Appendices to Fulbright report

7/29/2019 Appendices to Fulbright report

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Appendix 1

Writing Studies at the University of Winnipeg: A Strategic Opportunity

Louise Wetherbee Phelps

Emeritus Professor of Writing and Rhetoric, Syracuse UniversityAdjunct Professor of Rhetoric and Writing, Old Dominion University

May 27, 2011

University of Winnipeg, Distinguished Lecture Series


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Thank you all so much for the warm welcome Ive received in Winnipeg as a visiting

Fulbright scholar. The faculty and administrators here have been extraordinarily generous with

their time in answering my endless questions, offering historical perspectives, and engaging in

thoughtful conversations about this department, institution, city, and Canadian ways of doing

things. It has been an amazing, intense learning experience. I thought six weeks was a long time,

but it has gone by in a flash, and Ill leave next week with a folder-full of unanswered questions,

stacks of notes to sort out and make sense of, and a wish list of others I had hoped to interview

before I ran out of time. It is fortunate that the project that brought me here is a collaborative

one, which will continue without me. But I will not leave it behind. . . my visit has opened up

new paths for my own scholarship and graduate teaching, and I have plans for future

collaborations with my colleagues here.

Let me explain a little more about the circumstances that brought me to Winnipeg. The

Department of Rhetoric, Writing, and Communications sought me out, as a Fulbright specialist

in rhetoric and composition and writing studies, to assist in a reflective project to critically

examine its programs and chart new directions for its future as a faculty. The proposal for a grant

called for me to observe, evaluate, advise, andto the extent possible in six weekscollaborate

with the faculty in a process they called program architecture renewal. I take this to imply both

recuperation and conservation of the best of its past and also invention and revision that builds

on present strengths and potential.

The faculty conceived this project as both broader and deeper than the usual program

evaluation. They wanted me to help them reflect on the character and history of the department,

not only within the institution, but also in relation to both the U.S. and Canadian contexts for

instruction and scholarship in writing, rhetoric, and communication. Internally, they wanted to

make connections and create synergies among programs and faculty activities both vertically, by

articulation among levels of the curriculum, and horizontally, by dialogue among the

departments intellectual traditions.

Ive tried to contribute to all these goals, but I will focus here especially on understanding

the department in terms of the contexts into which it fits at different scales of description. (This

was a tall order. My outsider status gave me fresh eyes, but to learn so much so fast was like

drinking water from a fire hose. So the picture I construct here is necessarily tentative and

incomplete.) I asked these questions: As a department of Rhetoric, Writing, and


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Communications, how is it part of larger scholarly and pedagogical communities in Canada and

beyond? How is it distinctive in that scene? Second, how does it fit into the University of

Winnipeg as an institution, with its own uniqueness of locale, mission, and constituencies? This

is the framework in which I try to assess and highlight the ways the unusual profile and history

of this department make it a valuable asset to the institution, presenting a strategic opportunity

for the future development of writing and rhetoric studies at the University of Winnipeg. I will

also talk a bit about the processes modeled by the Fulbright project and how these can facilitate

the goals of the department.

Disciplinarity and the Institutionalization of Rhetoric and Writing Studies

There is a pervasive, deeply rooted attitude among many in the academy and the public

that writing is merely practical. Besides the cultural traditions and historical contingencies that

have produced and reinforced this notion, especially in Canada, there are some very good

reasons for folks to think this way. First, writing IS practical in the sense that it is tightly bound

into and constitutive ofpractices and systems ofactivity in business, government, law, science,

the academy, and civic life. It is also deeply implicated in the formation and expression of

identity, infusing writing with powerful emotions and values. It is profoundlynot merely

practical. That is why all the disciplinary studies of writing and rhetoric in any tradition are

broadly concerned with how people use language or other symbols in discursive practices, which

have a reciprocal relationship to the social structures, systems, contexts, and tools that mediate

human activity.1

A second reason is the paradox that writing is so deeply embedded in daily life

and so ubiquitous a tool in a highly literate society that it is almost invisible as a complex

phenomenon in its own right. Paradoxically, for some who use it the most, and with the greatest

skill, as a tool for thought, it becomes so transparent and natural, as a extension of their own

minds and bodies, that it seems not really worthy of scholarly attention.

1As Canadian scholar Aviva Freedman has pointed out, this focus on symbolic action can be limiting,blinding researchers to other motives of expression and communication and excluding some modes of

discourse entirely. She points to the esthetic and playful in examples of professional communication. See

her essay Pushing the Envelope: Expanding the Model of RGS Theory, inRhetorical Genre Studies

and Beyond, Natasha Artemeva and Aviva Freedman (Winnipeg: Inkshed, 2008), 121-41.


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All the more reason, I say, that it is worthy of serious study in the academy. Written

communication has become the object of inquiryan increasingly complex and expansive

objectthat is at once both disciplinary, especially in the United States, and multidisciplinary;

both culturally specific and intercultural, national and international. Increasingly, scholars of

writing, rhetoric, discourse, and literacy across the world, from a great variety of disciplinary and

practical bases, are recognizing each other as participants in a global interdiscipline.

In 1986 I published a book of essays, written over the prior decade, called Composition

as a Human Science, which was conceived as an effort to contribute to the emerging self-

understanding of a discipline. Motivated by the lack of a philosophical framework in which to

handle particular research questions, I asked myself what would be necessary for composition to

become a sustainable discipline. Here is what I answered then (the full list is attached):

an inexhaustible topic. . .

a connection with, or relevance, to the intellectual life of the culture

principles for differentiating itself from other fields with similar or overlapping interests

a mission; a moral imperative, social responsibility

methods that are mutually compatible and complementary. . .

social/territorial motives and professional/institutional settings where it has an accepted

role [including] journals, conventions, departments, and programs

an educational system for reproducing the discipline, providing scholars with a sense of

professional identity and common points of departure

irony [and] self-reflexivity about its own projects and discourse (ix-x).

