Review and Response

preterite Academia

Writing teachers often make use of a system whereby students write comments on one another’s papers, with those comments intended to help the student revise her writing. It’s a labor-saving pedagogical device, but when implemented carefully, it works well: students get a sense of how audiences read and respond to their writing, and revise accordingly. There is a name for this system.

Scholars who wish to share their insights make use of a system whereby their peers read and evaluate those insights and deem them worthy or unworthy for publication, and offer comments on those insights, with those comments intended to help the scholar revise her writing. It’s a labor-intensive academic practice, but our hope is that it keeps us honest: scholars revise, and only the best scholarship gets published.

While these two systems are similar, they are separate, and serve separate functions. However, there is a frequent tendency in our pedagogical and theoretical discourse to refer to both as “peer review.” I’d like to counter that tendency, because it too easily and conveniently elides the status differential between student writing and scholarly writing, and that status differential is something I’d like to see called into question. Mariolina Salvatori and Amy Robillard, among others, have already done substantial and significant work to make visible and problematize that status differential.

I think we need a more precise vocabulary that extends the work of Salvatori and Robillard and foregrounds the differences between those two systems in order to call into question that status differential. For that reason, I’d like to call our classroom work, wherein students read and respond to one anothers’ papers, “peer response,” and I’d like to call our scholarly work, wherein we review one anothers’ work for publication, “peer review.”

And I’d like to be a part of a conversation that discusses how we might productively blur those two terms.

Rescue Drama

preterite Asides

I’ve finally caved in and turned on the air conditioning at home, and Tink and Zeugma are taking turns standing on the printer with their paws on the window sash and their bellies up to the cold air blasting from the window unit.

So this morning, I’m cleaning out cages in the cat room (warning: cheesy MIDI) with D., who’s another volunteer at the shelter, and K.’s the senior volunteer working in the dog room with N., when the phone rings. Ben and Annie, a ginger tabby and a big black and white, are following me around trying to jump into the cages I’m cleaning after I pull out the litter boxen and the newspaper and bedding, Peanut’s guarding my coffee cup, and Reba’s being a bitch and taking random swipes at me. And it’s mostly a quiet morning, not like the chaos with all the dogs excited and barking on Wednesday morning after one of theirs who’d gotten away from the volunteer walking her this weekend had been found in the woods and returned, with the barking getting the cats all freaked out and barfy and yowly and hissy and swatting at one another. The phone rings, and I hear K. pick up and talk briefly, asking questions, and then giving directions. A few minutes later, it rings again: more directions.

K. comes into the cat room, a little exasperated, cigarette in hand, running her other hand through her hair. “This guy,” she says. “This guy’s like driving around, saying he’s by the drug store, and I told him how to get here, and he says he can’t find us. The drug store’s on Main, right?” D. affirms this. “So he says he’s got a puppy he wants to drop off. Says he found this puppy by the side of the road last night and doesn’t know what to do with it. We’re not hard to find, right?”

A few minutes later, a third phone call, and shortly after that, I’m in the front room with the nervous cats — the ones who aren’t so good in the big room with the other cats — cleaning up plates of old food when I see a minivan pull up. I take the food plates back into the big room and put them in the sink, and D. and I are taking stock of what to do next when K. comes hurtling into the cat room with a little yellow rag cupped in her hands, her eyes wide. “What. The fuck. Is this?” she asks.

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Recuperating the Individual

preterite Composition Theory, Economics

In his chapter “Can Economics Start from the Individual Alone?,” Geoffrey M. Hodgson gives an account of how economics turned its attention as a discipline away from a systemic focus and toward the individual homo economicus as its sole starting point. As Hodgson describes it, within the span of a few decades, scholars in economics chose to make their topic the “allocation of scarce means between alternative uses, as a universal matter of choice for every individual in a world of scarcity. Instead of the whole system of production and allocation of the means of life, the choosing individual alone became the foundation stone of economic theory” (57). To the contrary, Hodgson proposes that “the isolated individual is not viable as an analytical starting point” (58), and I see in his argument some instructive parallels to the shift in philosophical emphasis that some in composition have called “the social turn.” One of the more widely recognized indicators of that social turn is James Berlin’s landscaping of the field, wherein scholars focusing on formal concerns were labeled current-traditionalists, others focusing on the mental processes of composing were labeled cognitivists, and those focusing upon the authorial choices of the composing individual were labeled expressivists, to whom Berlin counterposed social-epistemic rhetoric, with its examination and critique of the ways social structures and institutions construct knowledge and interpellate individuals into hegemonic ideologies.

Berlin sets up social-epistemic rhetoric as a strong critique of what he characterizes as expressivism’s focus on the authorial choices of the individual composer, indicting that focus as divorced from the social and thereby unable to engage in anything other than apolitical, disconnected writerly solipsism. So, too, does Hodgson see a shift in political economy toward an emphasis on the choosing individual, which his essay strongly critiques — but his critique takes a direction quite different from Berlin’s.

