I don't remember how old I was when it began, but while all the other kids were bouncing on booths and testing out their milkshake slurping volumes in Perkins (or insert your favorite 1980s family diner here), I was busy editing the friggin' menu.
My name is Amy, and I come from a family of compulsive editors. ("Hi, Amy.") Not only was menu editing a common activity during McDougall family outings while I was just a wee one (Yep, I know, it's hard to curb your jealously when imagining such a fun-filled tradition in action), but editing also became my concentration -- within my major of print journalism -- during college. Then, I worked as a staff writer for a biweekly newspaper in Minneapolis, where I answered to the editor's every wish. When I didn't understand her wishes, I'd consult my trusty AP Stylebook for the Ultimate Answers on language conventions (a.k.a. Spooner's "master plan of finite conventions" [158]).
Eventually, I felt tired and stifled. Tired from my dependence on this standardized and format-obsessed version of English, and stifled because I wanted to believe that good writing could -- and should -- stretch beyond and outside such traditional limits. It seemed that nearly every author I was drawn to was messing with alternative discourses and styles, so why couldn't I?
I'm still asking that question. Maybe this (597) is the perfect arena in which to experiment with new and unconventional ways of writing... Or maybe I'll just stick with what I know. Yep, probably that.
But I can still study and applaud writers who are bending the rules in innovative ways while I stay safe in my comfortable writing style, right? And I can be satisfied by simply "allow[ing] variation to flourish" among my students while I continue consulting my AP Stylebook on my own writing, yes? No. I mean, I don't think so. See, it seems like a contradiction to me. Aren't I sending a mixed message to my students if I say, "Hey! Welcome to my radical, inventive, and resistant classroom, where busting out of these bland ol' conventions is encouraged!" while I remain nestled in the bosom of Grandpa and Grandma Grammarian? (Not my real grandparents' names, but might as well have been.)
This disconnect -- between promoting, but not modeling -- alternative discourses is where I wish Spooner would've spent more time. He does touch on it (within parenthesis like these) on 162 when he says, "(I think it's fair to note that most of the folks here advocating alternative discourses don't normally write in any other than the prestige dialect of American English. But does that make them phonies, Holden Caulfield?)" It's a dig, of sorts, to his colleagues, but he makes an important point: Do we believe in the potential of alt.dis enough to explore it in our own writing? If we don't, or aren't, then should we be cheering on our students to go there? Further, how many students really want to go there? Lastly, I'm led to consider questions of power. Can't Spooner delve into stylistic experimentation with wild abandon partly because he lives within a set of inherent privileges (being white, male, and professional)? Isn't there more at stake for humble 101ers than a published editor-writer-scholar like Spooner? I know the answer, but I'm not sure what to tell my students about it tomorrow morning. Or the next. Or the next. Or the...
For now, I guess the best I can do is just to live the questions. And, when needed, I'll consult the Bizzells, Foxes, and Shroeders of the world instead of my AP Stylebook. Come to think of it, I don't even know where that old thing is anymore. See, there is hope.
Sunday, April 1, 2007
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
shark bites and mixed discourses
On my first day of teaching, I told the 26 fresh faces before me that the one thing I hoped they would glean from our semester together was to feel less intimidated by writing. My expressed hope, or goal, wasn’t sparked by a breadth of pedagogical knowledge or teaching experience. After all, I didn’t have any of that! Rather, it was a response to the students’ first assignment, wherein I handed out crayons and asked them to draw their relationship to writing.
Roughly 80 percent of students drew graphic, violent images of writing as “the bully,” “the conqueror,” “the destroyer.” A Great White Shark circling an innocent swimmer, a deadly epidemic sweeping the nation, a rocky cliff sending a distracted hiker over its steep edge. The message I got from them: Writing is scary shit.
It seems that a common thread in our readings this week is the collective desire to make writing less intimidating and more accessible. But tell us, Doctors Bizzell and Gee, how do we make it happen? Perhaps they’d say this: by encouraging our students to experiment with mixed discourses and variant styles that they are already using in their lives outside the classroom.
Writing as experimentation. Writing as exploration. I love these concepts because of the way they seem to invite instead of exclude, unlock instead of paralyze. Both Gee and Bizzell seem to be searching for ways to make writing relevant, contextualized, and alive for students.
But what if our students aren’t interested in exploring new forms of discourse? What if they’d rather stay safe and cozy in their land of a clear-cut thesis, body, and conclusion? Further, what if they identify with the traditional academic discourse community persona, which Bizzell describes as “male, and white, and economically privileged” (Hybrid 11)? Similarly, what if they already speak the “specialist language” and prefer the “old capitalism” ways of hierarchical, assembly line, product-driven writing (Gee 95)?
The reason these questions came up is that, while I hope to someday teach at an urban community college, I’m currently working with many students who fit the aforementioned persona. Looking at their formulaic, template-style papers, I’m led to believe that they’ve probably been rewarded for their “notions of what’s real, normal, natural, good, and true” (Hybrid 9) because not only do their ideas reinforce conventional worldviews, but their style also fits into traditional definitions of “good academic writing.” And, given what Bizzell says about power structures and access to discourse communities, why would “community insiders” want to change up their writing style if they’ve received nothing but hearty pats on the back?
When I turn to Bizzell yet again, I learn that certain pedagogical strategies might urge students out of their safety zones and into the realm of risk-taking and exploration. I highlight her advice to choose a “cultural crux of our day” (Hybrid 17), which could spark students to bust out of their stale stylistic shell. I take note of her suggestion to introduce students to contact zones.
