Every semester and every class is uniquely its own which means its students are, too. In my most recent course I’m teaching, Expository Writing—a Gordon Rule writing course that teaches students how to fine tune their description skills—many of my students have self-identified as not a writer. In fact, many of my students are biology majors, pre-med, or engineering students, and some of them, I’ve come to find, were not looking forward to flexing their pens. So, at the beginning of this semester, my challenge lay ahead of me.   Early on, because of this unique mix of students, I decided it was important to actively implement participatory design: an approach to design that attempts to involve users in the designing process to ensure best usability. It’s a broad term or approach that can be applied in any field, whether it be software design, architecture, or the university classroom.   Now, this doesn’t mean that I sit back and let my students run the show, but it does mean that I ask a lot of questions and place value in their answers. Some things I ask include: What’s been the most helpful text we’ve read so far in class? Which writing exercise was most useful to you as a student? Would you prefer to submit your first essay to only me, or to start with a paired workshop right off the bat? If you start the semester with participatory design in mind, it’s easy to remain flexible and adaptable, shaping your teaching to your unique students’ needs. And, new research has even found that designers, or in this case, instructors, create more innovative concepts and ideas when co-designing with a group, or in this case, our students.   The advantage to keeping participatory design in mind is that, by staying open-minded and malleable in your teaching decisions, you can best adapt to student needs, offering them, perhaps, a more valuable classroom experience. For example, when we hit mid-semester, I noticed that my students weren’t responding as well in classroom discussions, and that some were even dozing off while I was trying to engage them in a lively discussion. Some of this is normal, but I also asked myself what I could do to liven this classroom up? I took another brief survey and found that my students were wanting more in-class writing exercises, and this was something I could easily facilitate and incorporate into our time. After a few new lessons and in-class writing exercises, I saw the classroom energy instantly turn around and pick up speed again, gaining the momentum they were needing during that mid-semester slump.   The best thing, though, about participatory design is that it includes students in the process which: Removes a hard-lined authoritative teaching style Better assess and responds to student needs, and Empowers students, giving them agency and stake in the classroom   Ultimately, participatory design leads to these outcomes where students are more engaged, and where they are transforming from mere students-at-the-desk to the co-creators and colleagues they will soon become in their futures. ... View more

Before I retired, I regularly taught a sophomore-level course on comics, one I developed out of my interest in the rhetorical power of images and one that brought me into contact with very interesting students from across all the disciplines. During the time I was developing and refining this class, some of my colleagues in the Creative Writing wing of the English department (particularly Adam Johnson and Tom Kealy) began to offer a course for students interested not only in studying and analyzing comics, but in producing them as well. Out of this impetus grew Stanford’s Graphic Novel Project (not to be confused with Stanford’s Graphic Narrative Project, a research group that has also been very successful). That course has now grown into a two-term, twenty-week course with the following goals: To tell a compelling real-world human story that is “worthy of study and creative devotion” and that seeks “to do good, seek justice, and bring about change.” To teach nonfiction research, visual storytelling, and long-form narrative through a collaborative effort, realizing that “through collaboration, a story can become richer, more inspired, and more layered with human experience.” These are lofty goals, yet in 20 weeks this small group of undergraduates comes up with a story proposal, outlines the story, thumbnails the scenes, does the inking by hand on Bristol board, and then uses Adobe Photoshop and InDesign to “clean” the text, create word balloons, color, and create the layout. Students carry out every step of this intricate and time-consuming process, through the editorial and printing processes that lead to a finished book. Given my 40 years of work on collaboration, not to mention my love of comics and my delight in teaching them, you can bet I’m a big fan of this project, which to  date has produced seven graphic novels: Shake Girl (2008); Virunga (2009); Pika-don (2010); From Busan to San Francisco (2012); A Place Among the Stars (2014); American Heathen (2015); and Luisa (2017).             What makes this series so compelling to me is its insistence on “real life” stories that students feel need to be told, and heard, today, striving in each volume to call attention to issues and places and people that should be remembered. That is certainly true with the current volume, which tells the story of Luisa Capetillo (1879-1922), born in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, and destined to become one of its most famous labor organizers. As the students say, in the aftermath of the American annexation of Puerto Rico, Feminist, anarchist, labor organizer, Luisa Capetillo. . . saw the advantages—the possibility of unions—and the disadvantages—the exploitation that made them necessary—of American rule. She set out to fight for the rights of the workers. Luisa believed in good hygiene, free love, and human dignity. She was also an impassioned, trenchant writer, famous in her day for her book, Mi Opinion Sobre las Libertades, Derechos y Deberes de la Mujer. With her tenacity, faith, and oratory, Luisa was the perfect advocate—except for one problem. She was a woman. Luisa was known for wearing white mens’ suits, as in the photo below, and throughout the graphic novel she is depicted as rejecting clothing as well as other norms, acts which led to many threats against her, including the threat of jail. She persisted, however, organizing not only in Puerto Rico but in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Florida, writing and speaking out for women’s rights and for the vote. When I read Luisa, I was reminded once more of the strength, ingenuity, passion, and capabilities of undergraduate student writers, and I celebrate the work they are doing to keep the memory of social justice advocates like Luisa Capetillo alive. I also celebrate the power of collaboration: this project demonstrates how, working together, students can pool their talents (even the font used in this book was created in their class from the handwriting of two of the student writers/artists), drawing on the artistic abilities of some and the storytelling abilities of others. I hope to see projects like this one—“comics advocacy”—blossoming all across the country. ... View more

