Volume 32 Number 1 Spring 2004

Reid, E. Shelley. "Uncoverage in Composition Pedagogy." Composition Studies (32.1): 15-34.

This article describes the increasing pressures on those who teach graduate seminars in composition pedagogy to cover a broad range of texts, topics, and techniques.  It argues that in response, pedagogy instructors may need to deliberately (re)design their courses in order to continue to help new writing instructors engage in inquiry and discovery, to help them learn to think like teachers.  Specifically, it recommends two kinds of un-coverage strategies.  The first is a problem-based pedagogy, such as one described by Wendy Swyt that features reading-clusters and a "contact-zone" approach, or one that focuses on investigating "unsolvable problems" in composition pedagogy.  The second is a discovery-draft pedagogy, one that uses exploratory, challenging writing assignments and writing workshops to engage students in reflection and inquiry.

Ryan, Kathleen J. "Memory, Literacy, and Invention: Reimagining the Canon of Memory for the Writing Classroom." Composition Studies (32.1): 35-47.

This article challenges the assumption that the canon of memory means memorization and transcription, and, as a result, has little relevance for the writing classroom.  An examination of the canon’s historical legacy and its relationships to literacy and invention open a space for redefining the canon of memory as rememoried knowing.  In brief, rememoried knowing is a strategic, contextual process of interpretation and invention to make meaning.  This new version of memoria has four dimensions:  memory material, imagination and interpretation, context and subjectivity, and transformation.  The author looks to the disciplines of life writing and women’s history to describe these dimensions, drawing specifically on the ways Toni Morrison, Julia Alvarez, and Gerda Lerner use and discuss memory.  Teaching this art of memory has the potential to encourage students to become rhetors – as makers and users of memory – in the writing classroom and the global community.

Panek, Mark. "Active Reading in the Multicultural Composition Classroom." Composition Studies (32.1): 49-72.

In "Active Reading," Mark Panek details the dialogic model for discussing reading assignments in introductory composition courses he developed while teaching at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa.  He then argues for the model's appropriateness and effectiveness for diverse student populations, situating his discussion in the conversation of collaborative classroom advocates and critics such as Kenneth Bruffee, John Trimbur, Greg Meyers, Carrie Leverenz, and Darin Payne.

Ampadu, Lena M. "Gumbo Ya ya: Tapping Cultural Stories to Teach Composition." Composition Studies (32.1): 73-88.

In "Gumbo Ya ya," the author reflects on how varied stories and cultural and linguistic perspectives encountered during her evolution from student to veteran teacher have helped shape her research and pedagogy. Using a simultaneity of voices that parallel the musical traditions of her Louisiana heritage, she shares her views on teaching composition and literacy that embrace oral traditions. She invites other composition practitioners to appreciate and draw from a diversity of cultural traditions as they interrogate and formulate pedagogical stances for the composition classroom.

Goodburn, Amy and Heather Camp. "English 354: Advanced Composition Writing Ourselves/Communities into Public Conversations." Composition Studies (32.1): 89-108.

English 354: Advanced Composition is a required course for undergraduate majors in English, broadcast journalism, criminal justice, and pre-service English education, among others, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, a research-one land-grant institution with a student population of about 24,000. English 354 focuses on “intensive study and practice in writing non-fiction prose” and has a prerequisite of at least one 200-level writing course.