“These are the kinds of complexities that will stimulate students to experiment, as they may well feel that the charged material cannot be adequately addressed in traditional academic forms” (Hybrid 18-19). I sure hope she’s right. I think it’d be exciting to see students stretch themselves in this way.
In her second piece, Basic Writing and the Issue of Correctness, Bizzell tries to convince me that these new forms of discourse are being used by everyone, not only by those from under-represented social groups (10). While I’d love to believe this, I haven’t seen much of it happening in my class.
Maybe I should show students some writing samples (like Victor’s Bootstraps) that reveal signs of experimentation and exploration. Maybe I should model and show it in my own writing. Maybe I should frame it in terms of Gee’s “playing to learn” concept (101). And maybe, after all is said and done, most students will still choose the status quo… who knows?
In the end, I think I’d like to frame these discussions of mixed discourses and new literacies in terms of human inequalities and social change. For example, I'd ask which students suffer because of institutional power structures and enforcement of traditional language usage? Who has been alienated and ignored? That way, even if I’m not successful at selling the “writing as experimentation” concept to students who equate such risk-taking practices to a shark attack, I can at least pose questions of access, privilege, and language by putting a human face on them.
Roughly 80 percent of students drew graphic, violent images of writing as “the bully,” “the conqueror,” “the destroyer.” A Great White Shark circling an innocent swimmer, a deadly epidemic sweeping the nation, a rocky cliff sending a distracted hiker over its steep edge. The message I got from them: Writing is scary shit.
It seems that a common thread in our readings this week is the collective desire to make writing less intimidating and more accessible. But tell us, Doctors Bizzell and Gee, how do we make it happen? Perhaps they’d say this: by encouraging our students to experiment with mixed discourses and variant styles that they are already using in their lives outside the classroom.
Writing as experimentation. Writing as exploration. I love these concepts because of the way they seem to invite instead of exclude, unlock instead of paralyze. Both Gee and Bizzell seem to be searching for ways to make writing relevant, contextualized, and alive for students.
But what if our students aren’t interested in exploring new forms of discourse? What if they’d rather stay safe and cozy in their land of a clear-cut thesis, body, and conclusion? Further, what if they identify with the traditional academic discourse community persona, which Bizzell describes as “male, and white, and economically privileged” (Hybrid 11)? Similarly, what if they already speak the “specialist language” and prefer the “old capitalism” ways of hierarchical, assembly line, product-driven writing (Gee 95)?
The reason these questions came up is that, while I hope to someday teach at an urban community college, I’m currently working with many students who fit the aforementioned persona. Looking at their formulaic, template-style papers, I’m led to believe that they’ve probably been rewarded for their “notions of what’s real, normal, natural, good, and true” (Hybrid 9) because not only do their ideas reinforce conventional worldviews, but their style also fits into traditional definitions of “good academic writing.” And, given what Bizzell says about power structures and access to discourse communities, why would “community insiders” want to change up their writing style if they’ve received nothing but hearty pats on the back?
When I turn to Bizzell yet again, I learn that certain pedagogical strategies might urge students out of their safety zones and into the realm of risk-taking and exploration. I highlight her advice to choose a “cultural crux of our day” (Hybrid 17), which could spark students to bust out of their stale stylistic shell. I take note of her suggestion to introduce students to contact zones.
“These are the kinds of complexities that will stimulate students to experiment, as they may well feel that the charged material cannot be adequately addressed in traditional academic forms” (Hybrid 18-19). I sure hope she’s right. I think it’d be exciting to see students stretch themselves in this way.
In her second piece, Basic Writing and the Issue of Correctness, Bizzell tries to convince me that these new forms of discourse are being used by everyone, not only by those from under-represented social groups (10). While I’d love to believe this, I haven’t seen much of it happening in my class.
Maybe I should show students some writing samples (like Victor’s Bootstraps) that reveal signs of experimentation and exploration. Maybe I should model and show it in my own writing. Maybe I should frame it in terms of Gee’s “playing to learn” concept (101). And maybe, after all is said and done, most students will still choose the status quo… who knows?
In the end, I think I’d like to frame these discussions of mixed discourses and new literacies in terms of human inequalities and social change. For example, I'd ask which students suffer because of institutional power structures and enforcement of traditional language usage? Who has been alienated and ignored? That way, even if I’m not successful at selling the “writing as experimentation” concept to students who equate such risk-taking practices to a shark attack, I can at least pose questions of access, privilege, and language by putting a human face on them.
Sunday, March 4, 2007
second grader pedagogy
I'm pretty sure I giggled and pointed a finger at Alexis Olson when I saw what she was up to that day.
I knew it wasn't the kindest reaction, but hey, I was a second grade girl, and that's what second grade girls do -- point and giggle. It's not a skill that's learned by instruction, but rather it's one we picked up through the unspoken, common culture of "second grade girldom."
So, what was Alexis doing that had me so amused that day? Well, much like Gee's "Jennie" (24), Alexis was performing a fake reading to a fake audience. There she sat, on our classroom reading rug, mimicking all the things Mrs. Thorvilson, our teacher, did during real reading time: her legs were crossed, her face was animated, and she licked the tip of her finger ever-so-lightly before turning each page. She was a mini Mrs. Thorvilson, and she was also the daughter of a school teacher. According to Gee, she was "learning and practicing non-vernacular forms of language associated with school and schooling" (23). Additionally, she was creating associations between school and home identities. She was making meaning about language in a natural, playful, non-traditional way. And I -- shame on me -- had the nerve to laugh at her, when I could've given her plenty of reasons to laugh at me (like, for example, by admitting my ardent belief that I had an otherworldly connection with monkeys, which was the inspiration for Muhlhauser's poem).
