The blog post in which I realize how married I am to MLA-- Blog #2

Predictor Variables: The Future of Composition Research

 This article...wow. So far, this has been the first article that I have read that has truly gripped me from the first page, and perhaps because of how eloquently Johanek explains the difference between APA and MLA, calling MLA a "'living' object of study" (190). I never thought of it this way! The literature lover in me came alive upon reading:
"The novel, the poem, the short story-- works of literature-- can always be interpreted, reinterpreted, criticized, but the work itself will not change. Once it is published, it's published. It's 'there.' Forever. Thus, present tense treats the text adequately-- the work 'is.'" (191)

This introduction also made me curious as to how Johanek was about to juxtapose composition next to literature, and she proceeds to do so in the next paragraph. Her proposal that composition focuses on process rather than product struck me as a pretty valid argument for separating composition from literature. As someone who always argues the importance of composition across all disciplines, this struck me as being a good point. I'm not yet sure that I agree with this assertion, but it brings up an interesting argument.

Moving forward, I found that I don't quite agree with her arguments for APA over MLA. Her discussion that the MLA present tense locks the authors into what they said in the past as being forever true does not seem to be a valid point. For example, if I were writing a paper on Hamlet, and I found an article from 1999 from a certain critic proposing one argument, and another article from the same critic written in 2010 refuting his former claim, both points would be worth noting in my paper for the sake of discussion. If I were to only use his old argument, my paper would not be up-to-date and reliable. If I were to use only his new argument, my paper would probably be fine, but both arguments would make for a more interesting discussion. If I were to write the paper and somehow manage to find the old argument and not the new argument, then I have not done enough research.
What I am saying, in short, is that research should always be up to the present. We work with what we have.

Further into the article, Johanek loses me. Like, 100%. I could be reading this wrong, but her arguments begin to sound petty to me. For example, "We all have stories, of course, but not everyone is allowed to tell one at a convention in front of everybody" or "Storytellers emerge when our field has granted them the privilege to do so" or "if I earn a 'name,' can I, too tell stories?" (195)  Her tone just rubs me the wrong way. I make a note of this in one of my annotations, but in terms of storytellings vs. the traditional research method, I think that the people who become known for storytelling are the ones who fought hard enough to make it work against the tide of the traditional. That being said, maybe I am not well immersed in the research world, but it seems to me that it is natural that you do what you have to do and you study whom you must in order to one say break away and be your own kind of researcher. One day, students will complain about having to cite you in their research papers.

I also, honestly, completely lost track of what the article originally seemed to be about. I was totally following the whole "APA for composition" idea, when suddenly I got lost in the sea of "why can't I tell my story?" Where did that idea get off to? When she went off to talk about Boyer (and I did like his four points of scholarship!), I had to continually reread and refocus, because I felt completely lost. The end of this article seemed to veer off into the world of statistics that we discussed last week, and I am grateful we had that discussion because it gave me some insight into the area the article dipped into. I think she made good points in the latter part of the article regarding research and statistics, and the inclusion of the students in the teachers work, but there was a lot of weird stuff going on in the middle.

I enjoyed reading this article because, as much as I disagree and will probably rant about it in class tomorrow, it was something I can relate to. I am certainly looking forward to hearing everyone else's opinions on the latter part of the article, because I began to struggle to apply it to what came before.


Writing in High School/Writing in College: Research Trends and Future Decisions

I found this report to be well compiled and a compelling look at the education systems of both high school and college. I was immediately drawn in by the the statistics that brought the important differences between high school and college teaching practices to light. I enjoyed reading through Tables 2 and 3, which presented the teaching practice data of high school vs. college faculty, and I found that the article led me to reflect upon my own academic history. 

When I was in high school, we had every class every day. We had time to work in partners or groups, the teacher was more readily available to meet with us and give us feedback, let us submit drafts, and gave us time to  freewrite and evaluate before the paper was due. In college, the opposite was true. Whenever a paper was due, even in my English classes, if I needed a professor's opinion I needed to schedule an appointment for office hours. If classmates wanted to peer review their work, they needed to meet on their own time. The writing center was rarely utilized but for the freshmen who were required to go there, and we next to never considered it as a resource. It was my opinion that this is just the way college is considered to be. Classes have less time together, two or three class periods a week depending on the day, and a lot of information to cover. I'd be surprised to hear that it was different anywhere else. 

However, I'm beginning to think that less class time might just be an excuse. So far, even though these graduate classes only meet once a week, we stay in contact through the website, our blogs, Twitter, email, and Hypothesis. Could it be, perhaps, that not enough college professors engage on all platforms? Perhaps the classes do not meet every day, but this might be averted through utilization of resources we now have on hand. Free writing, drafts, peer reviews, and the professor's comments might not be easily done during class time, but perhaps these statistics would be different if more people were open to the world of resources we have.

Further into the article, the line "Many faculty resist workplace genres on philosophical grounds, often arguing that their role is to help prepare citizens of the world, not train workers" (164). Look...I get it. I left college wanting to forever live in the world of scholarship and research papers, always having deep philosophical conversations. However, that is not what life is always like. And, for the majority of students, I would argue that practical application trumps the research paper. How many students get through college by learning the fine art of bullshitting a research paper, and cannot type a simple email? I know far too many. 

I like that the article included the college survey in its appendix. I plan on saving that survey for use in my own classroom one day, because I think it would a useful resource to start the semester. It's best to know what you are in for!