Today I would add other requirements, like histories and historical perspectives, and I

would put more emphasis on relations between the discipline and its social, political, economic,

cultural, and technological contexts, as implied in the reference to a mission. But now I simply

want to point out how these criteria relate to writing studies in the U.S., Canada, and beyond,

focusing particularly on an inexhaustible topic and means of inquiry (the intellectual heart of

disciplinarity) in relation to institutionalizing its place in the academy, including carving out a

space for itselfliterally and organizationallyand developing the bureaucratic apparatus by

which it does its work, makes that work visible and useful, and establishes a means and right to

reproduce itself.


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Accounts of the rise of studies in writing and rhetoric, in most parts of the world, tend to

conceptualize it as a teaching practice or set of pedagogical responsibilitieswriting

instructionlooking for a discipline. What I mean is that its practitioners want to find or develop

the intellectual content (in theory and research) that would rationalize and ground their teaching

practice and, indeed, they understand would engage them in ongoing inquiry. These concepts of

discipline formation, however, take both the practice itself (for instance, first-year composition)

and its institutional location as a given, at least as a point of departure from which it can, in fact,

be very difficult to depart.

Im going to reverse this arrow of development and instead suggest that writing studies

can be historicized as an intellectual movement looking for a location, not only literally (where it

will physically and administratively sit) but in the sense of the apparatus by which the

academy defines and perpetuates such movements as disciplines. While the aspiration to study

writing and rhetoric has so often arisen among practitioner communities, it develops beyond lore

only when and because it is pursued for its own sake, out of intellectual curiosity and a sense of

social and moral significance, whose scope is not limited to its original motive or practical site.

Once begun, as a new intellectual practice of scholarship, the question becomes how it can

establish and stabilize all the institutional correlates of that practice: curriculum and degrees;

programs, centers, and/or departments; faculty positions; journals and organizations;

undergraduate and MA degree programs, leading to professions or academic study; and doctoral

studies that can reproduce the field within the academy and make it sustainable.

Let me first make the claim that rhetoric and composition, or writing studies, has in the

U.S. met the criteria of finding an inexhaustible (indeed, an ever-expanding) topic and

developing a vast variety of methodological means for studying it. Writing no longer refers

solely to linguistic communication or print literacy: it is construed as intersecting with oral and

visual communication, mediated by digital technologies in global networks, deeply embedded in

and constitutive of culture and society, and learned and taught over a lifetime. It is studied from

every conceivable disciplinary point of view, in every aspect, at every age, and in every setting

of life. To make this point concrete, I would point you to the range of peer-reviewed

presentations at the main annual conference in the U.S. for rhetoric, composition, and writing

studies, the 4Cs (or Conference on College Composition and Communication), which had 3000

attendees this year. Each year, the incoming chair has the notoriously thankless task of defining


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area clusters in which proposals will be organized for reviewing. This has produced a

proliferating list of clusters and exemplary topics that never quite catches up to the

diversification of rhetoric and writing studies in topic, setting, and method, but is a useful way to

track the development of the field. The call for papers for next years conferences includes 13

broad areas of inquiry, each of which is subdivided into up to 14 specific areas of specialized

work that exemplify, but do not exhaust, that category. For example, the cluster of information

technologies now includes online identities, e-learning, and software development and design.

The history category has recently added histories of un-schooled as well as schooled literacy

practices along with histories of protest writing. The communitycivic and publiccluster

includes literacy practices and programs, civic engagement and deliberation, community-based

research or service, and other contexts for instruction like prisons or religious settings.

A field of studies that is organized by bringing multiple perspectives to bear on an object

(in this case, an expanding notion of symbolic activity) is by definition interdisciplinary, even

within its disciplinary expression in a given national academic landscape. That means that the

fields contributing traditions and methods actually construe writing differently, as well as

drawing on different, often eclectic intellectual resources. Thats why naming it gets very tricky,

because the various terms may represent different constructions of the object, different aspects or

specialized sites, theoretical traditions, or research methods that may be fundamentally in

conflict. Terms like rhetoric, composition, discourse, writing, communication, media, or literacy

express different relationships in combinationsometimes with other terms like digital or

culture and play unpredictable roles that may vary idiosyncratically from one local context

to another, while perhaps generally following field-wide trends. This will be something to

remember in considering the terms chosen to name the department at the University of

Winnipeg, its major, the earlier Centre for Academic Writing, or the Canadian organizations that

house scholars of writing, rhetoric, and cognate fields.

Finally, the discipline as it has developed in the United States is characterized by a

mission that is explicitly moral: originally, a pedagogical commitment to educating all students

in the context of mass education, seeing writing as the key to learning; more recently, articulated

in terms of social justice, access, engagement in communities beyond the academy, and broad

public and civic participation.


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I have spent a great deal of time demonstrating in the last five years that the intellectual

enterprise of writing and rhetoric studies in the U.S. has gradually acquired the features that

make it viable as a discipline within the American academy, in the pragmatic terms of my

definition: it has scholarly and pedagogical territory of its own; it is capable of sustaining itself

and reproducing itself through its production of scholar-teachers who populate higher education.2

These features include an array of publication outlets; a critical mass of tenured and tenurable

faculty; a varied curriculum including degree programs; some research centers and external

funding, if still limited; stand-alone writing programs and independent departments.

Lets turn now to Canadian scholarship in writing, rhetoric, and discourse. This is not

where most stories of writing studies in Canada begin: they focus on the development, location,

and organizing structures of writing instruction in Canada.3 I will return to the significance of

that history later, especially as it relates to the uniqueness of the Rhetoric, Writing, and

Communications department in the Canadian landscape. But here, I would like to flip that script,

which tends to produce a view of Canadian scholarship that is as scattered and ad hoc as the

forms and settings of writing instruction. Lets think instead of Canadian scholarship on these

topics as a convergent group of inquiries, representing several different research communities,

that is looking for a way to develop the institutional correlates that make it visible holistically as

a discipline. (Again, I dont mean that a discipline is easily bounded or unified, but that it has

been disciplined as an academic field by gaining those features that make it recognizable and

able to function coherently in and across academic structures). That doesnt mean it will look the

same or do the same work from place to place, but that it will be able to construct a presence that

informs all of those locations holistically. Right now thats not the case. But scholars seem to be

taking some steps in that direction, for example by renaming their most robust professional

organization the Canadian Association for the Study of Discourse and Writing to broaden its

scope. Let me quote excerpts from the CASDW website, explaining what it now encompasses as

an emerging area of research generally referred to as Writing Studies, with subdisciplines

2See Louise Wetherbee Phelps and John Ackerman, Making the Case for Disciplinarity in Rhetoric, Composition,and Writing Studies: The Visibility Project, College Composition and Communication 62.1 (2010): 180-215.

