Writing in an Alien World: Basic Writing and the Struggle for Equality in Higher Education / Edition 1

by Deborah Mutnick

Overview

Writing in an Alien World is a vigorous analysis of contemporary basic writing programs and everyone who participates in them. Tracing the history of basic writing from its origins to recent political attacks on college-level "remediation," Deborah Mutnick offers an account of one of composition's most vexing and rewarding challenges.

Mutnick places basic writing in a historical context and theorizes how its location in higher education overlaps with other social, geographic, and political margins. She explores how the low status of the teaching of basic writing-its devaluation in respect to literature, its gatekeeper role in the university, and its increasing reliance on part time teachers-constructs the academic margins. As a critique of basic writing, Writing in an Alien World suggests how the conception of social relations as inevitably hierarchical, depicted by a center and margins, might be reconstrued. But it also celebrates basic writing's pedagogical insights and questions the value of criticizing it at a time when equal opportunity initiatives are under siege.

Basic writing teachers, compositionists, graduate students, and critical educators will benefit from this book's theoretical scope, political analysis, and illuminating portraits of students and teachers.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780867093711
Publisher:	Heinemann
Publication date:	11/06/1995
Series:	Crosscurrents Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	222
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.60(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Deborah Mutnick is an assistant professor of English and director of writing at Long Island University in Brooklyn.

Table of Contents

Constructing the Margin

Voices from the Academic Margin

1960s-1990s: Theories and Politics of Basic Writing

Students and Teachers as Writers

Surface Errors and the Female Body: Basic Writers Who Make Mistakes

Writing in an Alien World: Basic Writers and the University

Multiple Teacher Responses: Authorizing Words and the Discipline of Writing

A Writing Pedagogy for the Nineties

A Two-Way Flow: Social Construction Theory and Critical Pedagogy

A Multiplicity of Voices: Postmodern and Feminist Pedagogies

Conclusion: Basic Writing and the Politics of Articulation

Editorial Reviews

This book provokes us to think critically about our everyday practice and how it is informed, not only by theory but by our own experiences as teachers and writers.”–Journal of Advanced Composition

From the Publisher

Mutnick (English, Long Island U.) places basic writing in historical context and theorizes how its low status overlaps with other social, geographic, and political margins. She also suggests how the conception of education as inevitably hierarchical might be reconstrued as a more fluid, democratic process. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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