appendices to fulbright report
TRANSCRIPT
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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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