The redesign of developmental English programs across the country presents some significant challenges for developmental instructors, especially those who have been teaching in traditional multi-level programs with separate reading and writing tracks. How do faculty begin to create an integrated reading and writing syllabus, especially if they only have experience in one area or the other? What does an integrated syllabus even look like?   In working with the implementation of Virginia’s redesign and with instructors in other states, I’ve seen several models of successful syllabi—as well as some strategies which do not seem to work as well. What follows is my own informal classification of syllabus types. As one would expect, some instructors combine elements from different syllabus types, and they often find success in that eclectic approach. My list is not in any particular order, and I’m sure I’ve omitted some possible approaches. I welcome additional suggestions and comments.   The Paired Skills and Processes Syllabus. This syllabus organizes instruction according to parallel skills or steps in the reading and writing processes. For example, pre-reading and pre-writing instruction might occur together in this approach, often with a focus on rhetorical situation. Similarly, reading skills such as finding and paraphrasing the main idea are coupled with a writing skill such as developing a strong thesis. The paired skills and processes approach is often combined with a focus on genres or traditional rhetorical modes.   Read to Write/Write to Read Syllabus. In this approach, instructors focus on the role that writing can play in the reading process (annotating, note-taking, reflecting, connecting, paraphrasing, summarizing, and responding), and the ways in which reading supports writing (through pre-writing, reading to revise, reading in peer-review, reading to edit, and writing from different texts).   The Thematic Syllabus. Instructors using this syllabus select thematically-related readings to enhance the development of content-awareness and vocabulary. Class activities promote active and critical reading skills, and students write in response to readings. With a thematic syllabus, instructors have a natural base from which to teach how to synthesize information from multiple sources.   The Argument/Rhetorical Moves Syllabus. Particularly well-suited to colleges and universities with an argument-based first-year composition course, this syllabus presents both reading and writing through awareness of rhetorical moves: introducing a topic, presenting a claim, considering a counterargument, creating a context, making a concession, etc. Students learn to identify rhetorical moves in reading, assess their effectiveness for the particular audience and purpose, and ultimately imitate them as they develop their own papers.   The Great Books Syllabus. In this approach, instructors build a syllabus around one or two critical full-length books, often one fiction and one non-fiction. Reading skills and vocabulary are addressed in the context of the readings, and writing assignments build from topics in the texts.   The Project-Based Syllabus. Instructors who develop a project-based syllabus organize the syllabus around a series of projects which require both reading and writing skills for success. For example, students might conduct research and interviews related to child-care services on campus, and then draft a proposal for changes, addressed to campus administrators. Instructors must consider reading and writing skills required for a project carefully so that instruction and scaffolding flow naturally as the project develops. Project-based syllabi often work well in programs that combine developmental instruction with a service-learning component.   From our redesign in Virginia, we’ve seen that one syllabus which does not work well is an alternating syllabus: one day (or segment) on reading skills, followed by one day (or segment) on writing skills. The original intent of the alternating syllabus was simple: bring together the expertise of a reading teacher and a writing teacher to team-teach the integrated course. Teach-teaching can certainly be effective (and a tremendous opportunity for professional development), but the alternating model keeps reading and writing separate and thus works against the intent of the redesign. Anecdotally, we saw a great deal of frustration in the alternating syllabus: with essentially two separate courses going on simultaneously, instructors did not feel they had covered learning outcomes adequately, and they felt rushed and overwhelmed. As team-taught alternating syllabi evolved into thematic, paired-skills, or other syllabus types (whether taught by one or two instructors), those frustrations began to wane.   What does your integrated reading and writing syllabus look like? Want to offer feedback, comments, and suggestions on this post? Join the Macmillan Community to get involved (it’s free, quick, and easy)! ... View more

Today's guest bloggers is Eric Rawson‌, author of American Subcultures: A Bedford Spotlight Reader. Rhetoric deals with matters of uncertainty and disagreement. In challenging our students to see their writing as a means of discovery as well as an articulation of ideas, we necessarily lead them into places of uncertainty. Their typical—and understandable—reaction when confronting strange territory is to seek safe ground, to fall back on familiar ways of framing arguments, such as the five-paragraph thought-killer. As writing instructors, we challenge our students to plunge into their confusion with the faith that they will find a path. Of course, we cannot sincerely pursue this course if we ourselves are unwilling to embrace a risk-taking model that welcomes uncertainty and doubt into our teaching practices. Instructors are as prone to confusion as students, as I recently rediscovered as I worked on the American Subcultures topic reader. Particularly when our composition courses are organized around thematics, we often struggle to project our mastery of the material. Since we usually are not experts in American subcultures (or other comp-class thematics), we have to assimilate new material in a hurry. But teaching writing in the context of thematics outside our expertise can be a very good thing. It means that we experience some of the same confusion as our students do. Rather than present myself as an authority on American subcultures, I tell my classes on the first day that I’m not a sociologist, but that together we will explore the readings, discuss the issues, and respond in writing. Embracing confusion has implications for assignment design. If we are to encourage our students to delve into material that requires thoughtful consideration—moving beyond the already clarified—then we do not want to overdetermine the writing tasks. We want to emphasize the point that for writing to lead to discovery and clarification, it must necessarily start from a place that is unknown and obscure. Confusion and invention: Modelling the invention process is essential, leading students into confusion and showing them a way out again. One way is to solicit a random topic from the class so as to cast the instructor in the role of confused student, as the class “stepstones” through initial ideas, analyzing assumptions, making connections, developing a thesis and perhaps a points-to-make list. Modelling this process risks failure, but failure can be an important lesson. Admit it. Scrap the plan. Start again, having risked appearing foolish. Point out that confusion is a sign that we are asking novel questions. Worry if the students are never Use confusion as a way of generating creative questions worth writing about. Confusion and drafting: Years ago, an Air Force pilot told me that he was trained that when confused about what to do in a damaged airplane, he should DO ANYTHING! Doing something means one can develop a course of action based on what happens next. The potter can’t begin to shape the pot without a lump of clay, and the writer cannot begin to shape an argument without a mess of prose to work with. Finding one’s way out of confusion requires action. Confusion and revision: Early in the semester I show my students a clip from Henri Clouzot’s 1957 documentary “The Mystery of Picasso.” Using time-lapse photography, Clouzot compresses eight hours of Picasso at work into a few minutes. We watch a painting develop from its initial idea, passing through multiple revisions as the artist scrapes the canvas and begins again—and again— revisiting trouble spots, trying radically new approaches. At one point, Picasso stops the procedure and addresses the filmmaker: “This is bad. This is very, very bad.” Then he completes a masterpiece. Having made the point that confusion brings rewards not only at the invention and drafting stages but also in the revision process, I turn the lesson to specific writing tasks, examining my own “time lapse”: the multiple drafts of a single introductory paragraph, for instance. It’s possible to oversell the work of close revision, with the unfortunate consequence of locking our time-pressured students in a dungeon of self-doubt. But if presented in a way that doesn’t demand prose at the level of a Nobel Laureate, imagining a reader’s confusion can guide the writer through the process of revision. Ultimately, confusion generates creativity, exploration, discovery. Too much certainty drives all manner of things drab or dangerous, from depressing architecture to rigid politics. It’s boring. Confusion can be generative. Confusion leads to discovery; certainty rarely does. Certainty can set us in motion, but confusion can change our understanding of the world. ... View more

