Volume 25 Number 2 Fall 1997

West, Thomas.  "Differencing Negotiation."  Composition Studies (25.2):  7-18.

Some scholars in composition have forwarded the rhetorical strategy of negotiation as a mode of social and pedagogical interaction to work through cultural differences. While such arguments for negotiation are compelling and hold promise, it is also important to remain critical of the strategy itself and to understand better its complex historical and political dimensions. In this way we come to see that, among other things, parties with the power to institute their ways with language use and have used negotiation as a way to contain dissenting voices within sanctioned conventions, thereby managing the social tensions associated with issues of cultural difference.