There were two articles from our assigned readings for last week that had a profound impact on me. First, when I read Rex Veeder's essay "Coleridge's Philosophy of Composition: An Overview of a Romantic Rhetorician" I recognized myself. "The Coleridgean compositionist would make considerable use of observation and detailed sensual description in order to engage the emotions and memory in the process of fixing both the writer's attention and the reader's attention on the subject (27). Veeder then proceeds to describe this strategy as "looping" in which, for example, a topic addressed to saving the homeless might draw upon the decline of agrarian ideals leading to an increase in the homeless population. "Such an approach requires a trust in associations, a willingness to believe that if we think of agriculture as we write about the homeless a relationship does indeed exist. It is the writer's task to connect the diverse associations by seeing them as metaphor or an analogy for the 'initiative'" (27). How many other students intuitively take this approach to their writing? Are they "Coleridgean compositionists" or are their papers seen as "disorganized", those who could benefit by first drafting an outline? Perhaps their creative powers need direction but not at the expense of a new topic sentence for each paragraph. As Veeder argues, "At each turn of the associational loop, the composer would increase the tension and deepen the mystery of the relationship between farming and the homeless rather than move to an immediate resolution" (27). Granted, this is very sophisticated theory even for advanced writers. But, the merit of this approach should be considered as a technique that does indeed drive some students. I know this is not only how I write, but how I process information and think. To have this approach validated by a pedagogy within the classroom might unleash creativity that is too often stiffled by dogmatic approaches.
Which brings to mind the second article "Grammar, Grammars, and the Teaching of Grammar" by Patrick Hartwell. Finally, finally an essay on grammar that absolutely makes sense. There isn't one grammar. Hartwell argues there are five grammars each with their own focus in relationship to writing pedagogy. What clarity! What insight! What are we waiting for? Twenty-five years after his article was published, the snarling debates continue. Hartwell has no qualms as to where he stands in 1985, "For me the grammar issue was settled at least twenty years ago with the conclusion offered by Richard Braddock, Richard Lloyd-Jones, and Lowell Schoer in 1963 'In view of the widespread agreement of research studies based upon many types of students and teachers, the conclusion can be stated in strong and unqualifies terms: the teaching of formal grammar has a neglibible or, because it usually displaces some instruction and practice in composition, even a harmful effect on improvement in writing'" (563). Hartwell then draws upon the seminal research of W. Nelson Francis who offered the "Three Meanings of Grammar" (566). Hartwell uses this as foundation for his own argument that because we are not informed by an awareness of past research "we are constrained to reinvent the wheel" (581). Hartwell divides the topic of grammar into: a formal pattern where words in language are arranged to convey meaning; the description and analysis of formal language patterns; linguistics; school grammar (slang); and grammatical terms used in the interest of prose style (578). Hartwell concludes "it is time that we, as researchers, move on to more interesting areas of inquiry" (581). Isn't it time that creativity in composition be approached and strenghtened by Hartwell's guidance?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
You bring up two issues for me. In higher education, and if one is not in a creative writing couse, is it acceptable to write non-linear compositions full of looping and divergences which are seemingly off-topic as long as those divergences come back to the thesis? Also, I wonder why we continue to have, as you describe, "the snarling debate" about grammar instruction. Furthermore, I wonder why, despite the considerable evidence that grammar instruction has a harmful effect on writing, that such emphasis is still placed on it. My students just took their CSAP exams. Fully one-half of the exam tested grammar. ACT and SAT exams also continue to test grammar knowledge. If the big tests require isolated grammar knowledge, then we must still have to teach grammar in isolation. The paradigm has not fully shifted.
ReplyDeleteOutcome-based education and teaching to the test have driven school curriculums. Poor writing has been tackled with accountability. But poor writing has been recognized for centuries. Mike Rose points out that "Freshman composition originated in 1874 as a Harvard response to the poor writing of upperclassmen (587). I am still persuaded by Hartwell's argument that to lump "grammar" under one heading is faulty logic which produces poor writing. Until we are willing to let go of this sacred cow in the academic community. For example Janice Neuleib, Martha Kolln, and John Mellon refuse to accept the results of solid research that teaching grammar in isolation produces no positve outcomes (564). Teachers and students are burned out with this approach. I'll be curious to see what the results are on your CSAP testing.
ReplyDeleteI, too, loved Coleridge's words about looping. Too often we priviledge a linear approach to the world, when I think many people do actually process and connect thoughts in non-linear ways. Things that are linear are more efficient, easily compartmentalized and fit nicely into the realm of what bell hooks calls the "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy." I agree with you that a pedagogy that respects this approach would be validating for many emerging writers and thinkers.
ReplyDelete