"Deep learning works better as a cultural process than it does as an instructed process" (13), which is exactly what Alexis, and "Jennie," were doing. They were practicing, experimenting, playing in a contextualized and relevant manner. They were not simply "doing school" or "getting the grade," but rather were making deeper discoveries of identity by exploring how it felt to be a reader, a teacher, and a storyteller in the very way they had seen modeled.
So, if Alexis had an advantage by coming from a middle-class home where "certain values, attitudes, motivations, ways of interacting, and perspectives" (28) encouraged such exploratory learning, how can teachers work with the language varieties that students from lower socioeconomic realities bring with them? To me, it feels like Gee scratches the surface of this question, but stops short of fully analyzing it. I want more. I want the how.
I'm also, or course, trying to apply Gee's chapters to my own teaching of 101, and I can't help but "out" myself for teaching a decontextualized, detached, skill-and-drill sort of lesson this week. You see, I was being observed (by someone in our class who will remain nameless), and I guess I had formed some preconceived notions about what my adviser would be looking for. I had it in my head that a formal, organized, content-based lesson would be appropriate, so that's precisely what I delivered. Of course, it absolutely bombed. It was dull, it wasn't in my natural style, nor was it the engaging, interactive kind of lesson students appreciate and respond to.
In hindsight, I should have asked, "'What experiences do I want the learners to have?'" (118) before creating the lesson rather than "cut[ting] up the world the way Aristotle did in terms of our traditional academic disciplines seen as bodies of facts and information" (118). I should have read Gee a few days earlier. I should have dropped the "should haves" and taken notes from Alexis and her playful second grader pedagogy. Not only would students have absorbed more of the lesson that day, but everyone would have also, I'm sure, had much more fun.
I knew it wasn't the kindest reaction, but hey, I was a second grade girl, and that's what second grade girls do -- point and giggle. It's not a skill that's learned by instruction, but rather it's one we picked up through the unspoken, common culture of "second grade girldom."
So, what was Alexis doing that had me so amused that day? Well, much like Gee's "Jennie" (24), Alexis was performing a fake reading to a fake audience. There she sat, on our classroom reading rug, mimicking all the things Mrs. Thorvilson, our teacher, did during real reading time: her legs were crossed, her face was animated, and she licked the tip of her finger ever-so-lightly before turning each page. She was a mini Mrs. Thorvilson, and she was also the daughter of a school teacher. According to Gee, she was "learning and practicing non-vernacular forms of language associated with school and schooling" (23). Additionally, she was creating associations between school and home identities. She was making meaning about language in a natural, playful, non-traditional way. And I -- shame on me -- had the nerve to laugh at her, when I could've given her plenty of reasons to laugh at me (like, for example, by admitting my ardent belief that I had an otherworldly connection with monkeys, which was the inspiration for Muhlhauser's poem).
"Deep learning works better as a cultural process than it does as an instructed process" (13), which is exactly what Alexis, and "Jennie," were doing. They were practicing, experimenting, playing in a contextualized and relevant manner. They were not simply "doing school" or "getting the grade," but rather were making deeper discoveries of identity by exploring how it felt to be a reader, a teacher, and a storyteller in the very way they had seen modeled.
So, if Alexis had an advantage by coming from a middle-class home where "certain values, attitudes, motivations, ways of interacting, and perspectives" (28) encouraged such exploratory learning, how can teachers work with the language varieties that students from lower socioeconomic realities bring with them? To me, it feels like Gee scratches the surface of this question, but stops short of fully analyzing it. I want more. I want the how.
I'm also, or course, trying to apply Gee's chapters to my own teaching of 101, and I can't help but "out" myself for teaching a decontextualized, detached, skill-and-drill sort of lesson this week. You see, I was being observed (by someone in our class who will remain nameless), and I guess I had formed some preconceived notions about what my adviser would be looking for. I had it in my head that a formal, organized, content-based lesson would be appropriate, so that's precisely what I delivered. Of course, it absolutely bombed. It was dull, it wasn't in my natural style, nor was it the engaging, interactive kind of lesson students appreciate and respond to.
In hindsight, I should have asked, "'What experiences do I want the learners to have?'" (118) before creating the lesson rather than "cut[ting] up the world the way Aristotle did in terms of our traditional academic disciplines seen as bodies of facts and information" (118). I should have read Gee a few days earlier. I should have dropped the "should haves" and taken notes from Alexis and her playful second grader pedagogy. Not only would students have absorbed more of the lesson that day, but everyone would have also, I'm sure, had much more fun.
Sunday, February 25, 2007
the naming game
This weekend I met Hank. Hank is from Taiwan.
It’d probably be more accurate to say that I met “Hank” because, as you might guess, that’s not the Taiwanese name he was given at birth, but rather the name of a white man sewn on his back, so to speak.
Gladish Community Center was the site of the local Taiwanese New Year celebration this weekend, and as I had my palm read, drank bubble tea, and wandered around the room, I met other Taiwanese students who introduced themselves as “Emma,” “Mike,” and “Anna.” It felt a bit odd, but I decided to simply liken it to how we chose Spanish names in ninth grade Spanish class (I was “Amada”). The only difference in this scenario is that this isn’t a classroom where they spend 50 minutes a day – this is their life! We’re messing with history and identities here! Who forced that old guy's name on this young man! This is assimilation and appropriation at its worst, I thought.
