This article challenges the rebirth narrative traditionally attributed to Composition Studies and the date 1963. By revisiting specific media-oriented moments excluded from that narrative, the article discovers important moments ignored by Composition Studies regarding technological innovation and rhetorical production. The article argues that the…

This essay describes a special topics creative writing course designed for nursing students, and argues that creative writing strategies work to improve nurses' compositional skills. Also discussed are other potential benefits from creatively writing patients' lives, notably, the blending of arts and sciences, and the ways in which medical schools…

"English 401: Composition IV: Theory and Research" is designated in the Elmhurst College catalogue as "a writing course that introduces students to the scholarly field of composition studies." It is part of a series of courses for English majors pursuing a degree with "Writing Emphasis," for students seeking teacher certification, or for "any"…

This article argues that traveling and working as a writer in Vietnam yielded metaphors that changed the author's pedagogy as well. The article first describes how the experience of crossing the street taught her to move on the terms dictated by local conditions. The metaphor of "moving in traffic" that grew out of this experience denotes a series…

In an experimental writing course we taught at a northeastern state university, we explored "queer" and "writing," hoping to discover what students could create by merging these terms. How might queer theory help students use writing to reimagine and rearticulate various identity categories in ways that allowed them to reconfigure the mental map…

This essay argues for sustainability--a course of action and a mindset that meets the needs of the present while being conscious of, and not compromising the needs of, the future--as a robust focus teaching first-year composition. The essay describes a course designed to respond to calls by composition scholars to reimagine pedagogical designs for…

This article outlines the experiences of a first-year writing program's adoption of large-scale portfolio assessment as part of its move from student-focused assessment to programmatic assessment. This research is an attempt to provide evidence to support the claims benefits associated with portfolio assessment and to chronicle the changes that…

"English 200: Intermediate Composition" is a program elective for English majors and a writing-intensive elective for nonmajors at Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU), a comprehensive institution of 11,000 undergraduate and graduate (master's level) students. English 200 is described in the departmental course catalog as a course "in…

The tenure line job search provides a crucial opportunity for small college composition programs to advance both the quality and visibility of writing instruction, both on their campus and nationally. Since small colleges rely upon the multiple competencies of their faculty, the job search helps to define both the new position and the work of the…

This article argues that graduate programs at large research universities do not prepare new WPAs for the realities of administrative work in small colleges. It first presents and then challenges a series of assumptions about the nature of WPA work, the resources available to facilitate that work, and the rhetorical strategies that are most useful…

Drawing on concepts and practices from the fields of communication, conflict management, leadership, and feminist theory, as well as on her experience as a teacher-administrator, the author explores perceptions, sources, and consequences of power. She argues that effective small college writing administrators must understand the availability of…

This essay examines contradictory attitudes toward teaching and writing at a small college. Looking at her "private" experience as a teacher and "public" experience as a WPA, the author considers how assumptions about the privatization of teaching inhibit deep understanding of teaching and learning as intellectual work.

English 116: Freshman Seminar is, according to the college catalog, the "gateway course for North Central College's integrative curriculum. [It f]ocuses on writing, reading, and critical thinking related to a specific area of inquiry [and is t]eam-taught by faculty from English and another department. Topics vary, but emphasis is on rhetoric and…

This article describes the increasing pressures on those who teach graduate seminars in composition pedagogy to cover a broad range of texts, topics, and techniques. It argues that in response, pedagogy instructors may need to deliberately (re)design their courses in order to continue to help new writing instructors engage in inquiry and…

This article challenges the assumption that the canon of memory means memorization and transcription, and, as a result, has little relevance for the writing classroom. An examination of the canon's historical legacy and its relationships to literacy and invention open a space for redefining the canon of memory as "rememoried knowing." In brief,…