3An exception is Jennifer Clary-Lemon, who has provided an extremely useful survey and analysis of writingresearch in Canada, Shifting Traditions: Writing Research in Canada, American Review of Canadian Studies 32.4(2002): 673-94.


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such as professional writing and communication, technical writing and communication, scientific

writing, Writing Across the Disciplines, and more.4

The website says that CASDW is concerned with the study and teaching of non-literary

writing and communication in all academic, business, government, and public contests. . . . [Its

scholarship} examines the generation, interpretation, structure, and impact of discoursesit

then offers a long list of disciplines and professional settingsand CASDW members also

study the role of technologies, visuals, and multimedia in communication. Next it names a

variety of pedagogical sites, including curriculum at several levels, writing centers, and degree

programs, which cover a long list of specialized subjects like genre theory, information design,

critical discourse analysis, visual rhetoric, and much more. It points to an extremely diverse body

of intellectual resources from various disciplines and to the fact that CASDW members work

and teach across disciplines, professions, and public contexts, in a variety of university

departments and faculties. The program for this years CASDW conference, which is being held

this weekend, offers a sampling of work from this diverse community that is small but

impressive, addressing topics from the emerging discursive conventions in nanotechnology

science to a transition program that teaches academic writing by linking it to traditional models

for wellness.

But I wonder how many undergraduates and graduate students in Canada, even the

majors in Rhetoric and Communications at Winnipeg, are aware of this emergent field and its

scholars as intellectual resources and even models they might emulate. If they are not, it is

becausedespite vibrant pockets of work and new programs coming on line in some

universitiesthey still dont find a recognizable discipline when they look for the usual

structural correlates of scholarly work: publication outlets in Canada; degree programs,

especially in graduate studies; faculties and departments. And I dont think the various traditions

of inquiry that span these topics have completely acknowledged each other as mutually relevant.

Why did the development of scholarship in rhetoric and writing take such different

courses in Canada and the United States? This question takes us back to the history of writing

instruction in Canada, which has been very well documented in publications by Roger Graves

4http://www.cs.umanitoba.ca/~casdw/en/home.htm


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and others.5

I am not going to rehearse that here, but will try to provide some highlights that are

revealing in comparison to the United States.

According to Kevin Brooks (and others), Canadian views of writing instruction

developed around an opposition between practical and cultural functions of education.6

Brooks explains how, during the 20th

century, composition became associated discursively with

practicality, anti-Americanism, and popular culture in opposition to English departments

determination to preserve British cultural heritage. This attitude did not significantly change

when in the 1970s U.S. composition teaching evolved toward a discipline, when it began to build

an intellectual enterprise by studying writing as a process and reviving rhetoric as a theoretical

and pedagogical tradition concerned with communication as a productive art.

In part, this reflects also the different responsibilities that US universities had at the time

for access. Influxes of large numbers of students, after World War II and again in the 1970s,

coincides in the U.S. with periods of growth in composition toward a discipline. In contrast, a

Canadian report on undergraduate English made the following remarks after reporting that large

numbers of entering studentsthe student at the gateswere no longer prepared to write

adequately:

No department in Canada could afford to . . . devote any of its departmental budget [or

teaching hours] to what is essentially not part of its real duties. The only fair and just

arrangement would be to recognize the fact that bringing students up to an acceptable

level for university entrance is not the universitys responsibility; it should certainly not to

be expected to pay for it, or to let it interfere with its proper tasks, and it is under no moral

obligation to provide instruction at any but full university level. Work which properly

5Roger Graves, Writing Instruction in Canadian Universities (Winnipeg: Inkshed, 1994); Teaching Composition

Theory in Canada, Composition Studies 23.2 (1995): 110-14; and Composition in Canadian Universities, WrittenCommunication 10.1 (1993): 72-105. See also Tania S. Smith, Recent Trends in Undergraduate Writing Coursesand Progrms in Canadian Universities, in Writing Centres, Writing Seminars, Writing Cultures: Writing Instruction

in Anglo-Canadian Universities, Roger Graves and Heather Graves, eds. (Winnipeg: Inkshed, 2006), 319-65.

6Kevin Brooks, National Culture and the First-Year English Curriculum: A Historical Study of Composition inCanadian Universities,American Review of Canadian Studies 32.4 (2002): 673-94. See also Henry A. Hubert,

Harmonious Perfection: The Development of English Studies in Nineteenth-Century Anglo-Canadian Colleges (EastLansing: Michigan State UP, 1994).


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belongs in the secondary schools is no more part of a universitys responsibility than

kindergarten or primary school instruction would be (20).7

This report was published in 1976, when I was in the middle of my doctoral program,

a self-designed degree in composition and rhetoric. This statement expresses the antithesis of

the moral motive that drove composition to develop in the U.S. But it is even more shocking

in the context of the University of Winnipegs policy that accepts social responsibility for the

potential students and larger community of the city and province.

As a result of this disdain for practicality (as well as simply not having to deal at the time

with masses of unprepared students), composition never got a foothold in Canada through widely

required writing instruction for first year students. Instead, it developed in remedial units, set up

in disciplines like engineering and law, or as interdisciplinary services, which evolved into

variants of writing-across-the-curriculum and writing-in-the-disciplines and eventually added

upper division courses and sometimes degrees.8

These were too various and unorthodox to provide the kind of institutional platform that

the cross-institutional first-year required composition course gave to U.S. scholars for

developing a discipline, despite all the disadvantages of its service status which made this such a

struggle (and still haunts the discipline). In Canada, the move from tutorial centers into more

varied offerings, cross-disciplinary integrated instruction, and degree programs was ad hoc and

serendipitous, according to local conditions. Some have managed to form coalitions or establish

an interdisciplinary structure that provides some institutional stability for faculty, although often

these units remain nontraditional.9

In other cases, rhetoric or writing scholars formed

partnerships or found homes where they could, most often with communication studies (which in

Canada had a completely independent development), applied linguistics, and education. In

general, rhetoric and writing studies have not coalesced easily in Canada in part because it

requires the kinds of intellectual communities that arise when it is possible to assemble faculties

7F.E.L. Priestly and H.I. Kerpneck, Report of Commission on Undergraduate Studies in English in CanadianUniversities (Association of Canadian University Teachers of English: December, 1976).