Suddenly, I had an urge to go around the room and ask everyone their “real” names (don’t worry, I didn’t). Sure, I might butcher some pronunciations on the first, second, and fifth attempts, but at least we’ll be working within their contexts and respecting their traditions, I thought. And, yes, I realize that we’re in Small Town America, but if they should feel free to bust out their birth names anywhere, shouldn’t it be at the local Taiwanese New Year celebration?? To my mind, I was witnessing what Lyon’s (quoting David Wallace Adams) described as “yet another deplorable episode in the long and tragic history of [insert your non-Euro-American culture of choice here] white relations” (449). It was another example of “the eradication of all traces of tribal identity and culture, replacing them with the commonplace knowledge and values of white civilization” (449).
And then, thanks to Lyons, I chilled out a bit. As he dug into his meaning of rhetorical sovereignty, he showed me that it is entirely wrapped up in the idea that the people have the power. That’s the whole point. What they do with that power is their “pursuit of self-determination” (449). So, I realized that my modern-day example of Taiwanese graduate students in the U.S. differs greatly from Luther Standing Bear’s account of American Indian children being forced to choose a white man’s name from the blackboard. On a basic level, the power dynamics are vastly different. Additionally, I know next to nothing about these Taiwanese grad students, and here I was, assuming that someone forced these names down their throats, as happened in Standing Bear’s story. I mean, for all I know, “Hank” chose “Hank” on his own accord, with no prodding from anyone, as a way of creating a new layer to his identity and practicing counter-/cross-appropriation. Though it looked to me like he was doing anything but reviving his past, perhaps that’s exactly what he’d say he was doing, as well as reviving his possibilities (449). Maybe choosing “Hank” was a way of determining his communicative needs in this new place because he didn’t want to hear dumbos like me (i.e. well-intentioned white liberals) butcher his birth name... again. Maybe this was his way of claiming rhetorical sovereignty in his “public pursuit of recognition” (465).
As Lyons asserts, rhetorical sovereignty is “the beacon by which we seek the paths to agency and power and community renewal” (449), and if someone feels more powerful appropriating a traditionally white guy’s name, then he should feel free to do so… without my impositions, assumptions, and simplifications. Let "Hank" be Hank.
Lyons (beautifully) ends his piece by painting the complexity that answers the question “Is it right for me to take a white man’s name?” His reply: “a No over there can sometimes enable a Yes over here. The ability to speak both—indeed at all—is the right and the theory and the practice and the poetry of rhetorical sovereignty”… “I speak. I speak like the people with whom I live” (211).
I still have plenty of questions about the power dynamics wrapped up in this naming game, but for now I’ll just let them simmer…
It’d probably be more accurate to say that I met “Hank” because, as you might guess, that’s not the Taiwanese name he was given at birth, but rather the name of a white man sewn on his back, so to speak.
Gladish Community Center was the site of the local Taiwanese New Year celebration this weekend, and as I had my palm read, drank bubble tea, and wandered around the room, I met other Taiwanese students who introduced themselves as “Emma,” “Mike,” and “Anna.” It felt a bit odd, but I decided to simply liken it to how we chose Spanish names in ninth grade Spanish class (I was “Amada”). The only difference in this scenario is that this isn’t a classroom where they spend 50 minutes a day – this is their life! We’re messing with history and identities here! Who forced that old guy's name on this young man! This is assimilation and appropriation at its worst, I thought.
Suddenly, I had an urge to go around the room and ask everyone their “real” names (don’t worry, I didn’t). Sure, I might butcher some pronunciations on the first, second, and fifth attempts, but at least we’ll be working within their contexts and respecting their traditions, I thought. And, yes, I realize that we’re in Small Town America, but if they should feel free to bust out their birth names anywhere, shouldn’t it be at the local Taiwanese New Year celebration?? To my mind, I was witnessing what Lyon’s (quoting David Wallace Adams) described as “yet another deplorable episode in the long and tragic history of [insert your non-Euro-American culture of choice here] white relations” (449). It was another example of “the eradication of all traces of tribal identity and culture, replacing them with the commonplace knowledge and values of white civilization” (449).
And then, thanks to Lyons, I chilled out a bit. As he dug into his meaning of rhetorical sovereignty, he showed me that it is entirely wrapped up in the idea that the people have the power. That’s the whole point. What they do with that power is their “pursuit of self-determination” (449). So, I realized that my modern-day example of Taiwanese graduate students in the U.S. differs greatly from Luther Standing Bear’s account of American Indian children being forced to choose a white man’s name from the blackboard. On a basic level, the power dynamics are vastly different. Additionally, I know next to nothing about these Taiwanese grad students, and here I was, assuming that someone forced these names down their throats, as happened in Standing Bear’s story. I mean, for all I know, “Hank” chose “Hank” on his own accord, with no prodding from anyone, as a way of creating a new layer to his identity and practicing counter-/cross-appropriation. Though it looked to me like he was doing anything but reviving his past, perhaps that’s exactly what he’d say he was doing, as well as reviving his possibilities (449). Maybe choosing “Hank” was a way of determining his communicative needs in this new place because he didn’t want to hear dumbos like me (i.e. well-intentioned white liberals) butcher his birth name... again. Maybe this was his way of claiming rhetorical sovereignty in his “public pursuit of recognition” (465).
