"The Sticky Embrace of Beauty" Response

Wysocki’s “The Sticky Embrace of Beauty” strikes a chord with me for several reasons. The first is that Wyscoki’s work here is theorized in a way that connects teaching applications to a context situated in a philosophical tradition that Wysocki is not only willing to explain, but to confront. Wyscoki then applies the knowledge and claims she generates by making meaning and challenging former knowledge about form and aesthetics, particularly in terms of how blind acceptance of universal forms can be dangerous for women and other oppressed groups: “My very (learned) idea of what is beautiful, of what is well-formed, is dangerous for women and any aestheticized Others” (169).  In much of the academic reading I’ve done, I’ve been struck by what a difficult task this really is: that which is “formally abstracted and perfected” (168)—such as academic writing itself—has always seemed threatening against women to me, but few scholars do much to establish a real link between theory, form, and practical application, and it has always seemed difficult to articulate the origination or prove the existence of the threat. For this reason, it seems to me that many legitimate critiques of form along these lines have been ignored or silenced because the connection and explanation wasn’t presented in a way valued in traditional academic discourse. I feel that Wysocki, however, has made this critique very successfully here, and  she does this well, though, one could argue, a bit messily (and this assessment is not a critique of course, as Wysocki would understand). But beyond that, to generalize a bit, I like this article because Wysocki also “puts her money where her mouth is”; investigating this topic through a personal observation is itself a challenge to formal approaches, as the personal in academic work is highly suspicious and considered less rigorous than other methodologies. These are only some of the many things I find particularly satisfying about this piece.

10/25--New Media Readings

I enjoyed the first readings form "Writing New Media," though the book is a lot different than I thought it was going to be for some reason. First, I was struck by the layout, which seems to go against traditional ways of organizing an academic text. The different openings and the way the applications are tied in were unexpected. Additionally, it is almost as if there is a hypertextual component to the design--it is not a linear as traditional texts.

Also I was struck by one of Wysocki's main points: that new media needs to be more focused on writing. Because I was first introduced to New Media Theory when I started the Rhet/Comp program, I just assumed New Media was wrapped up with composition, but I now understand that it's not necessarily thought of that way by people outside of our field. Wyscoki's call for materiality makes me think about ways to tie composing through New Media to actual lived experiences. In other words, instead of jumping on the multi-modal composition bandwagon and having students compose New Media texts just for the sake of incorporating this in the classroom, we should identify, discuss, and an analyze the ways New Media offers a way of composing and challenges concepts of literacy based on individual experience at the intersections of class, race, and gender. Additionally, Wysocki calls for using New Media writing for advocacy and action. I am very interested in this and am currently working on a project that connects New Media to Service Learning pedagogy. I plan to refer to Wysocki's work here as I continue working on this.

The Selfe article was also very interesting. I know people who have experienced the same issues David has: because of a linear concept of literacy, their work and strengths were not valued. Also, Selfe's article raises really important points about how we can or should work to find ways to assess and value multiple literacies. Technology has changed traditional composing, and, though academic writing traditions still cling to these conventions, the call to re-evaluate is becoming more and more clear.

10/18--Response to Comstock and Hocks, and Selfe

As Comstock and Hocks point out in their article, “Voice in the Cultural Soundscape: Sonic Literacy in Composition Studies,” “As many Western philosophers from Plato to Jacques Derrida have noted, Westerners tend to be phonocentric, quick to ascribe presence and immediacy to speech, even recorded speech.” In reading this article, I know agree with this statement and believe it to be true, though I’ve never really thought about this before. In my training as a graduate TA, especially in my MA, I was taught to critically evaluate what counted as a “text” and to encourage multimodal composition in the classroom. I cannot, however, remember ever discussing projects characterized by aurality.

In reading these articles, I was struck by an experience I had as a first year TA teaching ENGL 1101 by myself for the first time. A student always sat in class with one ear bud in his ear and I asked him several times during the term to take it out. When I began teaching as a full time instructor at a technical college upon graduation, I had a clause in my syllabus about ear buds. While in these situations, one can be relatively certain the students were not using music to supplement or transform their classroom experience in some critical way, I know wonder how music changes the experience of the composing student. As Selfe states, “This phenomenon [of today’s students’ penchant for listening to and producing sound and its ironic implications for English teachers], however, may reveal as much about our profession’s attitudes toward aurality and writing—or the related history of these expressive modalities within our discipline—as it does about students’ literacy values and practices” (2). Certainly environment plays a role in students’ state of mind, especially the sensory environment. I am really interested in exploring some activities that incorporate sonic literacy and aurality in the future. In particular, I find important the assertion that “sounds dissolve into nothing in a way that images and writing do not,” and am interested in further discussing and exploring the implications of this statement.

10/1--Anson, and Moran and Herrington

Often, we discuss how some readings for our class seem a bit outdated today. Almost a moot point (or at least, overstated point), I couldn’t help but be struck by this critique while completing my reading. This, of course, is the nature of technology, and it is the nature of writing about technology. The topic of assessment within the field of computers and writing, however, seems to resurface frequently, suggesting many questions about this topic that have yet to be answered or addressed satisfactorily—an there are many more topics out there in our field just like this one.