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Improvised Faux Indian

preterite Recipes

I decided it was time to do some refrigerator- and pantry-cleaning tonight, and the results came out surprisingly well. I’m not sure what one would call this — it’s not palak paneer, because of the potatoes, but it’s not aloo palak, because of the cheese. In any case, it’s easy, and it’s good.

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

.25 teaspoons cumin
.25 teaspoons coriander
.25 teaspoons cardamom
.25 teaspoons black pepper
.25 teaspoons cinnamon
.25 teaspoons cloves
.25 teaspoons nutmeg
.25 teaspoons cayenne or chipotle powder
.5 teaspoons curry powder

.5 cup vegetable broth
1 cup water

1 large onion, diced
3 garlic cloves, diced
2 medium potatoes, cubed

8 ounces cottage cheese (or paneer, of course)
4 ounces fresh baby spinach leaves

Melt the butter over medium heat until it begins to bubble. (Land O’ Lakes really is the best, with the least milk solids of any brand I’ve used.) Mix all the spices together, thoroughly, with your fingers. Add half — only half — of the spices to the melted butter and brown them for about five to seven minutes. Add the onion and sauté for 4-5 minutes, until it starts to become translucent. Add the garlic and sauté for another 2 minutes.

Pour in the vegetable broth and water, deglazing the pan, and add the other half of the spices. Add the potatoes and bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer. Cover and simmer for 20-25 minutes, until potatoes are almost (but not quite) done.

Half-mash the potatoes with a wooden spoon or potato masher — leave some big chunks, because they’re going to cook a bit longer. Increase heat to medium and add cottage cheese and spinach. Stir and cook uncovered for another 6-8 minutes, until the texture is thick and the spinach is wilted.

Serve hot. And somebody tell me what I should call it.

The Quiz Thing

preterite Asides

I’m not usually one to do the quiz thing, but I saw this at k8’s, and was curious if I’d changed much in the ten years or so since I first encountered the MBTI.

Click to view my Personality Profile page

Nope. Still strong INTJ. A little less extreme on the thinking/feeling axes than I was ten years ago, but otherwise mostly the same.

I’m familiar with the criticisms of the MBTI — the concerns with vagueness, and the concerns with telling people things they want to hear about themselves — and I get those concerns, but I also think that people aren’t necessarily coming to the MBTI with high expectations of scientific validity. I mean, I don’t really buy astrology — it seems fundamentally ridiculous to me that your personality traits can be in any way determined by the moment at which you’re born — but at the same time, I’m like “Yeah, I am so totally a Scorpio, and so not a Leo or a Pisces.” The supposed attributes of a Scorpio, in their differences from the attributes of other signs, help people tell stories about themselves in relation to others, much as the Myers-Briggs types do.

It’s not a bug, it’s a feature.

Someone Not Trained

preterite Composition Pedagogy, Composition Theory

There’s an excellent article in the June 2007 CCC that’s had WPA-L abuzz with excited discussions, objections, and elaborations. I think the excitement over the piece — “Teaching About Writing, Righting Misconceptions: (Re)Envisioning ‘First-Year Composition’ as ‘Introduction to Writing Studies'” by Douglas Downs and Elizabeth Wardle — is merited: there are some startling ideas here, provocatively posed, and Downs and Wardle have certainly got me thinking. Composition, they suggest, isn’t only (and shouldn’t be) about teaching a set of discrete and isolable techniques that help students write good essays in standard academic discourse for their other classes; and they thoroughly demonstrate how the study and teaching of writing has been shown in our discipline’s research to be considerably more complicated than that. (My inadequate account of the article does it discursive harm: please, read it yourself, rather than relying on my poor summing-up.) As some on WPA-L have pointed out, the article is not without its difficulties, and there are perhaps some underexamined terms and arguments, but overall, it’s a smart and exciting piece that’s sure to continue to stir discussion.

One passage in particular got me going, because of my institutional situation here at the Point, but I imagine others might have found it provocative as well. My situation: I’m civilian faculty, an assistant professor, with a PhD. As in most departments here, our faculty split is around 70/30 or 80/20 military/civilian. Military junior faculty come in with an MA, teach three years, and rotate back out into the Army, possibly coming back when they’ve got their PhDs, while civilian faculty tend to be more permanent. This proportionally faster turnover rate for military as opposed to civilian instructors creates some unique instructor training exigencies, as does the fact that the Army pays full ride for its military instructors’ graduate degrees, and strongly discourages (perhaps even forbids?) them from working as teaching assistants. So our Army instructors come to us with no college classroom teaching experience, although of course they’ve held company command and have immense experience leading and managing hundreds and sometimes thousands of soldiers. The military junior faculty are, on the other hand, burgeoning experts in their chosen fields, which tend for the most part to be associated with literature.