As Lyons asserts, rhetorical sovereignty is “the beacon by which we seek the paths to agency and power and community renewal” (449), and if someone feels more powerful appropriating a traditionally white guy’s name, then he should feel free to do so… without my impositions, assumptions, and simplifications. Let "Hank" be Hank.
Lyons (beautifully) ends his piece by painting the complexity that answers the question “Is it right for me to take a white man’s name?” His reply: “a No over there can sometimes enable a Yes over here. The ability to speak both—indeed at all—is the right and the theory and the practice and the poetry of rhetorical sovereignty”… “I speak. I speak like the people with whom I live” (211).
I still have plenty of questions about the power dynamics wrapped up in this naming game, but for now I’ll just let them simmer…
Sunday, February 11, 2007
barcelona meets pullman
Bizzell's Rationality as Rhetorical Strategy
“The more we understand situations like this [the Barcelona disputation], the more we should be cautioned against teaching argument in a simplistic pro-con sort of way” (146).
I recently asked my 101 students to try an exercise where they were to find two articles that covered the same (or a similar) social issue, but from different angles. When it was time to dissect the arguments at hand, the students seem frustrated as hell that 1) they couldn’t separate the two writers’ claims into a tidy list of pro versus con, and 2) the writers appeared to be contradicting themselves within their own texts. When I asked them, “What do you think that says, then, about argumentation itself?” one student responded, “That it’s way more complicated than rational rights and wrongs!” The rational, cautions Bizzell, certainly does have its limits.
From a religious debate in 13th century Spain to the composition classrooms of today’s U.S. universities, Bizzell moves with ease and grace as she draws connections to, and promotes the modeling of, hybrid discourses and rhetorical complexities. Her advice to me, as a new college writing instructor, is a breath of fresh -- and incredibly relevant -- air. I was hoping we would land on an article that specifically addressed 101 methodology by offering an “escape route” from the binary argumentation trap, and… Voila! Bizzell delivers in style.
Her most poignant assertion, I believe, is that the materials we need to begin teaching things like mixed discourses and rhetorical complexities are already at our fingertips. Referring to Nahmanides and Charles Langston as models, Bizzell says, “resourceful rhetoricians make use of the materials at hand, however flawed, to do something, however limited, on behalf of their causes” (146). Thank goodness. That gives me hope in the possibility of translating theory into practice because of its mere suggestion that the smallest victories are not to be overlooked.
What do I mean? When we (and by that I mostly mean I) consider a concept like social justice, we have a tendency to think in a polarized, sweeping, win/lose sort of way. If the “side” with less power falls short of accomplishing a full-blown social revolution, we tend to hang our heads and call it defeat. It’s hopeless. The Man wins again. But if we reprogram ourselves to notice the glimpses of change in human power dynamics as we saw in the Barcelona disputation, for example, we can be much more encouraged that some feathers are being ruffled, some balance is shifting, and cultural mixing is already brewing in our midst.
While Nahmanides’ rhetorical boldness may not have won justice for all Jews, it certainly started the process of prying open the gates of cross-cultural dialogue. As oppressive and unmoving as the Christians were, their spokesman (King James) still praised Nahmanides for his savvy rhetorical skills. He said, “I have never seen a man who is not right argue his case so well” (145). But if the case had never been argued in the first place, it wouldn’t have received such praise. Granted, KJ’s statement surely packs a harsh punch by claiming that Nahmanides is ultimately wrong, but it still shows a newfound realization within the King that despite ultimate discord in ideologies, the Jews can play as equals in the intellectual exchange game. A small victory, of course, but still worthy of celebrating. Or, as Bizzell says of Nahmanides’ success: “Limited, yes, but quite remarkable under the circumstances” (146). I might even use this in 101.
Romano's Tlaltelolco: The Grammatical-Rhetorical Indios of Colonial Mexico
“Tlaltelolco was a composition-rhetoric site designed for those perceived as needing instruction in the dominant culture’s uses of language” (118). My first thought: Sounds an awful lot like U.S. academia!
Overall, Romano’s piece offered me an historical “case study,” of sorts, that exposed blatant links between power relations and education. Most disturbing to me was the “create and control” mindset that so obviously steered the Friars’ leadership. Not only did an aggressive push for Christian doctrine drive the schooling system, but so did a condescending, fear-based misrepresentation that worked to maintain the existing hegemonic structure. When the Dominicans realized that they were empowering the very group they intended to subjugate, they pulled a 180, as if to say, “Oh shit, they’re gaining on us! Quick, call them monkeys, parrots and magpies, and claim that they’re full of vice!” In other words, “We are the appropriators in the house. Don’t you dare let them steal our authority.” I love that Romano refers to the basis of this behavior as “class anxieties” (123) because I think that’s exactly what’s behind the modern-day resistance to code-meshing and inviting home languages into U.S. classrooms. Just demonize the immigrant students and we’ll retain our power-seat. Juan Baptista’s influence of (mis)representing people in the image that best suits the colonizer’s needs is, tragically, still among us. Just open the newspaper: Our president’s stance on the U.S.-Mexico border dispute says it all. Something tells me Bush and the Dominican friars would’ve formed a pretty solid Old Boys’ Club.
Mao's Rhetorical Borderlands
(Warning: stream of consciousness writing style ahead)
“Indirectness and directness, like ‘yin’ and ‘yang,’ are never not fluid and fluctuating, and the value of one is always parasitic upon that of the other, and vice versa” (175).
