Bazerman, C. (2011). Genre as social action. In J.
Gee & M. Handford (Eds.), The routledge handbook of
discourse analysis (p. 226-238).
London: Routledge Taylor and Francis Group.
Author:
Charles Bazerman, professor Dept. of Ed. @ UC – Santa Barbara; PhD from
Brandies University – English and American Literature ‘71, current (2012)
editor of Reference Guides to Rhetoric
and Composition. Sees writing as a major medium in society and promotes its
importance in all areas of life. Interested in the science of and relationship
to writing and writing instruction within socio-historic contexts. http://www.education.ucsb.edu/bazerman/
and bazerman@education.ucsb.edu
Date:
2011
Research Questions: .doc
p. 2 “By what processes can these frail symbols bear so much weight of meaning
and coordination?”
Context (need for
study): Consider people in interaction,
locating worlds of created meaning. Necessity of identifying “the processes by
which language users create order and sense so as to align with each other for
mutual understanding and coordination” (p. 1 of .doc). Difficult script or
unfamiliar language is biggest indicator of problems aligning “over limited
clues”.
Methods: “Discourse
analysis” perhaps context analysis? essay
Findings: “The
answer proposed in this chapter and the kinds of work reported here is that the
problem of recognizability of meaning is in large part a matter of recognizing
situations and actions within which the meanings are mobilized through the
medium of the signs. Meaning is not fully available and immanent in the bare
spelled words” (p. 2 on .doc).
Children find their utterances corrected
and refined until both parties (at least the one in power) feel that both sets
of needs are met.
Genre is a “typified response to a
typified situation” (p. 4 on .doc). This relies on society. “Once upon a time”
invokes a certain level of expectation. Activity systems provide stability, not
the genre it and of itself. Genre, however typified, is only a partial account
of reality. Cool!
Groups of people validate themselves
by sharing documents and all the rules that go into what is more important and
who gets to handle what and in what order – this is seen in court when
establishing scientists as expert witnesses. The documents don’t speak into the
court, but people who have read the documents can become verified as holding
the knowledge that is valuable for presentation in the court.
Language study is only studying the “residue
of complex psycho-social-cultural processes” but the “orders of discourse are
to be found in the dynamics of life processes” (p. 11 on .doc).
Discussion (my
connection): Language works through individuals
during social participation, constantly calling on social and cultural
resources, but meanings come to individuals based on perception of situation
and role within it. Bazerman describes the “thinness” of writing – transmission
of mental images, the imaginative and ethereal really, “must be carried through
the arrangement of the few letters of the alphabet in words, sentences, and
larger units--along with punctuation, graphic elements, and materialities of
the medium” (p. 2 of .doc).
Attention to language is attention
to detail! (and orientation and perspective and habit) Be explicit with
students about the “organization and dynamics” of situations in order for them
to know orientation of goals as well as best use of options. There is a
connection between school and other life settings.
“All language is an approximate
indicator of meaning, with some situations having narrower tolerances for accuracy
and alignment than others” (p. 4 on .doc).
Bazerman repeats an idea on the
fourth page, citing three prior times he has used this terminology, that a
powerful text needs multiple dimensions within cultural settings in order to remain
meaningful. Success depends on recognizability – the audience has to know some
of what you know, some of what the writer/speaker is doing and why. Similar to
the child who knows how to give a good show and tell report – the person who
works within genre well is validated.
There seems to be a great possibility
to think deconstructionally about all this…
Reiff, M. J., & Bawarshi, A. (2011). Tracing
discursive resources: How students use prior genre knowledge to negotiate new
writing contexts in first-year composition. Written Communication, 28(3),
312-337.
Author:
Mary Jo Reiff, Associate Prof. Dept. of Engl. Univ. of Kansas, PhD from Kansas;
mjreiff@ku.edu, textbook and other
publications along with Bawarshi. Focus on audience theory and rhetorical genre
studies, currently on public petition as a genre that is culturally built for
social action.
Anis
Bawarshi, Professor in English, Director of Expository Writing at Univ. of
Wash., PdD from Univ. of Kansas ’99. Selected publications on website focus on
genre, ex: Genre and the Invention of the
Writer: Reconsidering the Place of Invention in Composition, USU Press 2003.
Interested in rhetoric and composition studies as well as running academic
writing programs. Enjoys studying the complex relationships of cultural
production, social practices and relations, as identities that the different organization
of writing (and writing communities) work together to produce.
Date:
2011
Research Questions:
How do students access and make use of prior genre knowledge during encounters
with new writing projects in 1st year comp courses?
On page 317: What genres (written,
oral, digital) do students report already knowing when they arrive in FYC? How
do students use their prior genre knowledge when they encounter and perform new
writing tasks in FYC? What seems to predict why and how students transfer prior
genre knowledge into new writing contexts? To what extent will be be able to
see, as Perkins and Salomon predict, both low-road and high-road approaches in
students’ use of prior knowledge, and what seems to predict their choice of
approach?