In addition to questions about assessment, this week’s readings raise important questions about other issues that seem to transcend any particular time table, unlike the media which produce these questions. For example, Anson’s article in particular seemed dated, though its overall relevance in terms of the way we respond to students via technology was quite interesting and is still a question many tech-savvy teachers discuss. The Moran and Herrington reading also seemed relevant, especially in its discussion of evaluating hypertext and establishing a hypertextual “grading” heuristic. Additionally, discussions of how we evaluate student writings produced in different media lead to discussions about how we value and count faculty publications produced in various media, making this topic interesting on two fronts; it is particularly relevant as discussions about how tenure review boards treat electronic publications by faculty begin to surface.

I think the most important thing about studying the literature of our field, however dated it may seem at times, is drawing inspiration from it. Not only are we inspired by the projects and applications we read about, we can be inspired to question existing practices, or we can be inspired to take up questions that were never quite “answered.” One of these questions that came to me as I read the first article, “Variations on a Theme…”, was this: to what extent does the type of classroom we teach in determine our pedagogy? In other words, is a class that takes up technology as a major theme out of place in a non-computerized classroom? Or can we count the computers (and they are computers) in our students’ pockets and backpacks in the form of cell phones as making our classrooms “networked” even if there are no desktops in the place? Can we assume that the extent to which our everyday lives are impacted by technology makes teaching technology as a major theme in a writing class that’s not in a computer classroom okay? What types of assumptions do we make about accessibility and literacy when we assume this?

My point is this: it’s obvious to anyone that some of these readings are a bit out of date. But the fact that they’re older is not really the point: it’s what these works say (and don’t say), the questions they raise (and don’t raise, or don’t really answer) that make them valuable and relevant today.

9/27--Selfe and Selfe, Wysocki and Jaskin, Sorapure

This week’s readings congeal around the common theme of ways in which “the rhetoric of technology” (Selfe and Selfe) obscures the things that may make us notice how power relations are reinforced and maintained through technology. As writing teachers, we risk reinforcing hegemonic ideals, too, especially when using technology to teach, and especially when we give in to pressures to “see forgetfully” (Wysocki and Jaskin). As all the authors this week point out, these pressures come from multiple sources, including text books, interfaces, software design in general, and institutional policies. As teachers, being aware of the risk of reinscribing such hegemony is essential.

I had read two of these articles before and in a different context, but one thing that struck me overall about this reading was that the power of the interface is inextricably tied up with accessibility. I was also struck by Wysocki and Jaskin’s image of “how we’re seen by the software.” I started to think about how I seek to subvert the power relations, for example, discussed in these texts in my own teaching.
One thought I have is along the lines of Sorapure’s analysis of writing in Flash. As someone interested in new media and using social media in the classroom, for example, to discuss the writing process, I began to wonder about the way we’re “seen” by social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace.

Are we seen as amateurs and novices who share the common human desire to express ourselves in writing but who cannot be bothered with concerns about design? Are we—through our tendency to accept the interface, format, and design of these sites without attempting to personalize or alter them beyond a status update—communicating to software designers that those of us with access to such technologies crave what’s generic and simplistic? I think an analysis of the dialectical relationship that could (should?) and occasionally does exist between designer and end-user would yield some interesting ideas, especially for teachers who discuss writing in these forums with their classes.

9/20--Blackmon, Hocks and Balsamo, Alexander et al

The readings for this week deal with identity politics and what use of the web can mean for those who aren’t, as Samantha Blackmon would say, “the majority.” Overall, the articles do a good job of discussing or encouraging classroom assignments that fit with feminist, cultural, and post-colonial theory.

Sometimes Composition and Rhetoric as a field is critiqued—especially when it comes to more politicized concerns—of not being sufficiently grounded in theory. Our field, especially the specialty of computers and writing, comes under scrutiny for its pragmatic research and the practical applications discussed in the scholarship, with the argument against this that scholars in the field aren’t generating sustainable theory.

One thing that struck me about the readings this week, however, was how balanced they were: each directly discussed or encouraged assignments created through a feminist or cultural theory lens, but each also took up major theoretical concerns and some—especially Hocks and Balsamo and Alexander et al.—actually generated theory that can serve as a framework for activist feminist rhetoric and feminist technology theory (in the case of Hocks and Balsamo) and queer technology theory (in the case of Alexander). The Alexander article, because of its seemingly “informal” vibe (it is a transcript from a MOO meeting of several Rhet/Comp scholars), asks questions that can certainly be explored further to become foundational questions in queer technology theory, even though it may seem initially not to be a theoretical work.

While all readings were useful, the balanced nature of the articles and their efforts to offer applicable ideas for instruction while still remaining grounded in or generating theory seems to be the most remarkable characteristic about this particular group of readings.