We’re again being called to check ourselves when it comes to western tendencies toward polarized thinking… as we should be… the obsessive need to define things and people in terms of difference, otherness, you over there vs. us over here… The ethnographer gone wrong… the scholar and the subject… Does he like coffee? Isn’t he Chinese? Wow, I didn’t know the Chinese liked coffee! We insist on the “this-ness” versus “that-ness” when often, as Mao asserts, reality resides in the both/and “entangled encounters,” the yi moments that reveal subtle cultural fusions, enriching rhetorical encounters, complications, and discoveries… “the third space” that allows an opening of eyes and minds and rules of language and borders… the lava lamp, the fortune cookie, the Nez Perce student’s rap video. Am I romanticizing the togetherness-in-difference concept? It doesn’t feel that way to me, but then again, I’m just one little human graduate student with social filters, imperfect constructions, and subjective truths of my own that inevitably are seeping out onto this very page… Right? (I'm trying t segue into Holliday, can you tell?)
Quick note on the Holliday crew:
The authors kept referring to Stuart Hall’s work in mass media analysis stereotyping, yet they didn't provide a very expansive picture of Hall’s writing. Maybe a little snippet was all they intended to give us, and I'll just look up his work on my own time, but I do think it would've strengthened their assertions (on 125) to offer more context. That's my biggest challenge with this book (and with most general ed, all-encompassing text books) - that it tries to cover everything under the sun about cross-cultural language exchange within 200 pages. I'd rather go in-depth on one, or a few, aspects than attempt to "know it all."
“The more we understand situations like this [the Barcelona disputation], the more we should be cautioned against teaching argument in a simplistic pro-con sort of way” (146).
I recently asked my 101 students to try an exercise where they were to find two articles that covered the same (or a similar) social issue, but from different angles. When it was time to dissect the arguments at hand, the students seem frustrated as hell that 1) they couldn’t separate the two writers’ claims into a tidy list of pro versus con, and 2) the writers appeared to be contradicting themselves within their own texts. When I asked them, “What do you think that says, then, about argumentation itself?” one student responded, “That it’s way more complicated than rational rights and wrongs!” The rational, cautions Bizzell, certainly does have its limits.
From a religious debate in 13th century Spain to the composition classrooms of today’s U.S. universities, Bizzell moves with ease and grace as she draws connections to, and promotes the modeling of, hybrid discourses and rhetorical complexities. Her advice to me, as a new college writing instructor, is a breath of fresh -- and incredibly relevant -- air. I was hoping we would land on an article that specifically addressed 101 methodology by offering an “escape route” from the binary argumentation trap, and… Voila! Bizzell delivers in style.
Her most poignant assertion, I believe, is that the materials we need to begin teaching things like mixed discourses and rhetorical complexities are already at our fingertips. Referring to Nahmanides and Charles Langston as models, Bizzell says, “resourceful rhetoricians make use of the materials at hand, however flawed, to do something, however limited, on behalf of their causes” (146). Thank goodness. That gives me hope in the possibility of translating theory into practice because of its mere suggestion that the smallest victories are not to be overlooked.
What do I mean? When we (and by that I mostly mean I) consider a concept like social justice, we have a tendency to think in a polarized, sweeping, win/lose sort of way. If the “side” with less power falls short of accomplishing a full-blown social revolution, we tend to hang our heads and call it defeat. It’s hopeless. The Man wins again. But if we reprogram ourselves to notice the glimpses of change in human power dynamics as we saw in the Barcelona disputation, for example, we can be much more encouraged that some feathers are being ruffled, some balance is shifting, and cultural mixing is already brewing in our midst.
While Nahmanides’ rhetorical boldness may not have won justice for all Jews, it certainly started the process of prying open the gates of cross-cultural dialogue. As oppressive and unmoving as the Christians were, their spokesman (King James) still praised Nahmanides for his savvy rhetorical skills. He said, “I have never seen a man who is not right argue his case so well” (145). But if the case had never been argued in the first place, it wouldn’t have received such praise. Granted, KJ’s statement surely packs a harsh punch by claiming that Nahmanides is ultimately wrong, but it still shows a newfound realization within the King that despite ultimate discord in ideologies, the Jews can play as equals in the intellectual exchange game. A small victory, of course, but still worthy of celebrating. Or, as Bizzell says of Nahmanides’ success: “Limited, yes, but quite remarkable under the circumstances” (146). I might even use this in 101.
Romano's Tlaltelolco: The Grammatical-Rhetorical Indios of Colonial Mexico
“Tlaltelolco was a composition-rhetoric site designed for those perceived as needing instruction in the dominant culture’s uses of language” (118). My first thought: Sounds an awful lot like U.S. academia!
Overall, Romano’s piece offered me an historical “case study,” of sorts, that exposed blatant links between power relations and education. Most disturbing to me was the “create and control” mindset that so obviously steered the Friars’ leadership. Not only did an aggressive push for Christian doctrine drive the schooling system, but so did a condescending, fear-based misrepresentation that worked to maintain the existing hegemonic structure. When the Dominicans realized that they were empowering the very group they intended to subjugate, they pulled a 180, as if to say, “Oh shit, they’re gaining on us! Quick, call them monkeys, parrots and magpies, and claim that they’re full of vice!” In other words, “We are the appropriators in the house. Don’t you dare let them steal our authority.” I love that Romano refers to the basis of this behavior as “class anxieties” (123) because I think that’s exactly what’s behind the modern-day resistance to code-meshing and inviting home languages into U.S. classrooms. Just demonize the immigrant students and we’ll retain our power-seat. Juan Baptista’s influence of (mis)representing people in the image that best suits the colonizer’s needs is, tragically, still among us. Just open the newspaper: Our president’s stance on the U.S.-Mexico border dispute says it all. Something tells me Bush and the Dominican friars would’ve formed a pretty solid Old Boys’ Club.