Context (need for
study): Much attention to outcomes and transfer
to other courses from first year composition (FYC) courses. Gap ins attention
to ncomees, to “discursive resources
students bring with them into writing classrooms” and their use of them in 1st
year comp classes (p. 312). Attempt at dissecting facets and processes students
use when negotiating and crossing discursive boundaries. Surbeys to 15 sections
at UT and 33 at UW. Students self-selected providing 52 and 64 responses.
Methods:
Cross-institutional study at UTennessee and UWashington, using genre as
conceptual lens because of Bazerman (2009, p. 283) calling it a “tool of
cognition” (p. 314). All set within study of knowledge transfer. Surveyed
(including 40 genres in order identify genre used before; to find student
attitudes) students to report on previous literacy experience, discourse-based
student interview (asked students to talk about what they thought they were to
do with assignments and the knowledge they drew on to make their decisions), and
analysis of course work and instructor syllabi. Use of in vivo (as opposed to a
priori) coding – using students’ terms when coding and reporting
Findings: Students
use prior knowings in a variety of ways: from analysis and repurposing while
others maintain known genres (?) (p. 312). Genre knowledge, as Beaufort (2007) and
Tardy (2009) identify, is a framework for analysis and bridge from social to
rhetorical knowledge situations (p. 314).
50% at UT reported previous writing
in 27 of 40 genres, and 50% at UW reported 34 of 40. Students expected their
experience with different genres would help them succeed in FYC. In school, top
% for UT students was research paper and 5 paragraph essay for UW. Out of school
for both was email writing. Report of felt sense of accomplishment and
perceived success based on college-prep or AP experience.
Domain overlap is limited, most
extensive writing is in school and work. Letter writing seems to be the biggest
out of school genre recognized. Confidence in own process and use of multiple
genres or strategies are indicators for corsssings.
Discussion (my
connection): Knowledge transfer was big with Dr.
Dethier. If that is an ultimate purpose or aim, it will come out in the ways
writing programs are set up, considering Dethier and Bawarshi are both program
directors – this probably has some influence because this is generally a
program that is “accountable” to the whole of the rest of the university.
Students are funneled through, or given a key out of, FYCs and the program
directors have to answer to the provost, deans, or presidents about it.
Students’ understandings of genres
may not be the same as a FYC teacher’s, but the focus on knowledge transfer triggers.
The perception that they have already accomplished, mastered, or even just
attempted a “research paper” in high school might give a false sense of
security for attempting it in an FYC.
The researchers talk in terms of
boundary crossers and boundary guarders who deal in high- and low-road
transfer. They include low confidence, a range of genre strategies, and “not”
talk about what genre their writing is not as the crossers while those with
high confidence seemed to be low-roaders. I get that there is a sense of having
been through it before that would give confidence (perhaps I feel that all too
much), but I am surprised that those without confidence are willing to cross
the boarders, but it is the limited strategy use for low-road boundary guarders
that makes sense to me.
The point seems
to be that those who are more successful in approaching new genres are reminded
of multiple strategies, and that takes exposure. The five-paragraph can’t be
the only thing students do. It comes back to alertness – as Grandmother would
say, “We need more ‘lerts in theworld.”
Wollman-Bonilla, J. E. (2000). Teaching science
writing to first graders: Genre learning and recontextualization. Research
in the Teaching of English, 35(1), 35-65.
Author:
Julie E. Wollman-Bonilla (now just Wollman), prof. Dept. of Elem. Ed. Rhode
Island College at time of writing, as of June 1, 2012 is the first female President
of Edinboro University, jwollman@edinboro.edu; PhD in Elem Ed from NYU ‘91.
Most recent book publication (2000) Family
message journals: Teaching writing through family involvement. Recent work
focusing on administration and team building. Interesting to look at (2003) “Email
as genre: A beginning writer learns the conventions” in Language Arts.
Date:
2000 – No Child Left Behind is on it’s way. Not a reality just yet.
Research Questions: p.
39 To what extent can the messages composed by first-grade, emergent, and
beginning writers be characterized as science writing when analyzed for
conventional structural and lexicogrammatical features? How might children appropriate
the conventions of science writing and recontextualize these for the purpose of
communicating with families in the context of Family Message Journals?
Context (need for
study): National reform in education emphasizes
that students do science and science
texts work in general, present characteristics. Discipline-defined ways of
thinking and writing.
Methods: Qualitative,
case study of 4 1st-graders’ messages to family members, analyzed
for conventional structural and lexicogrammatical features. System of Family
Message Journal in context influences understanding of genre of science
writing.
Findings:
Participants were consistent in composing “texts in which they appropriated the
linguistic conventions of science and…seemed able to use these conventions
flexibly, recontextualizing the genres to fit the task of a written dialogue
with their families” (p. 35).
Four categories of science writing
(% of FMJ in this category): report (60%), experiment recount (20%), experiment
procedure (6%), or explanation (14%).
Discussion (my
connection):
Australian
genre movement seeks to empower “child writers by introducing them to socially
valued genres” (p. 38). This is not child-centered, necessarily. It thinks
about what is good for students to be “successful” in the dominant discourse
and promotes the status quo, but it promotes
the status quo – an indoctrination of sorts, but if writing is social, then
that’s what happens more often than not.
The Australian
view of mastery first before flexibility matches how I used to (am still
getting over) think about grammar and formalities rules.