This article describes an assignment that involves students in an exploration of the rhetorical practices common in Facebook, making use of rhetorical savvy that they have—but generally are not aware of—to teach the often-challenging skill of rhetorical analysis. The class discusses articles about Facebook use and redefines traditional Aristotelian rhetorical concepts in the context of the visually rich and collage-like texts that are Facebook profiles. Students take their cues from an anthropologist's analysis of identity representation on dorm doors to explore rhetorical practices of exaggeration also discernable in Facebook profiles. Students and teacher note features from Facebook pages that suggest tendencies to be popular versus being an individual or signs of addiction to the networking tool. This assignment that brings academic analysis to bear on non-academic literacy practices like the construction of Facebook profiles encourages students to reflect critically on daily activities that involve more complex rhetorical skills than they might otherwise notice. In addition to making students' often-tacit rhetorical knowledge explicit, breaking down the usual division between school and non-school rhetorics in this exploration of Facebook helps to educate teachers about their students' digital literacy practices.

Review Article| January 01 2005 Changing the Contexts for Documenting Our Teaching Jane Mathison Fife Jane Mathison Fife Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Pedagogy (2005) 5 (1): 157–162. https://doi.org/10.1215/15314200-5-1-157 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation Jane Mathison Fife; Changing the Contexts for Documenting Our Teaching. Pedagogy 1 January 2005; 5 (1): 157–162. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/15314200-5-1-157 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu nav search search input Search input auto suggest search filter Books & JournalsAll JournalsPedagogy Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. © 2005 Duke University Press2005 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal Issue Section: Roundtable: Composition, Pedagogy, and the Scholarship of Teachingg You do not currently have access to this content.

While our field’s response practices have changed dramatically over the past two decades to involve more student comments on their own texts, empirical studies have lagged far behind classroom practices, focusing almost exclusively on teachers’ written comments as texts. By broadening our notion of response—and acknowledging the many and varied ways that teachers respond to student writing as well as the many and varied ways that students influence and interpret those responses—we will be able to narrow the gap between our teaching practices and our research questions.