I have been reflecting upon and writing about the ways that using photography (i.e., photovoice) and digital storytelling help open up spaces for students to develop a sense of agency and to be more civically engaged. So I was delighted to see that guest blogger Tanya Rodrigue contributed a piece on on multimodal assignments (See 3 Step for Creating a Multimodal Assignment). I appreciate the kinds of questions that she prompts instructors to ask in order to examine the different affordances of a given genre or digital tool. For example, “What is the purpose and what options are available to achieve [the writer’s] purpose? What features distinguish this tool or platform from others? What are the constraints and how might they impact pedagogical and conceptual affordances?” These are important questions that challenge us as teachers to consider the extent to which different tools foster democratic engagement, voice, and agency apart from the pedagogical context that encourages students to act on their convictions.   Here I am thinking about providing contexts for sharing power; creating spaces for critical conversations about inequality, racial struggle, and injustice; examining the sociopolitical contexts that stand in the way of change; or encouraging the intergenerational conversations that connect students to the communities we encourage them to be a part of. The work before us as educators entails examining the tensions, contradictions, and promises of educating youth for participation and leadership amid contexts that often demand compliance more than change.   My concerns about the contexts of teaching students to be more involved in their communities led me and my co-author, April Lidinsky, to include a number of readings in the 4th edition of our book, From Inquiry to Academic Writing. These are readings that challenge students to reflect upon the kinds of tools we often take for granted in discussions about the conditions that foster change. Dana Radcliffe explains in “Dashed Hopes: Why Aren’t Social Media Delivering Democracy?” that media platforms alone cannot create a movement, Instead, it’s useful to think about the importance of defining what we mean by deliberative democracy. I would add that it is important to center our attention on developing relationships that humanize individuals in our efforts to make a difference in the world. We have included additional readings that also invite students to think about different media platforms and the ways they work to achieve a given writer’s goals (e.g., Dan Kennedy’s “Political Blogs,” John Dickerson’s “Don’t Fear Twitter” and Steve Grove’s “Youtube”).   I wonder what other teachers of writing are doing to create the kinds of contexts that will enable students to develop a sense of voice and agency, while also looking critically at the tools we encourage them to use as ways to create meaningful change. What kind of citizens are we trying to shape? What kinds of democratic values? What political and ideological interests are embedded in or attached to varied conceptions of citizenship?  ... View more

This post originally appeared on the blog on 9/14/11   We are finally—I believe—past the time of the unexamined assumption that literary fiction is automatically high art (and therefore worthy of our imaginations and ink), while genre fiction is intrinsically lowbrow or mind-wasting (and therefore not worthy of those things. Or not for academic credit, anyway). My sense is that the past decade has seen a growing acceptance of genre writing in the workshop, or at least a growing acceptance of work that flirts with genre. And I wonder if this is because more writers who teach these workshops are themselves flirting more with genre. (Kim Wright recently published this essay about the phenomenon of literary authors jumping into the genre pool.) Still, potential arguments remain for emphasizing literary fiction, particularly literary realism, in the workshop: Literary fiction is generally more “character-based” than genre fiction. Instructors are more comfortable teaching their own area of expertise, which is usually literary fiction. Each genre has its own conventions that don’t necessarily cross genres or apply to literary fiction, whereas (the thinking goes) the lessons of literary fiction more readily apply across all genres. Maybe the most compelling argument is that conventions themselves—especially character types and clichéd plots—are precisely what we teach students to resist. In a “hard-boiled” detective story, the detective is, well, hard-boiled. He also solves the crime. Always. In the romance, the couple falls in love and gets together. The genre story, particularly its outcome, is largely determined by the conventions of the genre, rather than by the particular characters and their situations. When these conventions get substantially subverted, they are not generally considered genre stories any longer. Rather, they are something else: not a crime novel, but Lolita; not a science fiction novel, but Slaughterhouse-Five. Not a ghost story, but Beloved. Yet there are also some persuasive reasons to allow, maybe even encourage, genre writing in a workshop: Genre fiction is what many of our students are reading and is what inspires some of them to pursue creative writing in the first place. If the workshop dwells only in the domain of literary realism, how can we in good faith assign stories by Márquez or Barthelme or Borges (or contemporary authors like George Saunders and Kevin Brockmeier)—or anyone at all who strays from the “real”? Although I do promote literary realism, especially in the beginning workshop, ultimately I want—and ask—students to write what they’re most driven to write—provided they are careful not to make artistic decisions based on what “always happens” in a particular genre. If a story involves time travel, there needs to be a reason why it can’t simply involve flashbacks. If a troll is guarding a bridge, he’d better not be guarding it “because that’s what trolls do.” That troll needs a history and personality every bit as fleshed out as a character in a “literary” story. In this way, I try to help students develop the habits that stay with them for their next story, and their next, regardless of genre. A final thought: This issue seems particularly salient now, I think, because we have a whole generation of creative writing instructors who grew up on Stephen King teaching a whole generation of students who grew up on J. K. Rowling. And this is a good thing, indeed—because Stephen King and J. K. Rowling happen to know a thing or two about writing compelling stories. Your thoughts?  ... View more