8This distributed system, contrasting with American rhetoric and composition, is typical of postsecondary writinginstruction, where it exists, in Europe and globally.

9For examples, see Graves and Graves, cited above.


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in a common location who are empowered to pursue both scholarly projects of mutual interest

and shared pedagogical responsibilities.

The Department of Rhetoric, Writing, and Communications at Winnipeg

The department of Rhetoric, Writing, and Communications is a unique exception to the

ways that writing instruction developed in Canada: it is recognized as the first independent

writing program, then department, in the country. Again, this history is probably well-known to

those here and has been written about extensively by members of the program.10

The most salient

facts are, first, that it did begin with, and still sustains, a first year program that offers the stable

platform (both economically and pedagogically) for development that so many Canadian

institutions lacked; and, second, that it had from the beginning a substantial full-time faculty,

increasingly professionalized, that developed capabilities for both scholarly research and

curricula informed by intellectual traditions in rhetoric, writing, and communication. As

members of the department have recounted, by 2006 it achieved departmental status; now it

encompasses a first year program; an undergraduate major; a joint Communications program

with Red River College; and numerous community learning projects, curricular and

extracurricular, in which department members participate in collaboration with other program

and faculty. It has put forward a proposal for a Masters in Rhetoric, Writing, and Public Life

with a totally distinctive focus on practical advocacy.

Whether in the U.S. or Canada, an academic department, especially a relatively new one,

is at once a recognition of a cosmopolitan research and teaching area that stretches across

institutions at least nationally, if not internationally, and also a partial, highly contextualized,

local manifestation of that complicated phenomenon. It is most successful when it is well-

adapted to the distinctive mission and character of its institution. Thus the last context that forms

10See, for example, Judith Kearns and Brian Turner, Negotiated Independence: How a Writing Program Became aCentre, WPA 21.1 (1997): 31-43; Kearns and Turner, No Longer Discourse Technicians: Redefining Place and

Purpose in an Independent Canadian Writing Program, inA Field of Dreams: Independent Writing Programs and

the Future of Composition Studies, Peggy ONeil, Angela Crow, and L.W. Burton, eds. (Logan, UT: Utah State UP,

2002), 90-103; Tracy Whalen, Writing Programs and Coming of Age, Canadian Journal for Studies in Discourse

and Writing23.1 (2011): 1-10; Brian Turner and Judith Kearns, Into the Future: A Prairie Writing Program

Extends Is Tradition, in Graves and Graves, 273-95; and Jaqueline Rogers McLeod, An Undergraduate Research

Methods Course, in Undergraduate Research in English Studies, Laurie Grobman and Joyce Kinkead, eds.(Urbana, IL: NCTE, 2010).


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my own framework for thinking about this departments future is the institution itself and the

setting in Winnipeg that shapes its ethos and mission. This department is as unique as the

institution. It has growth and development opportunities that would both enhance this fit and

further develop the capacities of the department to advance the emergent field of Canadian

scholarship and pedagogy in written communication.

The way I have been thinking about this is in terms of a series of binary oppositions that,

at Winnipeg, have become productive tensions that the institution embodies and negotiates. In

fact, several of these have organized much of this talk. I described earlier the opposition between

the practical and the cultural that prevented the development of American-style composition in

Canada. This opposition lingers on here in the contrast between the general humanistic

disposition of the department, making rhetoric the center of a liberal arts education, and the

notion that writing is practical both as a set of productive abilities and as a path to careers in

the communication industry. This tension is played out productively in the Joint

Communications Program and, because they are in the same classes, all undergraduate majors. It

is, in that case, translated into another binary between practical career paths as communicators in

advertising, journalism, and so on, and academic careers through graduate studies.

Another important set of oppositions in both the department and the university are

translated into dialogue and relationships between the university and its environmentthe city

and its peoples, and in the parallel tension (identified in the Strategic Plan) between access and

excellence.11

These are dominant themes in President Axworthys vision of the mission of the

university, which I discovered when I read his policy paper upon first arriving here.12

I have

since tried to follow these themes as they actually play out in concrete projects for various

populationsfor example, in the reconstruction of borders through architecture, or the

movement of programs into inner city neighborhood. Or they are embodied in intellectual forums

like programs on aboriginal governance or urban studies which bring native peoples in as

11Referring to the Universitys mission statement, the Academic Plan Update (June, 2009) states the Universityacknowledges the tension between the two dominant values that define the University. First is the tension between

University and College. Second is the tension between access and excellence. In both instances the Universitystrives to achieve both. The University of Winnipeg defines itself as an institution that offers a superior university

education within the intimate atmosphere of a college as well as access with academic excellence (Executive

Summary).

12Lloyd Axworthy,The University and Community Learning: An Evolving Mission.http://www.uwinnipeg.ca/index/admin-president.


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teachers, advisors, consultants, and spiritual presences. I am filled with admiration for the

boldness and imagination of these efforts, including the innovative ways they are being financed.

These same tensions and borders are really constitutive for this department. It was

originally organized, in its first year program and tutorial centres, to support the mission of

access, work for which it has been praised in reports and national media. As Vice President

Corlett told me, this department gets it! The members understand and share a passion for these

goals and an understanding of the patience and inventiveness it takes to achieve them. They are

frequently called on, or volunteer, to participate in teaching experiments and projects that link

university and its communities in what Tracy Whalen calls liminal spaces,

But the very conversion of the Centre for Academic Writing into a department, with

professorial faculty who are increasingly expected to do research, brings this commitment

potentially into question. When a department with this commitment develops an undergraduate

major and, now, proposes a masters degree, some faculty are skeptical that it will neglect or

diminish its commitment to the first year program, especially to the difficult teaching challenges

of working with nontraditional students. I suspect they have similar worries about the

universitys investments in research and encouragement of graduate studies.

