This volume focuses on papers presented by grantees supported by the National Institute of Education and the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education at a meeting held in September, 1980. Papers are grouped into the following sections: composing processes and development, writing assessment, writing instruction in context, the writing teacher, language variation and writing, and functions of writing outside of school. Roger Shuy's concluding remarks highlight some of the issues that mark the recent work in writing: (1) writing is seen as critically related to broad individual abilities, rather than as a set of narrow skills; (2) there is a new interest at looking at the processes involved in writing rather than just at the products or finished products; (3) there is a greater emphasis on the functions than on the forms of writing; (4) new emphasis is being given to writing as social discourse; (5) language variation and cultural context, particularly with nonstandard dialects or bilingualism, are seen as deserving more attention in writing; (6) there is a general belief that instruction puts too much emphasis on surface features like grammar and spelling, but there is no consensus about how seriously to treat errors; and (7) teaching writing is difficult, and a major problem is that many teachers of writing are not knowledgeable or experienced writers. (HOD)