Last month I had the pleasure of attending the 11 th biennial meeting of the Feminisms and Rhetorics conference, held at the University of Dayton. Traveling cross country for the meeting took me back to the first meeting, sponsored by Oregon State and chaired by Lisa Ede and Cheryl Glenn in 1997. Lisa and Cheryl had gotten funding from their department to hold a conference on a topic of their choice. Since the three of us had recently published an essay entitled “Border Crossings: Intersections of Rhetoric and Feminism,” that’s the topic they chose, assuming that they would hold this one-time conference and that would be that. But that first conference stirred so much creativity, was so exciting and thought-provoking, that attendees decided it could not happen just once, and so colleagues from the University of Minnesota stepped up to say they would hold a second conference in 1999. And so the “biennial” meeting got a foothold, and before long the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in Rhetoric and Composition signed on as co-sponsor, and now here we are, in 2017, celebrating the 20 th anniversary of this conference. I’ve been to almost all of the intervening conferences and have come to look forward to this smaller, more intimate conference as my favorite. Certainly this year’s meeting was no disappointment. In fact, Margaret Strain, Elizabeth Mackay, and Patrick Thomas rolled out the red carpet in grand style for us, with an extraordinarily powerful book and document exhibit in the library (the first edition of Phyllis Wheatley’s poems almost brought me to my knees), a grand reception in their remarkable art institute (a perfect gem of a building full of magnificent paintings and sculptures), and a concert featuring undergraduate singers. These events were very special treats, but the conference itself more than matched them. I attended a panel at every single session, and I expected to find at least one that was, shall we say, less than engaging. Didn’t happen. Every panel I attended was thought-provoking, lively, deeply informed, and challenging in all the best ways. The conference theme, “Rhetorics, Rights, (R)esponsibilities,” seemed to have been particularly evocative, and we heard papers on the rhetorics and responsibilities of religious groups, presidential campaigns, indigenous cultures, protest movements, and much more. Of special importance to me were several sessions on Black feminist rhetoric (I loved Ronisha Browdy’s “Keeping my Eye on FLOTUS’s Garden: A Black Feminist Rhetorical Reading of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Kitchen Garden”), as well as talks by Kendra Mitchell and Jason Collins, a session devoted to “Black Women’s Multivalent Resistances to Marginalization,” and a memorable roundtable titled “#SayHerName #BlackGirlMagic: 21st Century Black Women’s Rhetorical Practices,” featuring Gwendolyn Pough, Tamika Carey, Elaine Richardson, and LaToya Sawyer. DYNAMITE. Claudia Rankine, the Frederick Iseman Professor of Poetry at Yale, a 2016 MacArthur Award winner, and the author of Citizen (which the conference organizers aptly describe as a “defining text for our time”) gave the keynote to a wildly receptive and appreciative audience. She spoke very directly about racism in our society and had a message for the 53% of white women voters who cast a ballot for Trump: not “what could they have been thinking” but what WERE they thinking, and it wasn’t good. I was on the edge of my seat through the entire talk and have since re-read Citizen. It’s a book every one of us should know well.  Now a few weeks after the conference, I find myself looking back on it, remembering powerful moments, such as Aneil Rallin’s hauntingly beautiful and provocative “’Can I Get a Witness:’ Writing with June Jordan,” a series of vignettes that mixed personal narrative with critical analysis to show, rather than tell about, the effects of racism all around us. I am also looking forward, already, to the 2019 conference, which will be held at James Madison University, hosted by Jen Almjed, Elisabeth Gunnior, and Traci Zimmerman. As of now, their working theme is "Re-visioning and Re-mediating the F-word: Feminisms & Rhetorics Twenty Years Later." I hope teachers of writing from all over the country will be joining me there!   Credit: Pixaby Image 2692553 by wangkunsunny, used under a CC0 Creative Commons License   ... View more

Here is a typical scenario that might be used on campus for a discussion about resources on and responses to sexual harassment: A student in your course tells you that a member of her writing group for the course has been making inappropriate gestures and comments to her for several weeks. She reports that last night the group had a meeting at the library. After the meeting, everyone split up. She went to the study area on the third floor. About five minutes after settling in at a table to do some work, she realized that the problem group member was watching her from the stacks on the other side of the room. She says that she felt uncomfortable, so she gathered up her belongings and moved to a different area on the 4th floor. Unfortunately, she was followed and was being watched again. A few minutes later, the other student blocked her in the corner and tried to grope her. She fought back and got away, but now she is reluctant to come to class and does not want to remain in the writing group. What resources can you suggest to help her? How do you handle the situation? This scenario works for a discussion on campus. The problem arises when this kind of scenario is the only kind that is discussed. You see, academic communities often have limited vision when it comes to dealing with sexual harassment, abuse, and violence. It may not be the issue that first comes to mind, however. What’s the Issue? Let me share an excerpt from Virginia Tech’s “What to Do if You Have Been Assaulted in the Past 72 Hours” instructions (scroll down to the last section on the page): You can have a PERK exam even if you do not make a police report. You will not be responsible for the cost of the exam. If you think you want to make a report to the police, the hospital will do a forensic exam to collect evidence, and can then do a drug screen if you think you may have been drugged. The hospital will contact the Women’s Resource Center of the NRV and an Emergency Advocate will meet you at the hospital to provide support and information. These services are free. If you wish to contact the police at one of the numbers above both the Women’s Resource Center and the Women’s Center at Virginia Tech have advocates who will go with you to make the report. Those details are presumably just fine for the student in the scenario above. They don’t make sense for every student who may want to report an assault, however. Let me explain why by beginning with some statistics on sexual assault. The Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) reports the following details on their Victims of Sexual Violence: Statistics page:   “Every 98 seconds, an American is sexually assaulted.” (Department of Justice) “1 out of every 10 rape victims are male.” (Department of Justice) “21% of TGQN (transgender, genderqueer, nonconforming) college students have been sexually assaulted, compared to 18% of non-TGQN females, and 4% of non-TGQN males.” (Association of American Universities) “4.3% of active duty women and 0.9% of active duty men experienced unwanted sexual contact in FY14.” (Department of Defense)   The RAINN page on Campus Sexual Violence: Statistics states, “Among undergraduate students, 23.1% of females and 5.4% of males experience rape or sexual assault through physical force, violence, or incapacitation.”   Do you see the issue now? If the student looking for help is one of the 5.4% of undergraduate male students who experiences rape or sexual assault, does support from the Women’s Resource Center and the Women’s Center at Virginia Tech make sense? What if you are one of the 21% of TGQN (transgender, genderqueer, nonconforming) students? The issue, of course, is that far too many of the campus resources available discuss sexual harassment, assault, and violence as if they only happen to women.   