Digital library
Textbooks, references and open learning resources.
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Writing in Knowledge Societies
Doreen Starke-Meyerring; Anthony Paré; Natasha Artemeva; Miriam Horne · WAC Clearinghouse · 2011
The editors of Writing in Knowledge Societies provide a thoughtful, carefully constructed collection that addresses the vital roles rhetoric and writing play as knowledge-making practices in diverse knowledge-intensive settings. The essays in this book examine the multiple, subtle, yet consequential ways in which writing is epistemic, articulating the central role of writing in creating, shaping, sharing, and contesting knowledge in a range of human activities in workplaces, civic settings, and higher education. Writing in Knowledge Societies helps us conceptualize the ways in which rhetoric and writing work to organize, (re-)produce, undermine, dominate, marginalize, or contest knowledge-making practices in diverse settings, showing the many ways in which rhetoric and writing operate in knowledge-intensive organizations and societies.
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Beyond Argument: Essaying as a Practice of (Ex)Change
Sarah Allen · WAC Clearinghouse · 2015
Beyond Argument offers an in-depth examination of how current ways of thinking about the writer-page relation in personal essays can be reconceived according to practices in the care of the self — an ethic by which writers such as Seneca, Montaigne, and Nietzsche lived. This approach promises to reinvigorate the form and address many of the concerns expressed by essay scholars and writers regarding the lack of rigorous exploration we see in our students' personal essays — and sometimes, even, in our own. In pursuing this approach, Sarah Allen presents a version of subjectivity that enables productive debate in the essay, among essays, and beyond.
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Yoga Minds, Writing Bodies: Contemplative Writing Pedagogy
Christy Wenger · WAC Clearinghouse · 2015
In Yoga Minds, Writing Bodies, Christy Wenger argues for the inclusion of Eastern-influenced contemplative education within writing studies. She observes that, although we have "embodied" writing education in general by discussing the rhetorics of racialized, gendered, and disabled bodies, we have done substantially less to address the particular bodies that occupy our classrooms. She proposes that we turn to contemplative education practices that engages student bodies through fusing a traditional curriculum with contemplative practices including yoga, meditation, and the martial arts. Drawing strength from the recent "quiet revolution" (Zajonc) of contemplative pedagogy within postsecondary education and a legacy of field interest attributable to James Moffett, this project draws on case studies of first-year college writers to present contemplative pedagogy as a means of teaching students mindfulness of their writing and learning in ways that promote the academic, rhetorical work accomplished in first-year composition classes while at the same time remaining committed to a larger scope of a writer's physical and emotional well-being.
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The Process of Research Writing
Steven Krause · Steven D. Krause · 2007
The title of this book is The Process of Research Writing, and in the nutshell, that is what the book is about. A lot of times, instructors and students tend to separate “thinking,” “researching,” and “writing” into different categories that aren't necessarily very well connected. First you think, then you research, and then you write.The reality is though that the possibilities and process of research writing are more complicated and much richer than that. We think about what it is we want to research and write about, but at the same time, we learn what to think based on our research and our writing. The goal of this book is to guide you through this process of research writing by emphasizing a series of exercises that touch on different and related parts of the research process.
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Writing In College: From Competence to Excellence
Amy Guptill · Open SUNY · 2016
Writing in College is designed for students who have largely mastered high-school level conventions of formal academic writing and are now moving beyond the five-paragraph essay to more advanced engagement with text. It is well suited to composition courses or first-year seminars and valuable as a supplemental or recommended text in other writing-intensive classes. It provides a friendly, down-to-earth introduction to professors' goals and expectations, demystifying the norms of the academy and how they shape college writing assignments. Each of the nine chapters can be read separately, and each includes suggested exercises to bring the main messages to life. Students will find in Writing in College a warm invitation to join the academic community as novice scholars and to approach writing as a meaningful medium of thought and communication. With concise discussions, clear multidisciplinary examples, and empathy for the challenges of student life, Guptill conveys a welcoming tone. In addition, each chapter includes Student Voices: peer-to-peer wisdom from real SUNY Brockport students about their strategies for and experiences with college writing. While there are many affordable writing guides available, most focus only on sentence-level issues or, conversely, a broad introduction to making the transition. Writing In College, in contrast, provides both a coherent frame for approaching writing assignments and indispensable advice for effective organization and expression.