Issues of Audience in Composition Research- blog #1

I have to admit, the way this section, "Don't Make Me Do Math," began with mathematics scared me. Marissa and math go together like oil and water...that is to say, they really, really don't.
I found that Johanek made a compelling case for statistics within the field of composition, and cited reliable sources who also understood the misgivings of their audience, as people who have been widely turned off to mathematics. However, sometimes stats are a necessary evil and, as Johanek says, the administration wants to see numbers. That leaves some pretty big hurdles to overcome.

A fear of mine when dealing with statistics is that they are like another language, and are often introduced in such a way that I feel completely lost. There is nothing I hate more than feeling like the only person at the party who doesn't know anyone, and that's how I often feel when mathematics are introduced into the equation (oops, was that a pun?).

I think that Johanek brings to light a very real problem that often arises when statistics meet composition research. She cites instead after instance where researchers direct readers to outside suggested readings, instead of explaining the methods they used within the text. If you know you are speaking to an audience that may be less likely to naturally understand statistics, I believe that you should make the data understandable to that audience. For reasons like this, statistics are furher stigmatized .

In the concluding sentences of this section. Johanek says: "We have to be careful, especially in rhetoric and composition, if we believe that statistics lie...Let’s admit it: words tell more lies than numbers do. After all, we have another way of  pointing out liars: 'you’re just telling stories.'"
Maybe this is coming from my own preexisting cynicism, but I do not agree. I do not believe that statistics lie, but I do believe that people lie. In the perfect world we call a spade a spade and that's the end of it, but the problem is that in the same way that person saying the words might be a liar, the person presenting the numbers could be manipulating them. Just like I'd be skeptical of someone telling me a story, I'd be skeptical of someone explaining their stats to me, without showing me all of the data-- as is exemplified by the cases she shows in this section. ("Figures don't lie, liars figure")

Going on to the second section in this chapter, "Feminist Responses to the Traditional Research Paradigm," I appreciated that Johanek began this section by establishing her own stance, which appears to be fairly reasonable and moderate--- "I hope instead to present feminist inquiry as aiding our understanding of both women and men and, especially, the unwritten rules of the power structure in which we live" (69). I feel that feminism is a topic that can easily become radical in one way or the other, and I think she does a good job of establishing that there are rational and valid points made from both sides amidst the arguments-- there is a happy medium. As she says, "An even bigger mistake than always choosing one method would be to reject a research method only because of its male-dominated history or to prefer some methods because they appear to suit women better" (69).

There are several interesting points made in this section. Johanek cites biochemist Shepherd as saying that generally, in her experience, the emotional is generally associated with female, and the rational is associated with male. I agree that I have also seen these generalizations, and I agree that they are wrong. However, as Martha commented and I agreed, Shepherd boards the crazy train on the next page when she compares "science without feeling" to "Nazi scientists conducting experiements on Jews." Johanek acknowledges this as an extreme result, but I think that "extreme" is not, perhaps, an "extreme" enough word to express the wild outlandishness of the statement.

If I'm understanding the next part of the section correctly, I like the methods proposed by Sullivan for feminist inquiry. Instead of favoring what I assume would be considered the disinterested perspective of the male inquiry of the past, she purports a "qualitative and naturalistic" approach. I find this to be a practical way of utilizing those tendencies that are feminine, and highlighting them in the best possible way. If it does tend to be true that women are geared more toward empathy and feeling, then it is impractical that we would treat research in the same way that men do. However, instead of looking at these differences as male vs. female, perhaps it is more helpful to view them as different approaches that each have their own merits.

It is sad to me that despite the good ideas that are presented throughout this section, there is still a marked separation between female and male researchers. Rather than accepting the aforementioned validity of different methods and approaches and moving from that point to examine the facts, the methods are often under fire. Why apologize "feminine research principles" and "feminine methodology"? Instead, why don't we just focus on the facts, and let the principles and methodology stand on their own?

Shifting my focus to the final section, "Preference for Narrative-As-Genre," the question after the colon puts forward an interesting question, "Are we still the stepchild of literature?"
Well, are we? I think that stories are important. I think they cater to a side that everyone has, the desire to learn and be engaged, and I think often, associated writing with stories seems natural. However, even in saying that, I can see where this could be disputed. Linking this to the first section regarding statistics, perhaps it is this reliance on stories that makes many so wary of statistics and analysis in writing, because it is something we're not used to being associated. I loved the line on page 79, "Storytelling, more than statistics, allows our emotions to emerge." This is true, and I think it's something to be celebrated! However, having read the first section, I think that there is the ability to teach using both approaches, and perhaps incorporating statistics and analysis makes writing classes more accessibly to people who are more likely to favor the rational world of numbers. I would not appreciate this, personally, but I know that many would.

This chapter has been interesting to me because I think that Johanek set it up in a very thought provoking way. In the beginning, I was wary of the incorporation of statistics, however, at the end, I was defending their merit. In the same way I found myself finding a happy medium in the middle section regarding feminine vs. masculine research methods. I think it is sad that differing values dictate what is considered worthy, especially when there is merit in different methods. Square blocks do not fit in circle holes, and unfortunately, there are many who try to force that.

There are many different ways of approaching analysis and each has it's own merits and weaknesses. I'm interested in hearing what everyone else thought in class tonight, because there are a lot of different points to discuss.