contexts of power. To accomplish this goal, I advocate instruction derived from practices of critical rhetoric, critical revision, and critical discourse analysis. Rhetoric education, based on Donald Lazere's Reading and Writing for Civic Literacy, trains students not only for academic writing, but for citizenry. Students write what David Bartholomae calls "practical criticism," critically revising their own texts. Also, students may practice the methodology of critical discourse analysis, as prescribed by Thomas Huckin, in a course that integrates civic literacy with introductory CDA assignments.

Journal
Reflections: A Journal of Community-Engaged Writing and Rhetoric
Published
2008-09-01
DOI
10.59236/rjv8i1pp258-281
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Topics
rhetorical criticism discourse analysis writing pedagogy revision literacy studies
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References (16)

  1. Aubrey (1991)
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  3. Booth (1974)
    Modern Dogma and the Rhetoric of Assent
  4. Burke (1969)
    A Rhetoric of Motives
     ↗
  5. Clark (1997)
    The Politics ofWting
Show all 16 →
  1. Harris (2003)
    Opinion: Revision as a Critical Practice
    College English
  2. Huckin (2002)
    Critical Discourse Analysis and the Discourse of Condescension
  3. Lazere (2005)
    Postmodern Pluralism and the Retreat from Political Literacy
    JAC: A Journal of Composition Theory
  4. (2005)
    Reading and Writing for Civic Literacy: The Critical Citizen s Guide to Argumentative Rhetoric
  5. Mckerrow (1989)
    Critical Rhetoric: Theory and Praxis
    Communication Monographs  ↗
  6. Orwell (1956)
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  7. (1956)
    The Orwell Reader
  8. Powers (2007)
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    CCC
  9. Wallace (2006)
    Transcending Normativity: Difference Issues in College English
    College English
  10. Weaver (1997)
    Dialectic and Rhetoric at Dayton, Tennessee
  11. (2000)
    Adopted by the Council of Writing Program Administrators (WPA)
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