Looking Forward--Multilingual and Multimodal Texts

My language is a mess. I have picked up bits and pieces of a dozen languages in my travels, and these fragments all find their way into my spoken English now and then. My language changes with my audience. I speak English with nit noi Thai to one friend. I turn around and speak English with un po' di Italiano and un poco de Espanol with another. Ciao bella. Hanguel mai? Selamat pagi. Kap jai lai lai. Khun suai. Xinchao. D'accord. Obrigado. My spoken English slows sometimes as I work through all of these pieces, restructuring my thoughts into something that other people can usually understand.

I tend to refine these foreign fragments completely of my written language, but I have to wonder if now and then my writing my just be better with them present. In our readings this week, we are looking forward to the future of composition in the college classroom, including the use of multilingual and multimodal approaches. As the last post for the key term project, I am considering how these approaches work to promote discovery and student voice.

Canagarajah argues for "code meshing" of World English and Metropolitan English, rather than limiting them to their informal and formal uses, respectively. Allowing students to write with their own World Englishes encourages them to explore their own individual voices and to communicate through them. Doing so also encourages students to experiment and play with language and structure--to discover their own most effective means of persuasion.

Fraiberg takes the concept of "code meshing" a step further, arguing for a "convergence culture" and a system of "knotworking"--more fully integrating multiple languages and media instead of working between the divide of World English and Metropolitan English. When used effectively and persuasively, this convergence approach does push students to discover their own voices through writing.

As long as multilingual and multimodal approaches do not interfere with the communication of ideas, they should absolutely be used in the composition classroom, especially as they aid students to learn, teach, and discover.




On the future of composition:

Canagarajah, Suresh A. “The Place of World Englishes in Composition: Pluralization Continued.” CCC 57.4 (2006): 586-619.

Fraiburg, Steven. “Composition 2.0: Toward a Multilingual and Multimodal Framework.” CCC 62.1 (2010).

Wardle, Elizabeth. “‘Mutt Genres’ and the Goal of FYC: Can We Help Students Write the Genres of the University?” College Composition and Communication 60.4 (June 2009): 765-89.

Fraizer, Dan. “First Steps Beyond First Year: Coaching Transfer after FYC.” WPA: Writing Program Administrator 33.3 (2010): 34-57.

Reflection

When I thought about my key term, discovery, six weeks ago, I was interested in the transformation that students go through during their first year of college (and their first year of composition). I considered my own experience in freshman English at Vassar and the discoveries I made there--about academia and about myself. While engaging with different texts, I discovered quite a bit about myself, and I began my major studies in English. Although I have no plans of trying to sway my students to be English majors, I do want to encourage them to use writing as a means of discovery in their lives. Following my key term through the reading assignments this summer, I found myself constantly returning to expressionist rhetoric. My key term could not work in isolation through the readings (and was occassionallly notably absent from them) and led me to other concepts that will be important in my class.

Considering the terms of expressionism, my key term emerges in the context of two others--dialogue and voice. Discovery and self-realization through writing shape the students' voices and prepare them to enter a dialogue with me, with their classmates, and with the existing academic discourse in their fields. In order to enter and participate in Burke's parlor of discourse, then, there must first be a reflective step--a time to pause and to craft a strong voice.

As a result, I plan to emphasize the importance of voice and audience in writing in my ENC 1101 course. After observing my mentor's class this summer, I plan to teach Strand I, which focuses on popular culture, and I am looking forward to seeing the dialogue that emerges both in writing and in the classrooom. Workshops and conferences are particularly useful for establishing a dialogue between all members of the class. I plan to do guided freewrites at least once a week, if not once a class, to encourage this process of discovery and the shaping of voice.

The first paper assignment for the course is a personal literacy narrative. Students will have to reflect and discover how media and popular culture has influenced their character and literacy. I enjoyed reading these narratives in my internship, and I know my students in the fall will use it well. The other two papers incorporate an analytical element in students' relationships to popular culture and again provide a space for self-discovery and creative voice.


