WTE Shaughnessay 1/26/12
Shaughnesssay can be related to the monolingual model because she taught her students the basics of prescriptive English. Harris stated that “while politically liberal, the plan of work sketched out in Errors and Expectations is in many ways quite intellectually conservative (105). [or maybe just practical?—I interject…]. While Shaughnessay had taken on a population that was not part of the dominant discourse community, she simply tried to include her students (of different classes and races and languages) b/c teaching them the standard, but she didn’t challenge the standard, so I would agree that she was not politically liberal either, still she was responding to the changes that open enrollment caused to happen to higher education at that time [ie. the democratization of education]… (then I read Ash’s work) Ash wrote about Shaughnessy too, but he categorized her as following traditional multilingual model, while I thought she was following more of a monolingual model... Good activity: Having another read your daybook and then respond to it in your own journal.
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TCE On Writer’s Voice
When I see inauthentic bullshit that sounds real nice, it reminds me of an old writer self who believed in all that jazz (and who used words like all that jazz); instead now, I make fun of expressions like “all that jazz” but I feel my own voice. I use my own voice. I am empowered by my own voice. I will not sacrifice my own voice, especially in informal and reflective writing. If anything, this is my value in this class that I have been working on in myself. I want to get the A, but I really want to challenge the teachers of teachers about the notion of an ideal text. I know how to write one, and I am told that we should not “expect” one; so I write a non-ideal text that is full of voice and bravado, and then bite my nails. There is a happy medium between reader and reader based prose here and I would like to explore this territory this semester. Journal 3/15/12
Genre can be ideological because it is constructed within a culture. A particular genre has its conventional formats and themes based on the script that a culture or subculture has constructed. For example, hip hop music is a genre. It has a culture: hip hop culture. It emerged in an effort to form solidarity within the African American community and to resist a dominant ideology. It originated as highly political and it was constructed in a specific dialect (AAVE) for a particular discourse community who spoke this dialect. There are some cultural norms, patterns, and practices that are exemplified by hip hop, and some of them are against society norms. For example, hip hop can condone smoking drugs and violent or criminal gang activity. Does this mean that all hip hop is like this? No. But if you heard a rap song about a fairy tale or perhaps about being a personal banker, it might sound strange because it would contain ideological content that was contrary to the discourse conventions. The five paragraph essay is a genre within a larger community of practice: the world of education. Does it have content? No. But it does have a dialect or register that is formal and academic in nature, and it is founded on certain assumptions that make the genre a product of ideology. When generic borders are crossed and new forms of discourse emerge, then it enables new ideological constructs to emerge along with them. Just as genre is a manifestation of ideology, it is also used to construct and reconstruct the ideology that it subscribes to. Question for class? What is your favorite genre of music? What type of person listens to that type of music and what are common ideologies that go along with this genre of music Genre Miller, Carolyn R. “Genre as Social Action” Quarterly Journal of Speech 70 (1984): 151-167. -Genre as a set of textual features is formalism. -Text features still prominent in expressivism; form is still taught, but individual voice comes out of form. -Social constructivism- social milleui of texts becoming actions in world. Relationships with people in social situations; stuff around writers and text Chapter 2 Genre as Rhetoric pg 13 -Genre redefined as social action -legitimization process when you cross genre borders---a memo to academic writing? -genre as social action; is a memo still a memo if it is published in an academic journal. -From a formalistic pt it is still a memo -From a social standpoint it is no longer a memo (when serving the function as an academic article. -Teaching genre hard because you pull it out of context -Authentic text (in rhet comp) a text that really does something instead of simulation of activity (as most writing in class) -Genre as having “a distinctive profile of regularities across 4 dimensions”: 1. text 2. process used to compose the text 3. the practices readers use to understand the text 4. the social roles of the text (Dean 11). TCE Responding to a student’s work
1/19/12 I was sympathetic about the text. I wrote like this in H/S and early college but I had less advanced vocab. Looking at student samples I realize how my values have changed—right now I value plain language and succinctness, and esp good org! My background in creative writing shaped me as a reader here..it makes me see through this artist ego and pretentiousness at times and observe some sensitivity; but the writer is trying to impress. I would not say this of course, being full of ego myself, I know not to tread that water. All of us (here) value, but value differently! So how can grading be fair? It is important for us to understand our own values and biases. WTE On daybooks, writer’s block, etc.