But it is not access that characterizes the mission, according to Dr. Axworthy, but the

relationship and balancing act between access and excellence. He means by that, in part, that

members of the community will be given every possible opportunity to learnand to teachand

then, they will be supported to meet the universitys high standards for graduation. But it means

a lot more than that. It means, I think, that the university expects the delivery of education for

nontraditional students, in the Tutorial Centre and first-year writing, as well the provision of a

requirement in academic writing for all students, will also be held to standards of excellence. In

turn, what that means in a scholarly community is that its pedagogy will be informed by

principles and research findings from the facultys disciplinary resources, that it will continually

assess and examine its program critically, and that some faculty may take the program as a site

for their own research. The same is true of all levels of the curriculum.

The department has a distinctive profile of strengths and interests that fits the

institution like a glove, in its institutional dynamic between access and excellence, academic

study and practical application, and the dialogue between university and local communities. In

imagining what it can build on this foundation, the department has one enormous advantage. I


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was thinking one day about how many of the widely separated Canadian scholars scattered

throughout the country would give their eyeteeth to have a local intellectual community, which is

exactly what a departmental structure is designed to afford, if it is able to strategically build a

faculty that will engage with one another, in part, over its common pedagogical commitments.

The faculty of the department has this, so rare in Canada; it just needs to appreciate, exploit, and

enhance its possibilities.

The department recognized this what would be called in rhetoric a kairotic moment of

opportunityin setting up the Fulbright project. Its members undertook to examine critically its

current programs, its legacy from a unique past, how it fits with the institution, what is its place

in the Canadian landscape. The first-year writing program, with its tutorial centre, is sixteen

years old; the undergraduate major is eight years oldas far as I know, neither has been

substantially revised since its inception, although both have evolved. Each is ripe for some

critical scholarly attention. The Masters proposal in Rhetoric, Writing and Public Life is still

under development, and new projects constantly present themselves in serendipitous ways. At

the same time, I have perceived a depth of thematic connections in its publications and course

designs that could be woven into a stronger web in order to articulate the curriculum vertically

and its intellectual traditions and perspectives horizonally. I will have some observations and

suggestions on these matters, but more importantly, the Fulbright project has modeled a process

for pursuing these goals through historical and contextual research, conversation, and

engagement with scholarly and pedagogical materials. This is how I learned to know this

department and, hopefully, it has been learning about itself along with me. I am actually of

French and Anglo-Canadian heritage on one side of my family, and I think I will leave here

feeling ever after a little more Canadian.


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FromLouiseWetherbeePhelps,CompositionasaHumanScience:ContributionstotheSelf-

UnderstandingofaDiscipline(OxfordUP:1986),ix-x.

Featuresthatcoulddefinecompositionasadiscipline:

aninexhaustibletopic(asubjectofadequatescopeand

permanentinterest)

aconnectionwith,orrelevanceto,theintellectuallifeof

theculture

principlesfordifferentiatingitselffromotherfieldswithsimilaroroverlappinginterests

amission:amoralimperative,socialresponsibility

methodsthataremutuallycompatibleandcomplementary

withrespecttoassimilation,testing,critique,anduse

social/territorialmotivesandprofessional/institutional

settingswhereithasanacceptedrole(journals,conventions,

departments,programs)

aneducationalsystemforreproducingthediscipline,

providingscholarswithasenseofprofessionalidentityand

commonpointsofdeparture

irony,self-reflexivityaboutitsownprojectsanddiscourse


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Appendix2

SummaryofStudentQuestionnaireFindings

Dear Instructors and Professors of the Rhetoric, Writing and Communications Department,

On May 12, 2011, I and 9 other students met with Dr. Louise Phelps. The intent of the meetingwas to give her a better understanding of how the students in the Rhetoric, Writing and

Communications (RW&C) department felt about the major. Prior to the meeting, I circulated abrief questionnaire (included below) to the students based on a discussion that Dr. Phelps and I

had earlier in the week. The aim of the questionnaire was twofold. First, I wanted to givestudents an idea of the types of questions Dr. Phelps was interested in asking. And second, the

questionnaire was meant to give her some basic information prior to the meeting so that shemight be able to focus on particular areas of interest, given the short time she had with the

students. The questionnaires, themselves were not anonymous, however, students understoodthat the information they provided to Dr. Phelps might be used (with identifying information

removed), for the purpose of her report.

After the meeting, Dr. Phelps suggested that there was an abundance of information in thequestionnaires that she was not able (given the time constraints of her visit) to go through

systematically. After we briefly discussed the ethical constraints, she suggested that I might gothrough the questionnaires systematically and summarize what the students had said.

13 students opted to complete the survey. I have summarized some information; however, I havealso tried to quote students as much as possible without revealing their identity. For this reason,

any reference to specific classes (which are taught by only 1 professors), or to specific professorsthemselves, has been taken out.

I hope that this information proves valuable!

Allison Ferry

Contents

The Questionnaire ..................................................................................................... 17Summary of Findings .................................................................................................... 17

Age Range ................................................................................................................. 17Majors ....................................................................................................................... 17

Amount of University Completed ............................................................................. 18

Discovering Rhetoric, Writing and Communications ............................................... 18After were done ................................................................................................... 19How our education will help us achieve our goals ................................................... 20

Looking back: How the program helped Alumni ..................................................... 20Tutoring..................................................................................................................... 22

Additional Information ............................................................................................. 22Reflection .................................................................................................................. 24


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The Questionnaire

1. Name:2. Age:

3. Major(s)/Minor(s)/Additional focusesie. if you have taken cognates in 1-2 otherdepartments:

4. Amount of university and degree completed:5. How did you get involved in the Rhetoric, Writing and Communications program?

6. What do you intend to do/what did you do once you finish(ed)?a. How do you think your education will help with that?

b. For graduates: How did the program help you (or not) with what you are currently doing?