Andy Warhol, my first pop culture love

Student Voices

Since I am thinking about discovery and student voice this week, I thought I would include a few of my former students' voices.

Student Voice and Discovery

In bootcamp this week we have been talking about three primary means of student support networks: the writing center tutorial, the peer response workshop, and the student-teacher conference. As I am exploring the notion of discovery in ENC 1101 andn student writing, I have to wonder, how do these three different networks affect a student's voice, especially the development of that voice (and the process of self-discovery it entails)?

The Writing Center Tutorial

Ideally, the writing center tutorial helps build a student's confidence by working one-on-one with a tutor who is careful not to take over the student writing, not to dominate or falsely construct a student's voice. In "Collaboration Is Not Collaboration Is Not Collaboration," Muriel Harris lists among the tutor's tasks "leading the student toward finding her own answers" and "listening while the student articulates her message" (371). In this light, the tutor is like a voice coach, working to bring out the student's best work. The tutor is a guide, but the student must go through the process of writing and self-discovery in order to craft a beautiful writerly voice.

In "Our Little Secret," Boquet acknowledges the role of the center in this process, quoting Stanley, who urges us to see the writing center as "'com[ing] very close to meeting the ends of true education' by encouraging students to be independent writers and thinkers" (467). The goals of "true education" then appear to be the development of the self and the voice that can take place in the writing center. This process therefore creates good writers, not just a good written product.

The Peer Response Workshop

While the writing center tutorial aims to shape the writer, the peer response workshop works to shape both the writer and the critical reader. In this setting, students have to work together and, as a result, be prepared to respond to varying evaluations of their work. Each student voice is heard and pushed to be more articulate. The individual voice then changes a bit in this setting, as students collaborate--like picking up an interesting accent after exposure to it. The student voice within the peer response network relies not only on individual reflection and exploration but also upon collective discovery.

The Student-Teacher Conference

Many of the same voice issues exist in the student-teacher conference as in the writing center tutorial. As with the tutor, there is a risk that the teacher's voice can dominate the student's, replacing the act of discovery with regurgitation. The conference is a tool for instructors to both teach individually and to hear about the students' writing process. I could not help but think of Berlin's social-epistemic rhetoric as I read Black's thoughts on discovery within the student-teacher conference, realizing that all of her reflections were "constantly being socially constructed" (18). In the conference, the teacher must work to encourage the development of the student's voice, whether or not it is a social construction (and my expressionist side certainly wants to say no).



Voices I am joining this week:

Harris, Muriel. “Collaboration Is Not Collaboration Is Not Collaboration: Writing Center Tutorials vs. Peer-Response Groups.” College Composition and Communication 43.3 (October 1992): 369-83.

Boquet, Elizabeth. “‘Our Little Secret’: A History of Writing Centers, Pre- to Post-Open Admissions. College Composition and Communication 50.3 (1999): 463-482.

Thonus, Terese. “What Are the Differences?: Tutor Interaction with First- and Second-Language Writers.” Journal of Second Language Writing 13 (2004): 227-242.

Carter, Shannon and Donna Dunbar-Odom. “The Converging Literacies Center: An Integrated Model for Writing Programs.” Kairos 14.1 (2009). http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/14.1/praxis/Carter_Dunbar-Odom/index.html

Black, Laurel Johnson. “Conversation, Teaching, and Points in Between.” Between Talk and Teaching: Reconsidering the Writing Conference. Logan, UT: Utah State UP, 1998. 11-37. (library eBook)

Discovery and Dialogue

My key term, discovery, has not been as present in this week’s reading and discussions about plagiarism as it was in the first three weeks of the term. In fact, it is a notable absence because plagiarism is an avoidance of the act of personal discovery in and through writing.

To prevent plagiarism in first year composition, all five strands have provoking paper assignments. In “The Economics of Authorship,” Kelly Ritter emphasizes the teacher’s role in originality of students’ work. She writes, “We should write original, compelling assignments so that they won’t be recycled; we should be sensitive to student pressures and stress when we assign work” (620). Such assignments push students to reflect on their own experience, develop a personal voice, and, hopefully, discover something about themselves along the way.