And therein lies the rub. According to Downs and Wardle, the pedagogy they propose “cannot be taught by someone not trained in writing studies” (574). Later, they elaborate, describing and indicting

the myth that content is separable from writing — that a FYC [first-year composition] instructor need not be expert in the subject matter of a paper in order to evaluate the quality of writing in that paper, or need not be a subject expert on writing in order to teach writing. Such claims accept the premise that writing instruction can be limited to fluent English syntax, grammar, and mechanics.

The first statement raises some difficult and complex concerns for me, but I very much agree with the latter sentiment. I can’t help but bristle when I get well-meant emails from friends or family equating what I do with teaching basic rules of grammar and mechanics. I am an expert on writing, just as my friends who teach chemistry or literature are experts on their topics, and I teach writing well. And this summer, I’m taking part in our arriving faculty workshop, and helping to talk to junior officers about best pedagogical practices for teaching first-year composition. Some of them — who’ll be teaching sections of first-year composition — have barely heard of our discipline. Certainly, some are enthusiastic: one major, although she wasn’t presenting, registered for this year’s CCCC in New York and took the train down two mornings to attend as many sessions as she could, and came back (to teach her afternoon classes) deeply enthusiastic and quickly put together a proposal for 2008. And certainly, we’re training them, to the limits of our time: we’ve got sessions on the rhetorical situation, the writing process, peer response, conferencing, commenting, reflection; we’ve got a set of required comp-theory readings; they’re watching Take 20 — but does that constitute being “trained in writing studies”?

I don’t know. It’s a start, maybe. But it’s a question Downs and Wardle raise: how does the pedagogy they propose intersect with academic labor practices? Even if the pedagogy they propose is a good thing, which I most definitely think it is, how can it be done? What do we do at my institution, if we have only a tiny fraction of our composition instructors with expertise in writing studies — and what does it mean to have expertise?

Checking the Boxes

preterite Asides

One draft of a co-authored piece, sent off Friday morning: done.

One piece of substantial and enjoyable assistant-editorial work, sent off Friday evening: done.

One draft lesson plan of a session for our arriving faculty workshop: done.

One enormously pleasant afternoon — today — showing an old, good friend around campus, said friend enthusiastic and intrigued by all the military training going on with M16s and camouflage and the balance between that training and the academic project: done.

(And I kinda wish it wasn’t done. Today was a fine day.)

Still to do before summer’s end: a quick-turnaround response piece that’s going to occupy a lot of my time for the next few weeks.

Still to try to do before summer’s end: condense my dissertation’s overarching argument about political economy and teaching writing in the information age into a digestible piece and send it out.

Still to do before year’s end: turn my conference presentation on Tacitus and weblog rhetoric into something to send out.

Still to do right away: stay in better touch with old, good friends.

LOLcats in a New Home

preterite Asides, Cats

After lots of investigating, emails, and phone calls, I finally found a no-kill shelter with slots for the two kittens, and as of tonight, they’re hanging out with other cats and in no immediate danger of being euthanized, tormented, run over, or eaten. It took some doing, and I’m relieved: I couldn’t rightly conscience letting two young beings I’d had in my care chance easy harm or death. Tink and Zeugma don’t miss them — well, maybe Tink, a little — but I do.

Especially with kittenish behavior like this wonder at the glories of the carousel microwave:

LOLcat with microwave

OMG!! It has soundz AND movez AND foodz! WANT!!!1!!1!

And I’ll be volunteering for a few hours a week at that no-kill shelter, starting tomorrow morning.

The Arugula Parabola

preterite Asides

I’m tired, dirty, stinky, and my hands look like hamburger. But with immense amounts of wonderful and generous help and guidance from my dad and brother, and a whole lot of work this morning and a long, long day yesterday, my house looks eighteen billion times nicer. Here’s the link to the flickr photoset, which I duplicate below with some narrative.

First: some “before” shots.

Back shed 1

The ugly old shed with pretty grape vine on the back of my house.

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Found in the Garden

preterite Asides

I woke up Sunday around 5 in the morning from a dream about cats. Tink, I dreamt, was hurt and complaining, in a very small-cat voice. I stumbled downstairs and found Tink sleeping on the chair, perfectly fine. I went back to bed.

Sunday evening, around dusk, I was washing dishes in the kitchen with the windows open and heard the same complaint. I looked outside.

Kittens in the garden. Two tiny kittens.

I put some litter and some food and water in the pantry, and they’re happy now. I surveyed the neighbors — everybody saw them, nobody wants them — and I did a careful look around the house for an injured and/or hiding mom. I’m not going to let them back outside because of hawks, because of traffic, and because of some bad neighborhood kids. But I’ll take them to the no-kill shelter in Beacon when it opens on Thursday.

Until then, my two (allegedly) grown cats are terrified of two tiny kittens who stumble and totter and mewl.