ForTutors:

1. How long have you been a tutor?2. How and why did you get involved in tutoring?

3. Could you please briefly describe your tutoring experience?

AdditionalInformation:

IfthereisanythingthatyouwouldliketobeintroducedintotheconversationwithDr.

Phelps,pleaseintroduceitbelow.

Summary of Findings

Age Range

-9studentsinearly20s(20-25)

-2studentsinlate20s(26-30)

-2maturestudents(1inearly60s,1oldenough).

Majors

-Becausethesurveydidnotaskstudentstospecifywhethertheyweretakinga3yearor4

yearmajorinRW&C,thisinformationwasnotconsistentlyavailable.

-5studentshaddoublemajors

-1studenthadacombinedmajor

-ALLstudentslistedhavinganadditionalfocusi.e.theyhadselectedcognateswhichwere

focusedprimarilyin1-2differentdepartmentsoutsideofRW&C(somestudentsreferred

totheseasminors,althoughtheuniversitydoesnotrecognizeminors)

-AllstudentswereRW&Cmajors

-NoJointProgramorCreativeCommunicationsstudentsfilledoutthesurvey,although3

studentsindicatedthattheyhadoriginallyintendedtogoontooneoftheseprogramsand

hadchangedtheirminds(SeeDiscoveringRhetoric,WritingandCommunications)


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Theotherdisciplinesstudentslisted:

-6studentslistedEnglish(specificallyEnglishLiteratureandCreativeWriting)

-2studentslistedLinguistics

-Otherdisciplines:Theatre,Business,Philosophy,Politics,Anthropology,Religion,History,AboriginalGovernance,PhysiologicalPsychology,Chemistry

Amount of University Completed

-Allstudentshadcompletedatleastoftheirdegrees

-ThesurveydidnotrevealhowmuchoftheirRW&Cmajortheyhadcompletedspecifically

-3studentswerealumnipriortoWinter2011

-2studentswillgraduateJune2011

-1studentspecifiedthats/hehadcompletedpartoftheirdegreeatadifferentuniversity

Discovering Rhetoric, Writing and Communications

-2studentssaidtheyfoundtheprogramwhiletheywereenrollinginuniversityfromhigh

school

-4studentsstatedthattheystartedindifferentdisciplinesandweredrawnintothe

majorthroughvariousavenues

-5studentsbecameinterestedintheprogrambecauseoftheirinitialinterestinCreative

CommunicationsortheJointDegreeprogram

Whatmadethemchangetheirmind?

-5studentsnotedthatitwasaspecificprofessor(ormorethanoneprofessor)whoinitiallycaptivatedtheirattention.

-3ofthesestudentssaidtheywereenticedthroughAcademicWriting

-3studentsbecameinterestedinthemajorthroughRhetoricalCriticism

-2studentslistedRhetoricwithoutspecifyingaparticularclass.

-2studentssaiditwasanotherstudentwhogavethemtheinformationabouttheprogram

thatmadethemwanttojoin

I wanted my education to include as much of a cross section of theoretical and practical

material as possible, so I thought this program would be an excellent fit for me.


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Myoriginalintentionwastoenrollinthejointcommunicationsprogramandeventually

moveontostudyCreativeCommunicationsatRedRiverCollege.However,afterdevelopinginterestinpursuingpostgraduatestudies(inbothCommunicationandjournalism),Ichanged

mymind.

General interest. Because I couldnt commit to the 2-year, full-time Red River CreativeCommunications program.

IspecificallytookthiscoursebecauseIwasonthefenceonwhatdegreeIwantedtopursue

andthereforeIwastakingtherequirementsfortheJointCommunicationsProgram.ThisjointprogramiswhatbroughtmetotheuniversityasIthoughtImaybeinterestedinacareerin

broadcasting.ItwasinmyfirstyearthatImetastudentinoneofmycourseswhodiscussedtheRhetoric,WritingandCommunicationsDepartmentandtoldmeIdidnotnecessarilyhave

toventureovertoRedRiverbutcouldcompletethemoretheorybaseddegreeat

UW.RhetoricalCriticismwasanamazingcoursewhichIfeltspoketomyinterestsdirectly.I

hadalwaysbeeninterestedinhowpeoplearepersuadedandwantedtolearnhowtoanalyzethatpersuasionsoIwouldknowwhenitwasdirectedatmeandothers,andhowsomepeopleareabletoholdpoweroverothers.ForthisreasonIfoundadvertisinginteresting,however,I

didnotbelievethatIwantedtobetheonetopersuadeothers(andthereforedidnotwantto

taketheRedRiverProgram).

Ibecameinvolvedwiththeprogrambasedonrecommendationsthroughfriendswho

are/werealreadyinthedepartment.Ihavealsocontinuedtotakeclasseswithmyfirstyear

academicwritingteacherwhoteachesintherhetoricdepartment.

IwasastudentatUofWwithafocusonBusinessAdmin,ItookAcademicWritingthen,

had.,lovedtheclass,hatedbusiness.Droppedout,camebackonceagain,stillinBusiness,

stillhatedit,anddroppedoutforthesecondtime.WhenIreturnedIdiscoveredthat

AcademicWritinghadgrownintoadepartmentandIdecidedtochangemymajors,loved

whatIwasdoingandlearning,andneverlookedback.

After were done

-Therewerevaryingdegreesofcertaintyaboutwhatthefutureheld,4studentsindicated

theywerenotentirelycertain,althoughonly1studentrespondedwithIdontknow.

-10studentsspecifiedthattheywereconsideringfurthereducationinsomecapacity

-6mentionedgraduatestudies(allindicatedinterestinmaintainingsomeconnectionwiththeirRW&CbackgroundwhenapplyingtoMastersandPh.D.programs)

-2mentionedCreativeCommunicationsortheJointDegreeprogram

-7studentsindicatedthecareerstheywereinterestedinpursuingaftergraduation

-2studentswantedtopursueacademia


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-3 students were interested in Journalism, Public Relations or Broadcasting.