This limited vision ignores any student who does not identify as a woman. As if being the victim of sexual assault is not traumatic enough on its own, these students are at least implicitly treated as if their experience couldn’t have happened. After all, there is no relevant suggestion for the support they will receive. Beyond what the absences in this policy say to male students, they suggest that we can only address the issue of sexual harassment with a binary definition of gender identity. We can do better. Taking It to the Classroom The first step to improving our campus discussion of sexual harassment may well be taking it to the classroom by going through the steps I discussed above:   Begin by asking students to read a campus statement on sexual assault or harassment, like Virginia Tech’s “What to Do if You Have Been Assaulted in the Past 72 Hours.” Ask students to identify the audience and purpose for the instructions. Share the statistics on sexual assault from the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network. Go back to the campus statement, and ask students to identify who counts and who is left out of the statement, relying on the statistics for support. Have students compose a document in response, such as one of the following: Rewrite the statement to make it more inclusive. Write individual letters or a group letter to the office on campus that is responsible for the campus resources and ask them to revise their materials to be more inclusive. Write a class letter to the editor of the campus newspaper, outlining the issue and asking for action to revise the materials. Create a campus campaign that calls for revision and/or outlines available resources and support for victims of sexual assault and harassment. Have students dig through other, related statements and resources on the campus website, such as the materials on Title IX; and then ask students to report their findings to the class. Ask students to research sexual assault and harassment on campus. Have students use their research to create infographics that communicate the information to readers. The infographics can be used as part of a campaign to improve the available resources on sexual assault and harassment.   Final Thoughts Like several other posts I have shared recently, the idea for this post grew from my participation in an inclusive pedagogy cohort, but I have to admit that it’s a topic that has been simmering for a few years. I had not noticed the limited view of sexual assault on campus until I attended an employee orientation in 2013. As part of the sessions, a police officer came in to tell us all about what the women could do in case of violence. I’m not sure what the men in the room thought. I guess they were supposed to be taking notes on how to help damsels in distress.   I wasn’t amused, but I was too nervous about my new job to speak up. Now, not only am I willing to speak up, but I am also willing to ask students to speak up with me. What issues inspire you to speak up on campus? How do you explore inclusive communities with students? Do you have ideas or questions about inclusive pedagogy? Please tell me in the comments below. I’d love to hear from you.   Credit: ask first by Robert Jack 啸风 Will on Flickr, used under a CC-BY-SA 2.0 license ... View more

Today's featured guest blogger is Samantha Looker-Koenigs, author of Language Diversity and Academic Writing: A Bedford Spotlight Reader. My first-year writing students and I both enjoy the topic of technology’s effects on language and communication, so I knew that I wanted to include this topic in my Bedford Spotlight Reader, Language Diversity and Academic Writing (LDAW, from here on). Unfortunately, what makes it a great topic for engaging students—constant change and up-to-the-minute currency—also makes it near impossible to do justice to in a textbook. I knew that any article about a specific technological change or language phenomenon was liable to be outdated before the book was even in print. So I compromised: I included two articles—Tom Chatfield’s New Scientist column “OMG—It’s the Textual Revolution” and Naomi Baron’s Educational Leadership article “Are Digital Media Changing Language?”—that feel to me relatively timeless (to whatever degree that term can apply to the realm of technological change). They emphasize not specific technological developments so much as the general affordances and constraints of technology; they focus less on specific changes to language itself and more on general attitudes toward communication and change. In my experience, both articles serve as great jumping-off points for discussions that can pull in whatever tech or texting phenomenon is hot at the moment. Right now, one of the most prominent players in the “language” of texting is emojis. Emojis are a particularly interesting phenomenon because they share many of the features of their alphanumeric textspeak predecessors while, at the same time, being decidedly more visual and less “language-like” (see McCulloch’s article linked below). They provide an excellent opportunity to reinforce general themes of language, such as the “in-group” nature of slang that Eble’s article introduces in LDAW Chapter 1, while also pushing us well beyond the basics of language change that are discussed in LDAW Chapter 3. (Even the word emoji itself is an interesting case of language evolution, as debates about its appropriate plural make clear.) Interested in discussing the role of emojis in language and communication with your students? For the remainder of this post, I’ll offer a few emoji subtopics, with recommended readings, that I think can lead to fruitful discussion and writing. Purposes of emoji use. The journal Computers in Human Behavior has published quite a few articles about emoji use in recent years. I find this journal’s articles great for first-year writing because they provide exposure to traditional academic research article structure but tend to be on the briefer side. I’ve taught one piece in particular, an analysis of common reasons for emoji use, in my own class alongside the Chatfield article in LDAW Chapter 3. The article emphasizes the meaning and conversational utility within emojis, making it a nice companion to Chatfield’s. Miscommunication. Grouplens, a technology research lab at the University of Minnesota, has done some fascinating work on emoji-related miscommunication. As these researchers have found, different phones and operating systems often render the same emoji in quite different ways. For instance, a big grin with smiling eyes sent from a Google Nexus is received by an iPhone user as something more like a grimace. A quick, approachable summary of some of this research is on the Grouplens blog, and they’ve also posted a full scholarly research paper published by the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence.   Emojis as a threat (or not) to language. As an “internet linguist,” Gretchen McCulloch researches recent developments in internet-influenced language. Her entire blog is worth a browse for articles that may interest your students. For an emoji discussion, I’m a fan of her article on The Toast titled “A Linguist Explains Emoji and What Language Death Actually Looks Like.” In it, McCulloch responds to the familiar worry that a recent technology trend is threatening the quality of writing (emojis being only the most recent culprit, of course, in a lineage of scapegoats that has included everything from text messaging abbreviations to inexpensive postal delivery and the decline of line engraving). McCulloch’s article makes an interesting companion to LDAW Chapter 3 readings like Robert MacNeil’s “English Belongs to Everybody”; students may hear echoes of MacNeil’s point that “experts who wish to ‘save’ the language may only discourage pleasure in it.” It also, with its discussion of “actual” language death, hearkens back to Romney’s Chapter 1 article about efforts to revive the Yurok language. Have you found other emoji articles or resources? What other language and technology phenomena do you find interesting to discuss with students? I invite you to let me and the Bits community know in the comments. ... View more

