GenAdmin: Theorizing WPA Identities in the Twenty-First Century

Abstract

Colin Charlton, Jonikka Charlton, Tarez Samra Graban, Kathleen J. Ryan, and Amy Ferdinandt Stolley Winner of the Best Book Award 2011-2012 from the Council of Writing Program Administrators. Writing Program Administration Edited by Chris Carter and Laura Micciche Information and Pricing 978-1-60235-236-0 (paperback, $30); 978-1-60235-237-7 (hardcover, $60); 978-1-60235-238-4 (PDF, $19.99). © 2011 by Parlor Press. 266 pages, with notes, bibliography, and index. Bookstores : Order by fax, mail, or phone. See our "Sales and Ordering Page" for details. About This Book GenAdmin: Theorizing WPA Identities in the Twenty-First Century examines identity formation in a generation of rhetoric and composition professionals who have had explicit preparation in scholarly dimensions of writing program work. GenAdmin disrupts histories and narratives that posit writing program administration as managerial, where the most one can hope for is to become a hero who successfully champions writing rather than a victim of an untenable job. The authors draw on composition and rhetorical theory, WPA experiences and scholarship, and contemporary philosophy to offer writing program administration as an epistemology and a discourse for change. GenAdmin repositions WPAs as agents and reclaims writing program administration as a positive professional commitment that looks toward, rather than simply stems from, current challenges in higher education. An Afterword by Jeanne Gunner, Joseph Harris, Dennis Lynch, and Martha Townsend continues the important conversation, setting the stage for future discussion of the issues raised in this groundbreaking account of a new generation of writing program administrators. What People Are Saying "GenAdmin: Theorizing WPA Identities in the Twenty-First Century makes an important contribution to writing studies in general by showing how the identification of writing program administration as scholarly and creative (not merely administrative) invites new ways to