9/12--Selfe and Digital Immigrants

I found this week’s readings insightful, interesting, and still very relevant. “Kids Today,” the Digital Immigrants reading, and Selfe’s article about “paying attention” were most thought-provoking to me, especially when I connected the three. Drawing the connection between these three made me realize that I occasionally subscribe to the “kids today” mentality, and that I also make assumptions about digital natives versus digital immigrants that may occasionally blind me to larger and more and more important issues in computers and writing. Also, as Selfe describes it, I’m occasionally guilty of “not paying attention,” especially when I feel out of my comfort zone. And I have just the anecdote to back this up.
Without my knowing, one of my ENGL 1101 classes was chosen to receive flip cameras this term. Because the notification was sent to my student email, which I rarely check, I found out only the day before they were scheduled to receive them. I was completely flustered when I found out, not because I wasn’t excited, but because I knew I’d have to change the syllabus and their assignments. Also, I’ve never had a flip camera and don’t quite know how to use one. To compound matters, apparently my students had known they were getting the flip cams before I did.

I really felt like a digital immigrant the day these were handed out, and I’m still working on my new syllabus and assignments, meaning we haven’t used the cameras for anything in class yet. In Selfe’s article, she writes,“…computers are rapidly becoming invisible, which is how we like our technology to be. When we don’t have to pay attention to machines, we remain free to focus on the theory and practice of language, the stuff of real intellectual and social concern” (3).

While this article is older, the phenomenon of teachers ignoring the technology when convenient—instead of going with the flow a little bit, and allowing the technologically-enhanced writing experience to be more organic like we might otherwise—still takes place, even amongst teachers (like me) who consider themselves more native than immigrant, to use controversial (and rightly so) terms. To an extent, this is what is going on while I have been crafting my new syllabus and assignments for my students with flip cameras. The “Kids Today” article suggests that students are in the unique position to be documentarians of their own lives and that they are embedded in all types of environments and situations, which make this prospect a particularly interesting one, one that I plan to use as a guide in approaching the flip cameras my students now have.

Overall, these three readings in particular remind us what we negate when we emphasize certain metaphors or ways of thinking, what we devalue when we privilege other things. In my case, I find that, despite my affinity for the use of computers and technology in the composition classroom, I sometimes devalue the experience of experimenting with that technology in favor of structuring a course to achieve outcomes I’ve achieved in similar ways in the past. The potential to do this, albeit subconsciously, re-enforces the problematic use of static terms like digital native and digital immigrant, and also reveals a slight suspicion of the use of technology by writing students today.

As I continue to find in this field, the continual process of reflecting on teaching methods and evolving as an instructor is more important than ever, especially as classroom technologies like computers and flip cameras become ubiquitous, and especially to those of us who consider ourselves technology-friendly pedagogues.

8/30--First Week's Readings

This week’s readings balanced theory and application well, which is important in the field of computers and writing. “The Rhetoric of Technology” raises important points about technological determinism and being aware of the hegemony that can be recreated by using computers in the classroom without careful thought and planning. The problem Selfe and Hawisher describe of educators demonstrating their excitement about technology in the classroom without considering the ways it can reconstruct traditional power structures is important because this still occurs, increasingly amongst administrators and not just instructors. One discussion point that’s interesting to me is the authors’ use of the word architect here, which seems problematic in a discussion of power within the instructor-student paradigm. Perhaps this word bears exploration as a keyword that is popular in discourse regarding online teaching.

Lanham’s article raises important points about copyright and power as well. On the first page, It thought certain comments of Langham’s seemed a little more deterministic than Selfe and Hawisher would have approved. For example, Lanham states, “Sooner or later, such electronic “texts” will redefine the writing, reading, and professing of literature as well” (265). Based on Selfe and Hawisher’s work, it’s not the texts themselves that are causing this transformation, but the way they are being used by teachers and students, and the emphasis placed on using these texts by the institution itself. Other interesting discussion points about this article for me include Lanham’s discussion of “viewer-arrangeable” or  user-arrangeable texts. At times I wondered if Lanham was describing hypertext only, or if he was describing other types of texts and documents.

Where Lanham’s article is historical, interesting, and theory-heavy, Dickie Selfe’s article regarding “techno-pedagogical explorations” is useful and applicable to daily teaching scenarios. I’ve taught online for awhile and found many of the activities he suggested useful, especially the idea of assigning different teams to be responsible for posting questions, answers, and reflections on the discussion board. The idea that all online teaching is experimental is another of Selfe’s important points. Too often, we’re afraid to think of teaching as experimental; I think I speak for most teachers when I say that we’re typically more comfortable with knowing what works and knowing what outcomes to expect. Giving ourselves permission to try something and “see how it goes” can be liberating for us as teachers and our students as participatory learners. For those of us who subscribe to collaborative, feminist, or critical pedagogy, this approach can help us enact our pedagogy in a more effective way.

Lastly, the “Technology as Teacher” article did an excellent job of combining theory and practice in the same article in a way that leads to the critical re-evaluation of what we do in the classroom. I was very interested in the idea that if we don’t plan ahead and analyze our teaching tools critically (an idea we see in Selfe and Hawisher, too), then the technology itself becomes a strong force in the classroom, structure and features sending messages about power and how learning should work. It’s an important message for any teacher using technology in the classroom, right down to those still having students write all drafts with pen and paper, which are old technologies but not exempt from analysis along these lines.