Today's guest blogger is Amanda Gaddam‌, an adjunct instructor in the First-Year Writing Program and the School for New Learning at DePaul University. She holds a B.A. in English with a concentration in Literary Studies and a M.A. in Writing, Rhetoric, and Discourse with a concentration in Teaching Writing and Language from DePaul, and her research interests include first-year composition, adult and non-traditional students, and writing center pedagogies. I often tell my first-year composition students that writing doesn’t happen in a vacuum, and neither do composition classes. With the current political climate and its reach into nearly every aspect of our lives, I, like other instructors, feel compelled to bring current events into the classroom, but I sometimes struggle with how to do it effectively, with balance, and with inclusivity.   As much as I’d love to spend all of our time talking about presidential tweets and examining the arguments for and against gun control legislation, I have a responsibility to be mindful of my limited face-to-face time with my class and to make sure that I’m covering the necessary curriculum to prepare my students for future coursework. So, when I do talk about current events in the classroom, which is fairly often, I try to do it in a way that connects directly to course topics and allows for viewing the situation from a new or different perspective. The following activity and assignment provide an opening to talk about recent protests and their texts through the lens of visual rhetoric.   Recommended readings The St. Martin’s Handbook: 18, “Communicating in Other Media”; Ch. 26, “Writing to Make Something Happen in the World” The Everyday Writer (also available with exercises😞 22, “Making Design Decisions” EasyWriter (also available with exercises😞 18, “Language that Builds Common Ground”   Assignment 1. Talk to students about visual rhetoric. Like most instructors, I like to build on previous conversations about the rhetorical triangle and rhetorical situations and apply those conversations to things like advertisements, photographs, and videos. We cover things like arrangement, font, typeface, and color, among other elements and concerns. Claudia Cortes’s “Color in Motion” video series is a fun way to start talking about pathos and color choices in visual texts. 2. Provide examples of protest posters, both recent and historical, and foster discussion in small or large groups. A simple Google search will yield hundreds of possible signs for discussion, and there are several curated lists, such as this one from The Washington Post, that you could assign students to read, as well. Discussion topics could include: What is the purpose of a protest sign? Who is the audience? What features cause some signs, especially in recent protests, to go “viral”? Are there particular combinations of arrangement, font, color, etc. that are more effective than others in the context of protest signs? Have the criteria for rhetorically effective protest signs changed over time? If so, how? How does the creator allow the subject or content of the protest sign to influence the visual rhetorical elements of the sign? Do creators make different visual rhetorical choices based on the subject of the sign and/or type of protest? These are just a few questions to get your class started with visual rhetoric, but this area is rich with opportunities to talk about language, audience, and discourse communities. You can and should tailor the discussion for your class based on your curriculum, interests, and course materials.   3. Create a list of “best practices” for creating an effective protest sign in today’s political climate. The “think, pair, share” activity could work well for this: give students time to think and free write on their own, then ask them to share their observations in small groups or pairs, and bring the class together to compile a collaborative list.   4. Ask students to use the list that your class has compiled to create a protest sign. This could be accomplished in any number of ways or a combination of different strategies: Students work individually on creating a protest sign about a cause that they’re personally passionate about. Small groups of students are assigned a cause based on a course theme or previous class discussion, and they collaborate to choose a stance, slogan, and rhetorical approach to their shared sign. Students use traditional poster board and markers to create, or they take advantage of more advanced digital programs like PowerPoint or Photoshop to create their sign.   5. Develop an opportunity to for students to share their protest signs and explain their rhetorical choices. One idea might involve setting up the physical signs around the classroom like a poster session at a conference and asking students to write a short explanation of rhetorical choices to accompany their signs. Students could visit their classmates’ signs, ask questions about their processes, and provide feedback about the rhetorical effectiveness of their products.   Reflection This activity and assignment showcase multimodal texts in a real-world situation with real-world consequences. While tired stereotypes about millennials might have one believe that they aren’t interested in civics (or anything besides themselves), the reality is that we have the privilege of working with a group of generally motivated, socially conscious young adults who have beliefs and values that they want to communicate in meaningful ways. Keeping this assignment firmly grounded in first-year composition teaching topics will provide a space for students to express themselves and pursue their passions, while maintaining a clear path toward meeting course objectives. Image Credit: "Citation needed" by futureatlas.com on Flickr. www.futureatlas.com ... View more

The arrival of the authors' copies of the ninth edition of Signs of Life in the U.S.A. prompts me to reflect here on the history of this—at least for Sonia Maasik and myself—life-changing project. So I will do something a little different this week, and return to the original purpose of the web-log, which was to write something along the lines of a traditional journal or diary entry rather than an interpretive essay—a remembrance of things past in this case.  To begin with, Signs of Life did not begin its life as a textbook. Its origins lie in a book I wrote in the mid-1980s: The Signs of Our Time: Semiotics: The Hidden Messages of Environments, Objects, and Cultural Images (1988). That book was a product of pure contingency, even serendipity. I was seated at my departmental Displaywriter (an early word processor that was about the size of a piano and used eight inch truly floppy disks) completing my final draft of Discourse and Reference in the Nuclear Age (1988)—a technical critique of poststructural semiotics that proposed a new paradigm whose theoretical parameters underlie the applied semiotic lessons to be found in Signs of Life—when my department chair drifted by and casually asked me if I would like to talk to a local publisher whom he had met recently at a party and who was looking for someone to write a  non-academic book on semiotics for a non-academic audience. As a young professor, I was ready to jump at any book-publishing opportunity, and, having found myself doing a lot of spontaneous interpretations of the popular culture of the 1980s (especially of stuffed toys like Paddington Bear and the celebrity Bear series—anyone remember Lauren Bearcall?), I was ready with a book proposal in no time. I soon had a contract, an advance (with which I purchased an early Macintosh computer that didn't even have a hard drive—it still works), and a tight deadline to meet (that's how things work in the trade book world). And that's also how Discourse and Reference and The Signs of Our Time came to be published in the same year.   A few years later, Sonia discovered that composition instructors were using The Signs of Our Time as a classroom text, and I found that chapters from the book were being reprinted in composition readers (the first to do so was Rereading America 2/e). So Sonia had a brainstorm: having worked with Bedford Books on other projects, she suggested that we propose a new composition textbook to Bedford based upon The Signs of Our Time. Looking back, it looks like a pretty obvious thing to have done, but this was the early 1990s, and America was hotly embroiled in the academic version of the "culture wars"; not only was the academic study of popular culture still controversial, but no one had attempted to bring semiotics into a composition classroom before. Still, Chuck Christensen—the founder of Bedford Books—who was always on the lookout for something both daring and new, was interested. He also wanted to know if I could provide a one-page description of what semiotics was all about. So ordered, so done, and we had a contract for a composition reader that would combine a full writing instruction apparatus with an array of readings, alongside unusually long chapter introductions that would both explain and demonstrate the semiotic method as applied to American popular culture.   