FoolsCap

::Woebegone sigh::

p. 151: "[. . .] scholastic [. . . .]"

I’d forgotten abuot this word, I confess.  I just want to highlight it as a possible contender for my replacement for "academic," which, loyal readers know, I want to repurpose in my discourse.

p. 157: "[. . .][If] ‘ideas’ can be represented on paper by ‘topics’ then the externally imposed structure afforded by the outline will insure that random or unconnected ideas are worked out into an orderly progression.  That minds, let alone discourse, sometimes flow into other channels, seems never to occur to authors of current-traditional composition textbooks."

While I hold this to be true, I have some reservations.

1. One of the things us new GTAs have had drilled into our ever-lovin’ heads is that freshman writing is often unorganized, and that one of our responsibilities as new comp instructors is to help the froshes learn how to organize their work.  But here comes Crowley seemingly undermining that notion (as, I find, Harris seems to at points).  How do we reconcile the assertion that discourse can be enriched by not slavishly following formulae while at the same time filling the expectations set for us (by the dep’t and the university) which might (superficially?) be at odds?
2. A sidebar that might prove relevant: In a recent class (I won’t name names, but the instructor’s name rhymes with "Barflack") we discussed how an argument is constructed not through its content but through its "meta-discourse": those words which signal relationships between ideas and allow the reader to tie figures together: but, however, contrary, et cetera.  [I think that’s how meta-discourse works.]
3. What we might see as our goal then, is to help student’s both think critically and generate ideas, even those that might not seem directly related to the subject at hand (see #2) above, and then using the meta-discursive apparatus available, contruct something resembling a sensible argument.
4. Which leads me, once more, to my rudimentary essay model in the previous post.