-Otherinterestsincludededucationpolicyandcurricula,publishingandteachingEnglish

overseas

How our education will help us achieve our goals

-CriticalthinkingandstrongerwritingskillswerethepredominantstrengthsstudentsfelttheyhadobtainedthroughRW&C

My education has given me the required writing and oral presentation skills, as well as a solidunderstanding of Rhetoric and Communication theory for to writing and speaking to a variety of

audiences. I have also learned how to craft my responses to unique rhetorical situations. Theseskills will be valuable in any occupation that involves communicating with the public, such as

those in Public Relations, Journalism, Advertising and many other areas.

I know that my education in Rhetoric and Communications will be advantageous no matterwhat field I decide to work in because of the skills developed concerning both critical thinking

and writing.

It's given me confidence, passion, knowledge, the ability to think and understand critically andclearly, the ability to express myself, form arguments, write competently and concisely. Whatever

I do it will influence my career and life both directly and indirectly. Ideally I'd like to do writingrelated work but I don't want to be limited to that and this program, although it makes that goal

possible, also does not limit me

Both of my majors are geared towards engaging critically with text and other forms ofcommunication. I believe that these are essential skills and skills that I should be passing along

to others. That being said, I believe that my education will help me be a better person, a morecerebral individual; I'm not entirely concerned with any job-relevant skills I may be acquiring or

neglecting.

I feel I have a strong foundation of critical thinking as well as a firm grasp on how to employrhetorical devices to strengthen my writing. I also feel as though having a background

indifferent areas of Communication has given me a unique edge when applying to graduateprograms. Further, ALL of the professors in the department extend additional attention to

students such as myself who are not only looking to get a degreeAs such, although theprogram is smaller, I do feel as though I have been given multiple opportunities to balance this

with multiple RA and TA positions, teaching opportunities, independent study opportunities,

etc

I think that a foundation in Rhetoric and Communications will help me write concisely and

effectively communicate ideas.

Looking back: How the program helped Alumni

Betterunderstandingofthepoliticsanddiscoursethatengagenot-for-profitorganizations.


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Adeeperawarenessofhowmoderntextsseektoinfluenceourlivesandprovidedthetools

withwhichtoanalysethem.Lookingbackonmyexperienceintheprogram,itwasthe

eclecticbackgroundofthevariousprofessorsandthereforethewiderangeofdiscoursethey

drewtheirmaterialfrom,thatIenjoyedthemost.

Isupposethatjustaboutanyonewouldbenefitfromhavingstudied,insomecapacity,

writingandcommunicationsIamnoexception.Idowish,however,thatmystudieshad

providedmeaclearerideaofwhatspecificallyIdliketopursuewithinthefield.Ilearneda

littleaboutalot,butIwouldhavelovedhelpnarrowingitdowntoaparticularstreamor

areaofstudywouldmakeiteasierwhenitcomestoplanninggradstudies.

RightnowI'maserversonothugely,althoughIhavecopyeditedthemenuandemailsformy

manageronrequest.WhenIservetherightguestmysmalltalkissometimesmoreinteresting

thanitmayhavebeeninthepastbecauseIdiscusstopicsI'vecoveredinclassesorthingsthat

I'vereadthatImaynothaveotherwiseread.Ithasallowedmetostandupformyselfandprotectmyselfandmyco-workersfrombeingtakingadvantageofbythemajorcorporation

thatweworkfor.BeingwellwrittenandwellspokencangoalongwayI'malsoavolunteerwriteranddoacollegeradiotalkshowsoithelpswiththatfromtheconfidenceaspectas

wellasbeingabletoexpressmyideasintelligentlyandbeingabletohaveintelligentideasat

all.LastsummerIdidpromotionworkforamusicpromotionalcompany,Imettheownerofthecompanythroughaclass,andmyeducationhelpedgreatlywiththatjobasI'msureyou

caneasilyimagine.

Iamamuchbetterwriter.

IhaveexemplarycriticalthinkingabilitiesIfeelliketheRhetoricprogram

encouraged/demonstrated/rewarded/pushedthedevelopmentoftheseabilities...

[However]ImadeitthroughtheRhetoricdegreeattheUofWwithonlywritingveryshort

criticalpapers,asidefrom[specificinstances]Ifeltlikeacookwhohadonlymadeonedish

atatimebeforewhohadtoprepareamulti-coursemeal.Idturnmyattentionawaytofocus

onanotherdishandaccidentallysetsomethingbehindmeonfire.IwanttoclarifyandsaythattheveryshortpapersgavemeextensivepreparationwithavarietyofdifferentareasButIjustdidntgetnearlyenoughpracticewritinglongcriticalpapers.Tosolvethe

issue:tailortheassignmentsdifferentlysothatstudentscanwritealongpaperattheend

ofthetermand(2)putthisonthestudentsradar,thatiftheyarethekindofstudentwhomightconsidergradschooltheyregoingtowanttopracticewritingalongpaperbeforeone

determinestheirentrance/lackthereofintogradschool...


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Aliberalartseducationimprovedmyanalyticalskills,andgavemeagreaterawarenessof

theforcesatworkinourglobalcommunity.

Tutoring

-3studentswhocompletedthesurveyweretutors

-Allhad1ormoreyearsofexperience

-2alludedtothefrustration/shockofdealingwithstudentswhoseskilllevelswereparticularlylow,despitehavingcompletedhighschooland/orsomeuniversity

-2mentionedaspecificinterestinworkingwithEALstudents

-1mentionedthattheyfeltithelpedtostrengthentheirownwriting

IgotinvolvedintutoringbecauseIbelievethateffectivewritingandcommunicationare

essentialtoameaningfuleducation.IrecognizethatI'mprivilegedintheseareas,andIthink

thatIammakingmeaningfuluseofmyskillsandtimebyhelpingothersrealizetheir

capacity.

Mytutoringexperiencewasaninvaluablepartofmyunderstandingofthecriticalrole

rhetoricplaysinourlives,howitcanbeusedasabridgeofunderstandingbetweencultures.MyexperiencewasapositiveoneandIespeciallyenjoyedtutoringEALstudents.

Additional Information

2studentsrespondedtothissectionandsuppliedapproximately8pagesoffeedbackwhich

wasfocusedalmostexclusivelyonpreparationforgraduatestudies.