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Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing Vol. II
Charlie Lowe; Pavel Zemliansky · Parlor Press · 2011
Volumes in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing offer multiple perspectives on a wide-range of topics about writing. In each chapter, authors present their unique views, insights, and strategies for writing by addressing the undergraduate reader directly. Drawing on their own experiences, these teachers-as-writers invite students to join in the larger conversation about the craft of writing. Consequently, each essay functions as a standalone text that can easily complement other selected readings in writing or writing-intensive courses across the disciplines at any level. Volume 2 continues the tradition of the previous volume with topics, such as the rhetorical situation, collaboration, documentation styles, weblogs, invention, writing assignment interpretation, reading critically, information literacy, ethnography, interviewing, argument, document design, and source integration.
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Stand up, Speak out - The Practice and Ethics of Public Speaking
University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing · 2016
Stand up, Speak out: The Practice and Ethics of Public Speaking features two key themes. First it focuses on helping students become more seasoned and polished public speakers, and second is its emphasis on ethics in communication. It is this practical approach and integrated ethical coverage that setsStand up, Speak out: The Practice and Ethics of Public Speakingapart from the other texts in this market.
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Writing for Success
University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing · 2015
Writing for Success is a text that provides instruction in steps, builds writing, reading, and critical thinking, and combines comprehensive grammar review with an introduction to paragraph writing and composition. Beginning with the sentence and its essential elements, this book addresses each concept with clear, concise and effective examples that are immediately reinforced with exercises and opportunities to demonstrate, and reinforce, learning. Each chapter allows your students to demonstrate mastery of the principles of quality writing. With its incremental approach, it can address a range of writing levels and abilities, helping each student in your course prepare for their next writing or university course. Constant reinforcement is provided through examples and exercises, and the text involves students in the learning process through reading, problem-solving, practicing, listening, and experiencing the writing process. Each chapter also has integrated examples that unify the discussion and form a common, easy-to-understand basis for discussion and exploration. This will put your students at ease, and allow for greater absorption of the material. Tips for effective writing are included in every chapter, as well. Thought-provoking scenarios provide challenges and opportunities for collaboration and interaction. These exercises are especially helpful if you incorporate group work in your course. Clear exercises teach sentence and paragraph writing skills that lead to common English composition and research essays. Features: Exercises are integrated in each segment. Each concept is immediately reinforced as soon as it is introduced to keep students on track. Exercises are designed to facilitate interaction and collaboration. This allows for peer-peer engagement, development of interpersonal skills, and promotion of critical thinking skills. Exercises that involve self-editing and collaborative writing are featured. This feature develops and promotes student inte
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Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing Vol. I
Charlie Lowe; Pavel Zemliansky · WAC Clearinghouse · 2010
Volumes in Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing offer multiple perspectives on a wide-range of topics about writing, much like the modelmade famous by Wendy Bishop's “The Subject Is . . .” series. In eachchapter, authors present their unique views, insights, and strategies forwriting by addressing the undergraduate reader directly. Drawing ontheir own experiences, these teachers-as-writers invite students to joinin the larger conversation about developing nearly every aspect of thecraft of writing. Consequently, each essay functions as a standalonetext that can easily complement other selected readings in writing orwriting-intensive courses across the disciplines at any level. Topics in Volume 1 of the series include academic writing, how to interpret writing assignments, motives for writing, rhetorical analysis, revision, invention, writing centers, argumentation, narrative, reflective writing, Wikipedia, patchwriting, collaboration, and genres.