When I teach in the fall, I plan to discuss plagiarism, copyright, and fair use doctrine in terms of a dialogue. In first year composition, students are entering a new academic community full of ongoing dialogues—between established writers in the field, their peers, and their teachers. Their paper assignments open up a dialogue between me as a reader and the student as a writer. As in a spoken conversation, I want to hear what they have to say; a recitation of someone else’s words just will not work (and is rather disrespectful to all parties involved).

Margaret Price advises us, “The most constructive way to approach teaching plagiarism is to invite students into a DIALOGUE about the subject, welcoming their perspectives on its complexities” (105-106). Conventions of citation and documentation do evolve, and as Ritter points out, some students plagiarize by mistake because they do not know the conventions. Therefore, I have one line to add to my course policy sheet: Ask questions! Ask yourself questions. Ask me. Ask another teacher. Ask a librarian. Ask a friend.



This dialogue started by:

Price, Margaret. “Beyond ‘Gotcha!’: Situating Plagiarism in Policy and Pedagogy.” College Composition and Communication 54.1 (2002): 88-115.

Ritter, Kelly. “The Economics of Authorship: Online Paper Mills, Student Writers, and First-Year Composition.” College Composition and Communication 56.4 (2005): 601-31.

Rife, Martine C. “The Fair Use Doctrine: History, Application, and Implications for (New Media) Writing Teachers.” Computers and Composition 24.2 (2007): 154-178.

Hunter, Rik. “Erasing ‘Property Lines’: A Collaborative Notion of Authorship and Textual Ownership on a Fan Wiki.” Computers and Composition 28 (2011): 40-56.

Tech Musings: Using What You've Got

"DISCOVER the archives of your life," Melissa Goldthwaite urges her readers, the majority of whom are first year composition readers and students, in "This Too Is Research" (On Writing 401). She suggests using personal experience and interests as a means of encouraging students to see the research they do every day and therefore not to be intimidated by research projects assigned for class. Having grown up with computers, my students already do research constantly, even if they don't know it as such (rather as "Googling," "Facebook stalking," and the like). Although I am not the most technologically savvy girl on the block (in the high-tech computer sense), I am excited by the possibilities of using these available technologies in my classroom to inspire personal discovery through writing.

Throughout the summer, I am using this key term blog as a technology to explore and develop my own pedagogy for the fall, tracing the idea of discovery in our weekly class reading. Writing itself is a technology for expression and to work through ideas, in the process finding a unique voice. High tech options for ENC 1101, like Blackboard, Wiki pages, and Blogs, are good ways to meet students on familiar territory and push them in their writing and thoughts. My mentor accomplishes this task though analyzing film trailers on You Tube and then moving on to discuss reading assignments; in the transition, students discover that they already have the vocabulary for the discussion.

I may not be as immediately comfortable with digital technology in the classroom as many of the other TA's are (or as my students are), but I still plan to use it when I can to push students in discovering their own voices and style. In her article on the necessity of using current technology in the classroom, Cynthia Self argues, "We need to recognize that if written language and literacy practices are our professional business, so is technology" (415). I do not believe that teaching technology is my "business," but using available technology well to help students become better writers is critical in any classroom, just as the use of the pencil was two hundred years ago (Baron).

Both Clark and Yancey join this argument for the use of new technologies in composition classrooms. Yancey acknowledges the writing students already do online through blogs, email, and chatting as a way that students access the process without institutional instruction, as they have "a rhetorical situation, a purpose, a potentially worldwide audience, a choice of technology and medium" (302). Students already use online technologies to write; using them in the classroom is another way to have them "discover the archives of their own lives."





This week's reading:

Baron, Dennis. “From Pencils to Pixels: The Stages of Literacy Technologies.” Passions, Pedagogies, and 21st Century Technologies. Eds. Gail E. Hawisher and Cynthia L. Selfe. Logan, UT: Utah State UP, 1999. 15-33.

Selfe, Cynthia L. “Technology and Literacy: A Story about the Perils of Not Paying Attention.” College Composition and Communication 50.3 (1999): 411-436.