Mao's Rhetorical Borderlands
(Warning: stream of consciousness writing style ahead)
“Indirectness and directness, like ‘yin’ and ‘yang,’ are never not fluid and fluctuating, and the value of one is always parasitic upon that of the other, and vice versa” (175).
We’re again being called to check ourselves when it comes to western tendencies toward polarized thinking… as we should be… the obsessive need to define things and people in terms of difference, otherness, you over there vs. us over here… The ethnographer gone wrong… the scholar and the subject… Does he like coffee? Isn’t he Chinese? Wow, I didn’t know the Chinese liked coffee! We insist on the “this-ness” versus “that-ness” when often, as Mao asserts, reality resides in the both/and “entangled encounters,” the yi moments that reveal subtle cultural fusions, enriching rhetorical encounters, complications, and discoveries… “the third space” that allows an opening of eyes and minds and rules of language and borders… the lava lamp, the fortune cookie, the Nez Perce student’s rap video. Am I romanticizing the togetherness-in-difference concept? It doesn’t feel that way to me, but then again, I’m just one little human graduate student with social filters, imperfect constructions, and subjective truths of my own that inevitably are seeping out onto this very page… Right? (I'm trying t segue into Holliday, can you tell?)
Quick note on the Holliday crew:
The authors kept referring to Stuart Hall’s work in mass media analysis stereotyping, yet they didn't provide a very expansive picture of Hall’s writing. Maybe a little snippet was all they intended to give us, and I'll just look up his work on my own time, but I do think it would've strengthened their assertions (on 125) to offer more context. That's my biggest challenge with this book (and with most general ed, all-encompassing text books) - that it tries to cover everything under the sun about cross-cultural language exchange within 200 pages. I'd rather go in-depth on one, or a few, aspects than attempt to "know it all."
Sunday, February 4, 2007
divided i/we stand
Anzaldua doesn’t tell, she shows. While reading her interview with Lunsford, I felt like she was grabbing me by the hand and pouring me the same potion she must’ve guzzled to reach what she described as her “heightened state” (55) before sitting down to write. In other words, she truly put me there.
Consider her rich use of imagery: The us/them nosostras concept, the compustura seamstress idea, and the metaphor of the Trojan burra within the university walls. Through this symbolism, Anzaldua exposed the “both/and” realities of multiplicity that our traditional social constructions don’t allow us to see.
But I think what I appreciate most about Anzaldua is that she lived in the otherness, she was the colonized, and her internal response to such painful realities marches on her pages like an activist in an anti-war protest. I read somewhere that she used to tell her students to "get their shit out” on paper (sounds kinda like “putting one’s business on Front Street”). She pushed for academic writing to break out of its tidy, formulaic structure and into the dangerous, the personal, the transformative.
But, as usual, I rave on and on about a theory, and then find myself stumped when faced with its application. I might become a broken record on this one, but how in the world can such liberatory pedagogy be lived out in the classroom? Lately, I’ve been feeling a huge contradiction - a disconnect - between the theory I’m reading and how I’m “supposed to” teach. I even see contradictions within my own head about the possibilities of gate keeping vs. gate opening. In many ways, I think our role is to be gatekeeper -- to prepare students for the performance aspect they’ll need to endure as humans within a system that maintains its clench-fisted dogma regarding traditional language usage.
While my idealistic self gets swept away by Anzaldua’s notions of writing as an emancipatory project, as a way of “freeing yourself up” (70), I can’t begin to fathom how that looks within a university writing program that requires every ‘i’ to be dotted and ‘t’ to be crossed.
Is there a model in existence that shows more than one revolutionary teacher pushing for systemic change? What kind of savvy rhetoric would it take to convince a resistant Detroit school administration that street culture can and should be “productively appropriated in the English classroom” (Monroe 65)? How can we allow our students “permission to demonstrate linguistic competencies of their home languages” in our classes when other WSU departments hold us responsible for supplying the by-the-book, “standard,” MLA-style foundation?
I don't wanna play gatekeeper anymore! But is that even the job we’ve been given? Some say "of course!" Others say "no way!" Whatever the case, it sure feels like too much pressure to me today. The gate looks massive, and instead of skillfully scaling it with my students at my side, I feel like tearing it down altogether. Revolucion, anyone?
Consider her rich use of imagery: The us/them nosostras concept, the compustura seamstress idea, and the metaphor of the Trojan burra within the university walls. Through this symbolism, Anzaldua exposed the “both/and” realities of multiplicity that our traditional social constructions don’t allow us to see.
But I think what I appreciate most about Anzaldua is that she lived in the otherness, she was the colonized, and her internal response to such painful realities marches on her pages like an activist in an anti-war protest. I read somewhere that she used to tell her students to "get their shit out” on paper (sounds kinda like “putting one’s business on Front Street”). She pushed for academic writing to break out of its tidy, formulaic structure and into the dangerous, the personal, the transformative.
