This article reports on a qualitative case study that explored the literacy and disciplinary experiences of 4 Taiwanese/Chinese students learning to write in a US graduate TESOL program. A combination of writing research methods was employed--case study techniques of interview and document collection, combined with discourse and text analysis of students' written language--within Bakhtinian perspectives on discourse socialization (Bakhtin, 1981; Gee, 1989/2001, 1992). The findings suggest the complex interplay between students' previous educational experiences outside the US and their current literate processes as they engage in reading-to-write, perceiving of self, and exerting strategies that show their individuality as well as group membership when interpreting and accomplishing field-related texts. Implications for theory, research, and practice are also discussed.