Yancey, Kathleen Blake. “Made Not Only in Words: Composition in a New Key.” CCC 56.2 (2004): 297-328

Clark, J. Elizabeth. “The Digital Imperative: Making a Case for a 21st Century Pedagogy.” Computers and Composition 27 (2010): 27-35.

Discovery and Rhetoric

In my internship this week, I observed two days of conferencing for the students' personal digital media literacy narratives. My mentor urged all of her students to be more personal in their writing, and they were excited to talk about themselves and use "I" rather than a distant observer voice. One student made remarkable improvements from her conference draft to the draft she emailed on Friday by taking this advice and really starting to discover her own voice.

This notion of discovery (namely, students' personal discoveries in writing) best falls into Berlin's Expressionistic Rhetoric. On the importance of the individual in this approach, he writes, "It [writing] is an art, a creative act in which the process--the discovery of the true self--is as important as the product--the self discovered and expressed" (16). Berlin's description of this process poses Expressionism within the Romantic tradition, in which students use the art of writing to discover their "true selves." In ENC 1101, we are working to develop the writer as well as the writing, as we discussed on the first day of class, and this form of rhetoric useful to accomplishing that goal.

Berlin favors Social-Epistemic to Expressionistic Rhetoric, arguing that students (and therefore their voices and writing) are the products of their social and historic contexts. This approach devalues the role of self-discovery in the writing process that is so critical to the Expressionistic approach. Like Berlin, Braun aruges for a more outwardly-directed rhetoric in first-year composition--"attention on the texts that already surround" students rather than the traditional "process of self-discovery" (97).

Although Berlin and Braun would suggest a different approach to teaching (the social-epistemic), I still like to think of my students as in a process of self-discovery. Just as I am starting a new book in my life, so are they. Whether they are coming to FSU from across town, across the state, or across the globe, they are in a new place and having experiences everyday that change their perspectives and, in turn, shape their voices as young writers. Sometimes the change is difficult and painful (I'm guessing a student or two may feel homesick in the fall...), but what great emotions to draw upon for writing. As I am forming my own approach to teaching in the fall, I am picking and comibing elements of different approaches, including a flower of expressionism.

This week's musings courtesy of:

Berlin, James. “Rhetoric and Ideology in the Writing Classroom.” The Writing Teacher’s Sourcebook, Eds. Edward PJ Corbett, Nancy Myers, and Gary Tate: Oxford UP, 2000. 9-25.

Winterowd. W. Ross. “The Classical Tradition and Composition/Rhetoric. A Teacher’s Introduction to Composition in the Rhetorical Tradition. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1994. 1-18.

Braun, M.J. “The Prospects for Rhetoric in a First-Year Composition Program: Deliberative Discourse as a Vehicle for Change?” WPA: Writing Program Administration 31.3 (2008): 89-109.



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[Because the commenting function is not working, I will have to post my comment response here.]

As I am considering discovery on this blog and primarily coming from the expressionist camp here, I have to think about the uniqueness implied in Berlin's own social-epistemic rhetoric. He argues that an authentic voice doesn't exist in favor of considering the product of cultural and historical context. Can these social influences not affect one student differently from the way they affect the next student?
Berlin's four strands of rhetoric do indeed consider language in different ways, especially when it comes to the role of the writer and his or her voice. Elements from the different approaches will perhaps never fit together seamlessly, but using patches (key ideas) of different approaches can be useful in a composition class. I am thinking about the assignments for the Strand I course that I am observing for my internship. The first paper, the personal literacy narrative, works well with expressionist rhetoric, as students explore their own pasts and the formation of the individuals they are today. This assignment is also one of the first experiences students have for using the "I" in their academic writing, a key in cognitive rhetoric. The second paper, the digital media analysis, and the third, the advertisement analysis, both work well within the social-epistemic approach, as the students critically examine social implications of each (and often push against them). All three papers have elements of the current traditionalist approach, as students write within established genres.
July 17, 2011 4:24 PM