But, as usual, I rave on and on about a theory, and then find myself stumped when faced with its application. I might become a broken record on this one, but how in the world can such liberatory pedagogy be lived out in the classroom? Lately, I’ve been feeling a huge contradiction - a disconnect - between the theory I’m reading and how I’m “supposed to” teach. I even see contradictions within my own head about the possibilities of gate keeping vs. gate opening. In many ways, I think our role is to be gatekeeper -- to prepare students for the performance aspect they’ll need to endure as humans within a system that maintains its clench-fisted dogma regarding traditional language usage.
While my idealistic self gets swept away by Anzaldua’s notions of writing as an emancipatory project, as a way of “freeing yourself up” (70), I can’t begin to fathom how that looks within a university writing program that requires every ‘i’ to be dotted and ‘t’ to be crossed.
Is there a model in existence that shows more than one revolutionary teacher pushing for systemic change? What kind of savvy rhetoric would it take to convince a resistant Detroit school administration that street culture can and should be “productively appropriated in the English classroom” (Monroe 65)? How can we allow our students “permission to demonstrate linguistic competencies of their home languages” in our classes when other WSU departments hold us responsible for supplying the by-the-book, “standard,” MLA-style foundation?
I don't wanna play gatekeeper anymore! But is that even the job we’ve been given? Some say "of course!" Others say "no way!" Whatever the case, it sure feels like too much pressure to me today. The gate looks massive, and instead of skillfully scaling it with my students at my side, I feel like tearing it down altogether. Revolucion, anyone?
Friday, January 26, 2007
complex creatures are we
Despite the bone-dry textbook style of “The History of the Study of IC," Martin and Nakayama put forth some definitions that could benefit me, and certainly our class discussions, in a big way. I appreciated the section where they explained the three approaches to intercultural communication: social science, interpretive, and critical. I had never seen them spelled out quite this plainly, and was especially interested in the critical approach’s focus on macrocontexts (14). I guess it gave me a name for the disturbing distance that I notice in academic research between “expert” and “subject.”
While I tend to view social issues on a systemic level, I also believe that the up-close-and-personal human interactions tell us far more than what we are capable of learning from our office in the sky. For a year, I worked as the director of a homeless lunch program in Seattle, and there’s something profound and invaluable to me about my ability to vividly remember the voices, sights, and smells of that particular “contact zone.” While I was aware of the broader societal causes at play, it was the close-quarters, in-your-face reality of it all that led me to deeper, more compassionate understandings of what it means to be homeless.
I must admit that Martin and Nakayama lost a little credibility when I laid eyes on the contrived photo of an overly eager woman interviewing a member of the Brethren Order. Remember the one? The caption read: “One way to study and learn about cultural patterns is to interview other people” (12). Wait a minute… do they mean I should actually communicate with people I’m curious about or studying? What a concept.
As for Holliday, Hyde, and Kullman… I’m fascinated by this concept of our multi-dimensionality. We are complex, vast, and varied, and the more we try to essentialize one another, the more we bust out of those constructions. They suggest that we see ourselves as “members of several communities,” (58) and are, therefore, much more adaptable than we let ourselves believe. We are living contradictions and mergers, which can be a beautiful thing. If I were asked to describe my father, I’d say he is a veterinarian and a hunter, an animated story-teller and an anti-social stoic, a singer of harmonies and a believer in all things masculine. And that’s just one human.
The “real Indian” argument in Wieder and Pratt kinda made me wanna ralph. How’s that for an intellectual analysis? Honestly, I felt like I couldn’t absorb the substantive info (if there was any) because I couldn’t get past the objective, cold, presumptuous tone. It felt like it came from a "push to publish" place rather than from the writers' natural curiosity. A gigantic contrast to this was "Concerted Cultivation," which I found to be humble, thoughtful, and up-close.
While I tend to view social issues on a systemic level, I also believe that the up-close-and-personal human interactions tell us far more than what we are capable of learning from our office in the sky. For a year, I worked as the director of a homeless lunch program in Seattle, and there’s something profound and invaluable to me about my ability to vividly remember the voices, sights, and smells of that particular “contact zone.” While I was aware of the broader societal causes at play, it was the close-quarters, in-your-face reality of it all that led me to deeper, more compassionate understandings of what it means to be homeless.
I must admit that Martin and Nakayama lost a little credibility when I laid eyes on the contrived photo of an overly eager woman interviewing a member of the Brethren Order. Remember the one? The caption read: “One way to study and learn about cultural patterns is to interview other people” (12). Wait a minute… do they mean I should actually communicate with people I’m curious about or studying? What a concept.
As for Holliday, Hyde, and Kullman… I’m fascinated by this concept of our multi-dimensionality. We are complex, vast, and varied, and the more we try to essentialize one another, the more we bust out of those constructions. They suggest that we see ourselves as “members of several communities,” (58) and are, therefore, much more adaptable than we let ourselves believe. We are living contradictions and mergers, which can be a beautiful thing. If I were asked to describe my father, I’d say he is a veterinarian and a hunter, an animated story-teller and an anti-social stoic, a singer of harmonies and a believer in all things masculine. And that’s just one human.
The “real Indian” argument in Wieder and Pratt kinda made me wanna ralph. How’s that for an intellectual analysis? Honestly, I felt like I couldn’t absorb the substantive info (if there was any) because I couldn’t get past the objective, cold, presumptuous tone. It felt like it came from a "push to publish" place rather than from the writers' natural curiosity. A gigantic contrast to this was "Concerted Cultivation," which I found to be humble, thoughtful, and up-close.
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