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Romeo and Juliet
Rebecca Olson · Oregon State University · 2021
This edition of Romeo and Juliet was edited by students for students. We believe that reliably edited versions of the play should be available for free online. But we wanted ours to be easy to get in other ways as well. The editors—Oregon State University students who remember, far better than their professors, what it was like to read the play for the first time—carefully considered every pronoun, punctuation mark, and footnote. Our goal: to make a friendly, confidence-building edition that supported classroom activities at the high school and college level.
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Informed Arguments: A Guide to Writing and Research
Terri Pantuso; Sarah LeMire; Kathy Anders · Texas A&M University · 2023
Informed Arguments: A Guide to Writing and Research(4th Edition) is a premier Open Educational Resource (OER) designed to bridge the gap between critical thinking and rhetorical mastery. This edition refines the art of academic inquiry, offering students a transparent and accessible framework for deconstructing complex claims and constructing evidence-based positions. By prioritizing digital literacy and diverse perspectives, it empowers learners to navigate today’s information-saturated landscape with analytical precision. Comprehensive yet concise, this textbook remains an essential, cost-free solution for fostering scholarly voice and civic engagement in the modern composition classroom.
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Oregon Writes Open Writing Text
Jenn Kepka · Open Oregon Educational Resources · 2018
This textbook guides students through rhetorical and assignment analysis, the writing process, researching, citing, rhetorical modes, and critical reading. Using accessible but rigorous readings by professionals throughout the college composition field, the Oregon Writes Writing Textbook aligns directly to the statewide writing outcomes for English Composition courses in Oregon.
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Conventions 101: A Functional Approach to Teaching (And Assessing!) Grammar and Punctuation
Chauna Ramsey · Open Oregon Educational Resources · 2016
This is a collection of cumulative units of study for conventional errors common in student writing. It's flexible, functional, and zeroes in problems typically seen in writing of all types, from the eternal “there/they're/their” struggle to correct colon use. Units are organized from most simple to most challenging.
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Working With Academic Literacies: Case Studies Towards Transformative Practice
Theresa Lillis; Kathy Harrington; Mary Lea; Sally Mitchell · WAC Clearinghouse · 2015
The editors and contributors to this collection explore what it means to adopt an "academic literacies" approach in policy and pedagogy. Transformative practice is illustrated through case studies and critical commentaries from teacher-researchers working in a range of higher education contexts—from undergraduate to postgraduate levels, across disciplines, and spanning geopolitical regions including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Cataluña, Finland, France, Ireland, Portugal, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Key questions addressed include: How can a wider range of semiotic resources and technologies fruitfully serve academic meaning and knowledge making? What kinds of writing spaces do we need and how can these be facilitated? How can theory and practice from "Academic Literacies" be used to open up debate about writing pedagogy at institutional and policy levels?
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WAC and Second-Language Writers: Research Towards Linguistically and Culturally Inclusive Programs and Practices
Terry Zawacki; Michelle Cox · WAC Clearinghouse · 2014
In WAC and Second-Language Writers, the editors and contributors pursue the ambitious goal of including within WAC theory, research, and practice the differing perspectives, educational experiences, and voices of second-language writers. The chapters within this collection not only report new research but also share a wealth of pedagogical, curricular, and programmatic practices relevant to second-language writers. Representing a range of institutional perspectives—including those of students and faculty at public universities, community colleges, liberal arts colleges, and English-language schools—and a diverse set of geographical and cultural contexts, the editors and contributors report on work taking place in the United States, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.
