Williams – Seeking New Worlds: The Study of Writing Beyond Our Classrooms

Williams, Bronwyn T.  “Seeking New Worlds:  The Study of Writing Beyond Our Classrooms.”  CCC 62.1 (2010): 127-146. In this article Williams is arguing that our institutional responsibilities – as departments charged with the teaching of academic discourse – and our specific focus on university-level writing practices has severely hindered a broader, more comprehensive “vision” of what constitutes writing and literacy. W. claims that... Read More

Williams – The Posttheory Generation

Williams, Jeffrey.  “The Posttheory Generation.”  Disciplining English:  Alternative Histories, Critical Perspectives.  Eds. David R. Shumway and Craig Dionne.  Albany: SUNY Press.  2002.  Pgs. 115-134. W. claims that folks that are post-60s and pre-GenX (folks entering the field in the late 80s and early 90s) are in a precarious position in English departments.  Literary studies is, according to W., characterized by a breakdown in Theory... Read More

Lauer – Invention in Rhetoric and Composition

Lauer, Janice.  Invention in Rhetoric and Composition.  West Lafayette: Parlor Press, 2004. Print. Chapter 1 – Introduction and Overview:  L. notes in the introduction the focus of the book and then continues to define invention a couple of different ways: as a solution to the “problem of finding subjects to write about and of developing these subjects” as well as something that “provides guidance in how to begin writing, to explore... Read More

CCR711 – Miller – The Formation of College English

Miller, Thomas P. The Formation of College English: Rhetoric and Belles Lettres in the British Cultural Provinces. Pittsburgh, Pa: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1997. Much of the work that Miller does in this work is to demonstrate how English studies were reduced to literary studies (rhetoric and composition were stripped from the curriculum).  To achieve this Miller works an argument that traces the influences of Scottish professors whose roots... Read More

CCR711 – Miller – What Should College English Be. . . Doing?

Miller, Thomas. “What Should College English Be… Doing?” College English 69 2 (2006): 150-55. Print. As with much of his work, Miller traces some of the binary-based themes about English in this article.  Miller starts by noting how most conversations about English studies have traditionally centered around the question of what English is to what it’s teachers and students should be doing.  Other discussions of English have focused... Read More