The activity were we read each other’s daybooks was very effective pedagogically because we read and responded to each other’s work. Later on in the semester, if I didn’t think people were going to read it (just a journal) I became a little lazy. Sometimes in the semester, I did not like writing ‘on the spot’ so I sat and thought instead. And I used to be so judgmental/impatient of students who did not get down words on the page, they couldn’t “just write”--- Now I can really sympathize with them and I think you can go overboard with daybooks. We went a little overboard in the Summer Institute training on May 5th, but what did I expect? I had already referred to a book Lil and Sally (and others?) had written on daybooks when I was studying writer’s block, so I knew the compulsive okay now “just write” was going to occur in the training. Now having been that “slow writer” I realize that I don’t have to “just write” automatically. I can take my time and think first. Really, my capacity to “just write” is slowed down when I take medicine (for focus). The medicine which gives some people a rush actually slows me down. I need to slow down as a writer and process more carefully (but get started on big projects sooner than later, because I am a slow writer due to the thought and effort I like to put into it. This Writer’s Block project I did this semester for a Problems of Practice Inquiry project was very useful for me and also Elizabeth mentioned that she learned a lot from it too. I have had several compliments on the presentation, and I would consider taking it to a conference or writing formally on it if Chris would agree (because she was my teammate). Writer’s block has been a problem for me, and I would like to investigate more into Axel Lutes conceptual writer’s block, perhaps primary research. Anyways, my old philosophy of “just write” has changed as I now simplified who those who can “just write” on command. I believe in writing when you are ready to write (Murray), but not procrastinating. There is a fine line! Also, I find this really tedious going back and typing my notes from my daybook, so I will allow Moodle posts and daybook journals to be posted on the e-portfolio, with no specified amount of one or the other. If I had my choice here, Moodle posts would predominate, because they are easier to copy and paste. Anyway, my mind is wandering as I write a reflection on this teaching practice here…so adios amigo. TCE Seed for Revamping Resume Idea
I have been studying Writer's Block for another project, and I think that students can become blocked only in certain genres. Miriam Axel-Lute wrote an article about contextual writers block and how a student can be blocked because of the content of the material, issues with the professor, or the discourse itself. Let's say a student is in a business class and is required to write a resume. This is pretty simple, right? It is a genre for sure. So, the student may know the genre: resumes, but he may not know what to fill in the form. He may not have any experiences. He may not really want to go into business and be taking the class to please his mother... Long story short, he sits down to write a resume for a job and he has no idea what to write. The blank screen consumes him. A fear that his life is not reportable consumes him. He has nothing to report. The generic resume may be a sort of block in and of itself, because it assumes a person can be summarized in list format. It assumes that one can be understood without using complete sentences. It assumes that the quality of one's word can be interpreted from a list of action verbs and context-specific nouns. It assumes that one's history and past makes the person a professional, and most students don't have a professional past, so where do they begin in writing a resume, when there is nothing there to summarize? Dean also wrote about resumes as a problematic genre for some writers: "By downplaying the voice and persona of resume writers, the resume depersonalizes job seekers, portraying them as commodities that can be sold” (31). So, anyway: let's say we revamp the resume and include visuals or other types of materials. The MacArthur Foundation is soliciting help from programmers to form an online badge-making system that future "resume writers" could use as hyperlinks on their resumes. These badges could be for non-traditional or non-professional accomplishments, like having designed a website or organized a fundraising event. While these activities might not have happened in a business context and therefore would not be reportable on a typical resume or on the top of the resume where one lists professional experiences, the badge system could be a standardized way to receive an honor for hard work and valuable experience which has no specific tangible definition, certification, or label. It is an attempt at labeling new 21st century skills (such as YouTube video making or social media developing) and putting them into a format that could be accepted by a new sort of 21st century resume system (perhaps a conventional resume with hyperlinks to the online badge portfolio). Later, I decided to require students to make a Writer’s Resume as a Writing to Explore (WTE) Assignment. I am teaching genre first, and I think discussing resumes as a social construct and all of the implications will be