Ithinkthatalthoughstudentswantingtogoontogradstudiesarenurturedandmentored

byprofessorsinthedepartment,thecourseofferingsarelimited.Thereneedstobecourses

thatchallengethesestudents[Ican]getthisexperiencethroughreadingcourses(bothin

Rhetoricandotherdepartments),however,inthesesettings,Iamnotexposedtoother

studentswithwhomIcandiscuss,debate,andingeneral,learnfrom.Eveniftherewasonefourth-yeartheoryclassofferedineachofthedifferentareas,Ithinkthiswouldgoalongway

topreparinggradstudents.

MyconcernisthatIamnotadequatelypreparedforgraduatestudiesinCanadianschools,

whichdonothaveeitherCompositionorRhetoricastheirfocus.WhileIdonotagreewiththe


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ideathatthisareashouldbeseenassuperiortotheotheraspectsoftheprogram,Idofeel

thatCanadianCommunicationsisasufferingareaintheprogram.

MyCV[was/is]quitebareforapplyingtogradschool,anditwouldvebeenhelpfuliftheUof

Wsetupsomeopportunitiestohavesomethingonthere[forexample]a1credithourstudent-runcolloquium,whereweworkshopeachotherandsometimesprofessorscomein

andtalkabouttheirresearch.Iftheydsetthatup,thestudentscouldalsotaketurnsbeingthe

co-chairs,andthatwouldhelpbridgeintogradschoolforboththewritingqualityandthe

CV.

IfeltlikeI[was/am]writinginavacuumalotofthetimeattheUofW.Mywriting

noticeablyimprovedwhenIwasgivensomethingtopushoffofthatwentbeyondthe

classroommaterial.Ifeellikeeveryonesgotthisontheirradarforpractical,community-

basedwriting,i.e.thestudentswhowanteverythingtheydotohaveimmediatetangibleconsequences,butnotallstudentsarelikethat!Theyrenotreallydoingjusticetothe

studentswhoaregenuinelyinterestedinacademicknowledgeforitsownsake.AfterIwas

given3pagesofButlerandAlthussersessay,Iwasalreadyabetterstudent.Iwasabletocontextualizeandrhetoricizeasituationandmakemoresophisticatedmovesandcritiquesin

mywork.Cantheymakeanoptionalcoursepackforstudentsinthedepartmentwhowanttoengagewiththeoristsbeyondtheonesthatfitintotheimmediateclass?

Eventhoughmycritiquesofthetheoristswereprettyaccurate,Iwasalsoveryawareofhow

littleIknew,andthereforeabsolutelyneededthefeedbackfromfacultytonodtheirheadsor

makeacheckmarkbesidemysentenceThestudentscanstepuptheirgameandwritebetter

ifthefacultyputtheminasituationwheretheycancontextualizeandrhetoricize;wejust

needtobeputinmoreofthosesituations.Ithelpedalotwhenfacultyspokeoftheirown

work,especiallystuffthattheyhadntpublishedyetbecauseitprovidedinsightintohowthe

processofknowledge-creationworked.Idontthinkmostofthefacultydidthisenough.

ItwouldalsobehelpfulforfacultytomakeavailabletheirCVssothatstudentsinterestedcan

gofindtheirwork(becauseitgivesusmorecontextandwecanmakeassociationsfromwhat

theytalkedaboutinclasstowhatwaspublished,etc.)

if[studentsread]eachotherswork,theyllgoOMGIdidntrealizeeveryonesfirstsentence

beganwithInsocietytoday...Wewereofteninavacuumandcouldntseethedumbmovesweweremaking.Thesearechoicesthatstudentscanself-correctiftheycangetoutoftheeye

ofthestormoftheirownworkIdontthinkthisshouldbedoneinclassbecausetheresimply


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isntenoughtimebutthefacultycansetupaspacewhereinterestedstudentscanhelpeach

othergrow.

Ireallywanttodiscourageusingthestrongstudentstopulluptheweakerstudentsby

constantlypairinguswiththem.MostofthetimetheweakerstudentsIwaspairedupwithweretherebecausetheyjustwantedtoearnadegreeandgetajob,theydidntcareaboutthe

knowledgeforitsownsake,anditssuchanenthusiasm-killertobepaireduplikethat.

iftheyredoingcolloquiums,thereshouldbeonethatsrigorousandrequiresextrareading

forlittlerewardotherthantodeveloponesownwork,andmaybethereshouldbeonefor

peoplewhoaremoreinterestedinthepracticaloutcomesoftheirworkthosearetwovery

differentattitudes,anditalwaysseemstobethestudentsinterestedinknowledge-for-

knowledge-sakebendingtotheotherswhocareonlyaboutpracticaloutcomes.

Reflection

Generally,thestudentsprovidedmoreinformationthatIinitiallythoughttheywouldwhen

Idistributedthesurvey.IthinkthatthisisareflectionofthefactthattheRW&Cstudents

aregenuinelyinterestedintalkingabouttheirexperienceswiththedepartment.

Thequestionthatyieldedthemostinformationfromstudentswastheonewhichaskedstudentstodescribehowtheywereintroducedtotheprogram,whilestudentsstruggled

morewithquestionsaboutwheretheyfeltthedegreewouldeventuallytakethem.

Thismightalsoreflectoneoftheshortcomingsofthissurvey,whichisthatnoneofthe

studentswhopartookwereofficiallypartoftheJointDegreeorCreativeCommunications

program.Itwouldseemlikelythat,particularlyintheAdditionalInformationsection,

responsesmighthavebeenextremelydifferent.

Inspiteofthisabsencewhichinnowaywasintendedtosuggestthatthosestudentsare

unimportanttotheprogramwhatthesurveydoesrevealisavitalcommunityofstudentswhoviewtheirtimeintheRhetoric,WritingandCommunicationsprogramasthe

beginningtotheiracademicpursuitsandmanyattributedthistothepassionoftheirprofessorswithinthedepartment.


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Appendix3


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Appendices to Fulbright report

Documents

Transcript of Appendices to Fulbright report