That part of the matter was unusually smooth. But there were bumps in the road on the way to completion. For instance, there was our editor's initial response to our first chapter submissions. Let's just say that he was not enamored of certain elements in my expository style. But thanks to a long long-distance phone call we managed to clear that up to our mutual satisfaction. And the good news was that Bedford really wanted our book. The bad news was that they wanted it published by January 1994—a good deal less than a year away and we were starting practically from scratch. It was published in January 1994 (just in time for the big Northridge earthquake that knocked my campus to the ground). I still don't know how Sonia and I did it (the fact that we said "yes" to Chuck's invitation to do another book—it became California Dreams and Realities—in that same January, giving us six months to do it this time, simply boggles my mind to this day, but, as I say, we were a lot younger then).   Well, all that was a quarter of a century ago. In that time we have improved upon every prior edition of Signs of Life, listening not only to the many adopters of the text who have reviewed it over the years in the development stage of each new edition, but adding changes based upon our own experiences using it in our own classes. Of these changes, the most important to me are the ongoing refinements of my description of the semiotic method—the unpacking of the often-intuitive mental activity that takes place when one interprets popular cultural phenomena. There is an increasingly meta-cognitive aspect to these descriptions, which break down into their component parts the precise details of a semiotic analysis—details that effectively overlap with any act of critical thinking. And, of course, every new edition responds to popular cultural events and trends with updated readings, updated chapter introductions that introduce fresh models of semiotic analysis, and the introduction of new chapter topics altogether. And in the case of the 9th edition, we have added plenty of material for instructors who may want to use the 2016 presidential election as a course theme or topic. But perhaps the most important refinements for those who adopt the text are those that Sonia brings to each new edition: the expansion and clarification of the writing apparatus in the text that guides students in the writing of their semiotic analyses.   As I draw to an end here, I realize that I could write an entire blog just on the history of the covers for Signs of Life. Maybe I will in my next blog entry. ... View more

Last month I shared the Point of View Menu, a tool I use to help students see the effects of their point of view and tense choices in a story. My students were floored by the possibilities, and they were particularly interested in learning more about second person point of view. Given the range second person point of view offers, I developed a tool to focus on three options of second person paired with the simple verb tenses past, present, and future. My students promptly dubbed this new tool the “Secret Menu.” (They then had to explain to me that a secret menu at a fast food restaurant is one customers can order off of, but only if they know it exists.) They were thrilled at the prospect of understanding a technique they had not deeply explored before.   To teach the “Secret Menu,” I review the indicators of each tense and some of the reasons why a writer would choose to write in each, as we discussed with the original menu. Past tense allows for reflection, present tense provides in-the-moment reaction, and future tense allows for prediction. We review the purposes of each point of view: first person gets us right into the speaker’s mind, third person gives us distance from the characters, and second person lands somewhere in between providing space between the reader and the characters.   The “Secret Menu” tool allows us to dissect this space second person offers. That space can shrink or grow, inviting the reader deeper into the story or putting up a wall, depending on the way the writer approaches the story. I then offer to my students three possible uses for second person.   Second person can be used as a masked first person, that is, the story is written with a “you” character as a protagonist that reads similarly to an “I” character. In this use of the second person readers can get almost as close the protagonist’s mind as in first person.   Second person can also be used to invite the reader into the story. The actions of a “you” might come across as if they are directed to the reader.   Finally, second person can be used to offer directions or suggestions.   Similarly to our first menu, I grid the three possibilities for second person and the simple tenses alongside each other. Again, as we fill out the resulting boxes, students see the many combinations of storytelling available to them. It’s important to note that many stories in second person fluctuate among these three uses, so I use dashed lines to indicate fluidity. A story might read as a masked first person and also read as a series of directions and suggestions.     Past—reflection Present—reaction Future—prediction 2.A—masked first = fairly up close and personal Reflection fairly up close and personal Reaction fairly up close and personal Prediction fairly up close and personal 2.B—speak to the reader as a character = invitation Reflection w/ invitation Reaction w/ invitation Prediction w/ invitation 2.C—directions and suggestions Reflection w/ direction Reaction w/ direction Prediction w/direction   One of my favorite short stories to teach with the secret menu in mind is Lorrie Moore’s “How to Become a Writer.” Together, students look at Moore’s technique at the sentence level and identify how the second person point of view might read different ways depending on readers’ interpretations.   After this discussion, I find students are eager to re-read other second person stories with attention to how they might pull off this tricky technique. I then challenge them to try writing their own stories in second person, experimenting with these possibilities, and the drafts they submit demonstrate thoughtfulness and confidence in the voices they choose. ... View more

In my last two posts (Part 1 and Part 2), I introduced a writing about writing assignment for students enrolled in both my FYC course and an ESL co-requisite support course. In a course-long project, students are researching a discourse community, using Joseph Bizup’s 2008 article, “BEAM: A Rhetorical Vocabulary for Teaching Research-Based Writing” as the theoretical framework guiding their selection and analysis of source material.   Students first looked for a general description of the discourse, or a background (B) source. Next, they searched for sources that would illustrate common communication practices within the discourse, including professional organization websites, social media sites, newsletters, and professional or academic journals. These texts will serve as exhibit (E) sources.   This past week, students began looking for examples of argument (A) sources, which we are actually using as exhibits through which students investigate the language of argument within their target discourse. As with exhibit sources, the search for argument sources has created some challenges for the students. Several students, for example, had simplified or idiosyncratic definitions of argument. Some believed that argument requires a combative tone, while others assumed that articles which present research and evidence must be, by definition, informative only, and not argumentative.   In addition to re-conceptualizing argument, students also had to come to terms with the idea that all discourses and communities practice argumentation; several students initially questioned whether members of various professions actually argue (although a reminder that any presentation of reasons and evidence in support of position of a claim or proposal constitutes argument helped most of them envision how argument might function within their particular target discourse community).   We next tackled methods of searching that might lead to argument texts, including use of terms such as editorial, op-ed, or “response to” (in the title).  