helpful to discuss resumes as genres in action. I will probably discuss the badge-making system and challenge them to “revamp their resume.” At the end of the course, Section 5 of the portfolio will be a creative assignment labeled something like “Myself as a Writer.” Because of contextual writer’s block, the writer’s resume does not have to be written about the student or life experience. It can be entirely invented for a fictive person, or a made up resume for a fiction writer. It can also be researched and put real bibliographical information about a writer, but I don’t really expect that. In the Writing Summer Institute, I may use “revamping the resume” as my demonstration project in order to preview the idea before I implement something similar in the classroom. Resumes are so threatening to people, and I think we should explore them as a genre. I have already been thinking how to implement this in a teacher workshop. I will probably ask if I can do this as a 15 minute presentation on a Monday (for example). I would show them my revamped resume, and challenge them to do the same. Also, I would discuss resumes as a genre and how they could work as a genre in action, even though they are so rigidly formatted. Then, on the following Monday (for example), we could all show our revamped resumes. My personal revamped resume will be a digital story, which would probably take me a week to make. I am not going to teach the technology of a revamped resume, but challenge people to explore new digital literacies to reformulate their resumes to be more multidimensional (or multi-modal). *Axel-Lute, Miriam. “Consciousness, Frustration, and Power: the Making of Contextual Writer’s Block. Podis, Leonard A. & Podis, JoAnne M. (Eds.). Working with Student Writers. (2nd Edition). New York: Peter Lang. 2010. Dean, Deborah. Genre Theory: Teaching, Writing, and Being. Urbana, Illinois: NCTE. 2008. **The Badge-making System; http://www.macfound.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=lkLXJ8MQKrH&b=6479569&ct=11641493 TCE Moodle Why you gotta go and make things so complicated?
I see a trend in academic articles: they want to complicate things. I always thought of complicated as negative. In fact, I remember a teacher comment from high school that my writing was too convoluted, but yet it seems that convoluted writing is now the fashion. I wonder if our world has become more complicated simply because new media has merged so many different discourses and languages, and the accessibility of information has overloaded us with so much text that we are trying very hard to synthesize the globalized world and all of its complications. (Wow, that was one complicated sentence!) Or, perhaps, it is one way academics display power in order to complicate knowledge so much as to make it inaccessible to the general public. I wonder if this esoteric talk is akin to a peacock fluffing his feathers: look at all my intricate colors and flashy form. Underneath, a peacock is just a peacock. We, as graduate students, are learning the jargon in our respective disciplines in order to fluff our feathers. We strive to complicate as well, but do we actually become more knowledgeable or more confused? In our efforts to emulate this ideal of complication, do we write with more conviction or more doubt? (The Plain English advocates are trying to move towards a more simple fashion of speaking, however). On the other hand, I think that this trend of privileging complication over simplification could perhaps be an effort to get past binary thinking, that is, thinking in black and white. We are making an effort to say, well this may be right in this context, and this may be right here, and this may be right here, but wait, this is the rightest of the right in the most generalized context. That is just it, we feel we must come to a conclusion once and for all in each argument, which may just make the opposite of that declaration not right. Still, we want to admit nowadays that one theory is right, but... And the 'but' is important to keep the conversation open to new interpretations. Here is an excerpt from John Searle (Speech Act Theorist) about Derrida, the most complicated writer I know. Prior to reading this, I had thought his writing was an extreme version of a French convention. But, if Foucault has called him out on practicing obscure terrorism, then I would have to agree. “With Derrida, you can hardly misread him, because he’s so obscure. Every time you say, “He says so and so,” he always says, “You misunderstood me.” But if you try to figure out the correct interpretation, then that’s not so easy. I once said this to Michel Foucault, who was more hostile to Derrida even than I am, and Foucault said that Derrida practiced the method of obscurantisme terroriste (terrorism of obscurantism). We were speaking French. And I said, “What the hell do you mean by that?” And he said, “He writes so obscurely you can’t tell what he’s saying, that’s the obscurantism part, and then when you criticize him, he can always say, ‘You didn’t understand me; you’re an idiot.’ That’s the terrorism part.” And I like that. So I wrote an article about Derrida. I asked Michel if it was OK if I quoted that passage, and he said yes.” Searle, John. “Reiterating the Differences: A Reply to Derrida,” Glyph 1 (1977): 198-208. TCE Teaching with Technology