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Foundational Practices of Online Writing Instruction
Beth Hewett; Kevin DePew; Elif Guler; Robbin Zeff Warner · WAC Clearinghouse · 2015
Foundational Practices of Online Writing Instruction, edited by Beth L. Hewett and Kevin Eric DePew, with associate editors Elif Guler and Robbin Zeff Warner, addresses the questions and decisions that administrators and instructors most need to consider when developing online writing programs and courses. Written by experts in the field (members of the Conference on College Composition and Communication Committee for Effective Practices in OWI and other experts and stakeholders), the contributors to this collection explain the foundations of the recently published (2013) A Position Statement of Principles and Examples Effective Practices for OWI and provide illustrative practical applications. To that end, in every chapter, the authors address issues of inclusive and accessible writing instruction (based upon physical and mental disability, linguistic ability, and socioeconomic challenges) in technology enhanced settings. The five parts of this book attempt to cover the most important issues relevant to principle-centered OWI: (1) An OWI Primer, (2) OWI Pedagogy and Administrative Decisions, (3) Practicing Inclusivity in OWI, (4) Faculty and Student Preparation for OWI, and (5) New Directions in OWI. Working from the belief that most writing courses eventually will be mediated online to various degrees, the editors offer principles and practices that will allow this collection to inform future composition theory and praxis. To this end, the editors hope that the guidance provided in this collection will encourage readers to join a conversation about designing OWI practices, contributing to the scholarship about OWI, and reshaping OWI theory.
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Writing Programs Worldwide: Profiles of Academic Writing in Many Places
Chris Thaiss; Gerd Bräuer; Paula Carlino; Lisa Ganobcsik-Williams · WAC Clearinghouse · 2012
Emerging from the International WAC/WID Mapping Project, this collection of essays is meant to inform decision-making by teachers, program managers, and college/university administrators considering how writing can most appropriately be defined, managed, funded, and taught in the places where they work. Writing Programs Worldwide offers an important global perspective to the growing research literature in the shaping of writing programs. The authors of its program profiles show how innovators at a diverse range of universities on six continents have dealt creatively over many years with day-to-day and long-range issues affecting how students across disciplines and languages grow as communicators and learners. In these profiles, we see teachers and researchers relying on colleagues and on transnational scholarship to build initiatives that are both well suited to their specific environments and can serve as regional and often global models. Their struggles and achievements offer insights to colleagues in similar locales and across borders who seek to establish, enhance, and assess their own work as designers of writing programs. An introduction and three section essays by the editors illuminate themes that inform this collection. Growing networks of initiators and scholars and survey results from the International WAC/WID Mapping Project exemplify the argument of this collection for transnational exchange and collaboration.
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Design Discourse: Composing and Revising Programs in Professional and Technical Writing
David Franke; Alex Reid; Anthony Di Renzo · WAC Clearinghouse · 2010
Design Discourse: Composing and Revising Programs in Professional and Technical Writing, edited byDavid Franke, Alex Reid, andAnthony Di Renzo,addresses the complexities of developing professional and technical writing programs. The essays in the collection offer reflections on efforts to bridge two cultures — what the editors characterize as the "art and science of writing" — often by addressing explicitly the tensions between them. Design Discourse offers insights into the high-stakes decisions made by program designers as they seek to "function at the intersection of the practical and the abstract, the human and the technical."
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Copy(write): Intellectual Property in the Writing Classroom
Martine Rife; Shaun Slattery; Dànielle DeVoss · WAC Clearinghouse · 2011
The editors of Copy(write): Intellectual Property in the Writing Classroom bring together stories, theories, and research that can further inform the ways in which we situate and address intellectual property issues in our writing classrooms. The essays in the collection identify and describe a wide range of pedagogical strategies, consider theories, present research, explore approaches, and offer both cautionary tales and local and contextual successes that can further inform the ways in which we situate and address intellectual property issues in our teaching.
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Critical Expressivism: Theory and Practice in the Composition Classroom
Tara Roeder; Roseanne Gatto · WAC Clearinghouse · 2014
Critical Expressivism is an ambitious attempt to re-appropriate intellectual territory that has more often been charted by its detractors than by its proponents. Indeed, as Peter Elbow observes in his contribution to this volume, "As far as I can tell, the term 'expressivist' was coined and used only by people who wanted a word for people they disapproved of and wanted to discredit." The editors and contributors to this collection invite readers to join them in a new conversation, one informed by "a belief that the term expressivism continues to have a vitally important function in our field."