Some students had identified current controversial issues in the process of finding their exhibit sources, and they were able to use that information to find appropriate argument texts. Moreover, since some students are researching professional organizations with legislative advocacy or social justice teams, they found argument texts in the form of briefs, white papers, and position statements, many addressed to those outside of the particular discourse. We also discussed the ways that different discourse groups might use multimodal arguments: ad campaigns, slogans, memes, and other visual or audio texts.   Having found appropriate argument texts, students next grappled with reading the arguments so that they could develop a summary. Vocabulary often proved difficult, as did seeing how the argument terms we have worked to define (claim, counterclaim, reason, evidence, concession, rebuttal, credential, ethos, pathos, etc.) can be applied within this discourse context.   But what I found heartening—even as I found myself repeating, reminding, clarifying, and debunking—is that the majority of my students are determined to understand the texts they have uncovered in their research. When I suspected a source might be too difficult, students did not opt for an easier, more obvious text. “This is my field, Dr. Moore,” they would say. “I want to read this now; I plan to be writing it some day.”   This poster, developed by the Newseum, is another tool to remind students that sources have a discourse context and a provenance; taking time to examine that context can lead to more confidence about the information they find. I plan to share it with students as they continue their semester research project.       Want to offer feedback, comments, and suggestions on this post? Join the Macmillan Community to get involved (it’s free, quick, and easy)! ... View more

Each week, the inclusive pedagogy cohort that I am a member of posts on a specific topic. Recent posts have focused on food or housing insecurity, religious observances, military veterans, gender identity and expression, and cognitive diversity. Even when I knew about the resources included in these posts, their scenario-based approach has helped me to think about how I would react in response to these topics. Each weekly post opens with a specific scenario that a teacher has encountered. Here’s an example from the message on supporting LGBTQ students: Our class is discussing topics and writing opinion pieces related to same sex marriage legislation. There’s a wide range of viewpoints on the subject. Last week, a student revealed in his opinion piece that he is gay and is very uncomfortable with some of the perspectives being expressed—especially since very few people know his sexual orientation. How do I support this student? The scenarios outline a situation that a teacher has encountered that results in the teacher needing support and additional resources to know what to do next. The posts continue with an explanation of possible resources and end with available campus resources. I particularly like that these messages aren’t asking me to play a game of “Guess the Right Answer.” Instead, they give me answers and model exactly what I can do next if I am ever in a similar situation. Because of the effectiveness of this strategy, similar scenarios could be useful with students. Rather than describing situations from the teacher’s point of view, scenarios could be described from the student’s perspective and then matched with responses and campus resources that can help students. In particular, students could benefit from scenarios that explore resources students would be unlikely to know about otherwise, such as services that the Writing Center provides beyond basic tutoring sessions or how to get support from the university library. Further, I can talk about these resources without connecting them to any specific student in the class. Using this strategy, I can give students more than name of a place or a brief explanation of its services. I can share a narrative students identify with, helping them build stronger connections to the information. What do you think? Can this scenario-based discussion of campus resources help students? How would you use the strategy? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.   Credit: Tutoring Writing by Jake Mohan on Flickr, used under a CC-BY 2.0 license ... View more

As a transition between Writing Project 1 and Writing Project 2, I invited students to watch and reflect in writing on a video preview of Raoul Peck’s film “I Am Not Your Negro,” published in The Guardian when the film opened in the UK. In the preview, James Baldwin speaks at the Cambridge University Union in 1965. Baldwin’s subject is the “American Dream,” and he states unequivocally that “what [America/Americans] are not facing is the results of what we’ve done.” What Baldwin means here is that white supremacy denies that African Americans and other people of color did the hard labor to build this country: “under someone else’s whip. For nothing.” In reading the reflections, I discovered that students have found in Baldwin’s work a profound inspiration for their own writing. Students have been moved by how Baldwin inserts himself and his experiences into his essays and speeches. By doing so, Baldwin offers a model for writers to create their own profound connections to pathos and ethos, even as he has been dead for three decades. From the students’ perspectives, Baldwin’s writing on the struggles of his time hold significant implications for the world in which students are coming of age.   For these reasons, I decided to design Writing Project 2 so that students would have more time to study an idea in depth. The assignment sheet below offers a glimpse of what we will embark on as we stretch toward midterm and beyond. WRITING PROJECT 2 PROMPTS: Choose one of the three sample prompts below or create your own prompt. The prompts ask you to work on the following skills, which will serve as grading criteria for WP 2:   Choose a significant aspect of “I Am Not Your Negro”   Explain the significance through supporting examples Explore research to learn more about your examples Develop reasons for your own opinions   SAMPLE PROMPTS: RESPONSIBILITY: What, in your opinion, does Baldwin mean by “taking responsibility for your own life”? What examples from the movie support your opinion? When you research these examples in more depth, what do you learn?  Why did you choose this option? In other words, what does the phrase “taking responsibility for your own life” mean for you and what relevant experiences support your examples?   AMERICAN DREAM: How did you define the “American Dream” before watching “I Am Not Your Negro”? What specific examples from the movie support and/or contradict your definition? When you research these examples in more depth, what do you learn? Has your definition of the “American Dream” changed as a result of watching the movie? Why or why not?   HISTORICAL MEDIA ARTIFACT: What historical media artifact (music, photography, film, advertising) draws your particular attention in “I Am Not Your Negro”? What specific examples from the movie support your ideas? When you research these examples in more depth, what do you learn? Why did these particular examples draw your attention? Why do these examples seem especially significant in 2017?   CREATE YOUR OWN PROMPT: Follow the four steps above, and take a look at the example included below. EXAMPLE ESSAY FOR WP 2: “James Baldwin’s Lesson for Teachers in a Time of Turmoil” by Clint Smith might serve as an example for WP 2. In his essay, Smith illustrates each of the four skills to be practiced for WP 2. Smith: Chooses a significant aspect of “I Am Not Your Negro” (using education and Baldwin’s essay “A Talk to Teachers”) Explains the significance through supporting examples (providing significant events of 1963) Explores research to learn more about your examples (comparing past history with current events) Develops reasons for your own opinions (addressing why he believes his ideas are significant)   ADDITIONAL RESOURCES AND SUGGESTIONS: See Paul Thomas’s course archive for Reconsidering James Baldwin in the Era of Black Lives Matter. Photo: Civil Rights March on Washington, D.C. [Author James Baldwin and actor Marlon Brando.] From National Archives Catalog. ... View more