Hey all you tangible bookophiles or technophobes, or what have you. You are not alone. Lots of English professionals have a distrust of technology. Many of us are into the tangible turning of the page. Other disciplines outside of humanities do not fear or bidistrust technology as much as we do. Personally, I prefer to read on paper, and write on a computer. Reading a PDF or website is still not the same as writing in the margins with colorful highlighters, messy scribbles, and tiny diagrams. A part of me is not willing to give up the opportunity to artistically illustrate and notate my thoughts. But we're the ones to think about digital literacy, not only as a necessary tool or skill, but as a changing social construction, which leads to cognitive changes as well. I believe our brains have become less linear moving and more spatially oriented due to the way information is laid out on the computer screen. I believe that we (humans) have started to become more visually oriented and more open-minded (culturally) because of technology too. About teaching with technology: I am disorganized and often spill coffee (or wine, oops) on students’ papers. If I had a digital portfolio for my students, it would help me stay organized and I wouldn't have to carry the dreadful pile of papers. I have always hated that "pile of papers" that I have had to bring home time and time again, and I hope that having the papers as digital files might actually help lighten the load (physically but perhaps psychologically as well). I see technology as a tool for helping the day to day managing of classroom activities, and I will definitely use it for that. I hope to expand to thinking about other digital avenues outside of educational platforms and email. On the other hand, I don’t want to create more work for the students for the sake of being technically savvy. If I use digital tools, I want them to be useful creatively or practically, and not just random tweets to put my words out into the universe. Recently, I started my first twitter account. It was a request from an instructor in the Writing Institute training, so I acquiesced. I think I tweeted three times for practice, and now I am bored. I am not one for small talk, and not much else can be done in so few words. Plus, I do not want my small thoughts to go out into the universe to be discoverable by anyone and everyone. However, for the sake of progress, I will try it out in this one group. TCE Moodle Discovering Genre in Action
Although genre theory is not new and teachers have been teaching genre for a long long time, Dean (Genre Theory) has invited us to think of genre as action. I think genres, being naturally unstable, do not have to be intentionally destabilized by a teacher. We just have to explore the natural instability and mix it up creatively (not for the purpose of disruption but rather new constructions). Students will often resist attempts at destabilization, believe it or not. A lot of them want that five paragraph rigidity because it is comfortable and easy. The challenge is...how do we teach it that way? It is so easy to talk about genre in English class and let a genre settle into a solid form that students follow. Students often want a form to fill out, and teaching genre the old fashioned way encourages them to follow society's prescribed models. I think the easiest way to teach genre is to talk about how it is changing due to digital technologies, to talk about genre, not as a solid form, but as a living breathing organism (in "action"). Of course there is nothing wrong with following a format to achieve a goal, but mostly these goals are bureaucratic ones. TCE Moodle About Using First Person
Yes, I agree. I don't know how many times I have heard the word "I" and the question, can we use "I" in this paper. But I have only ever heard this question from high school students (perhaps because of my lack of teaching experience in college). I am surprised I haven't come across this question as a tutor, because it is such a common one. I will say that "I" is a little overused in highschool writings. Students, being adolescents, tend to be ego-centric and base all of their ideologies and conclusions on what their opinions and experiences are. "I believe" or "I think" typically weaken a work, but there is nothing wrong with I. It is just a matter of the verb that follows. I concur...I challenge... etc. I would tell students to take out the word you all together. There is nothing worse than hearing someone preach at "you" like you, the reader, are really just the general person you, as in most people. Unless used as a stylistic device, "you" should be avoided and "I" should be discussed as more of a content issue than a style issue. Is the paper about you? No- then the I should be used sparingly, because it is the content and the thoughts, not the subject of the sentence that is important. Obviously, I is essential in personal narrative. I may do the personal narrative assignment in the third person, and mix it up. It is strange to talk of oneself in the third person, but also a means to think outside of oneself and a particular or narrow world view. To watch oneself as a character in a story is much more enlightening than a reporting of events, and it also helps people stay in the present moment of the story (instead of just telling a synopsis). |