Journal Entry for Last Section of Michaud Academic Autobiography (9/13)

It occurs to me that there are two sources to consider in framing out the section on my doctoral education…the list below from Beaufort and/or the book A Guide To Composition Pedagogies. The key point is this, Beaufort writes:

Whatever the choice of aims for academic writing courses, teachers and program directors, myself included, will develop the best possible curricula for their particular goals if they are clear with themselves, with colleagues, and with students about what those overarching goals are.

It’s not so much that I wasn’t clear with myself about what my overarching goals were, it’s that I didn’t know that I might choose other goals. That other goals even existed. Be clear about your own goals is important, but must be done within a larger context of understanding what’s possible. So one important revelation was the realization that I might choose a different set of goals, beyond the expressivist/process goal.

A second point that I think I want to make is that when I realized that there were a wider range of goals possible, I began to want to experiment with different goals, particularly the critical theory/cultural studies goal/democratic goal. In large part, this desire was shaped by two factors: 1) the fact that critical theory/cultural studies was “en vogue,” during both periods of my graduate education, and since this vision seemed to be of interest to the field, it became of interest to me, 2) larger political and historial events of the early to mid-2000s (i.e. the Bush administration) prompted me to feel a need to shift my pedagogy in a more politically engaged direction.

(It might be interesting, here, to take a detour that illustrates this point: “Consideration of any proposal for new curricular guidelines requires first examining whether there is agreement with intended learning goals” (2-3)—I think I may have had a semester where I taught BOTH a cultural studies textbook AND Murray’s Craft of Revision)

The third point, which I’ve already begun to develop in a few blog posts, is that ultimately, I have come to the pragmatic goal as the one that drives me and my work. Beaufort has left a genre approach off her list, but I believe it fits nicely with the pragmatic approach or beside it)

(And here it might be interesting to go to another moment when I tried to merge two different philosophies, during that Expository Writing course and struggled to do so)

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Even though courses may be designated as academic writing courses, texts related to academic writing curricula reveal a range of underlying values and assumptions driving the work (Berlin; Fulkerson):

1. The expressivist goal, facilitating self-expression, finding one’s voice, one’s personal truths; 

2. The critical theory/cultural studies goal, facilitating critique of social hierarchies and cultural 
hegemonies; 

3. The democratic, rhetorical goal, facilitating informed participation in civic issues;
4. The pragmatic goal, facilitating successful written expression in school and work contexts; 

5. The aesthetic goal, facilitating an appreciation of the craft of writing and a love of language; 

6. The process goal, facilitating growth in managing writing tasks. 


These goals, interwoven but often unstated in multiple venues within the discourse community of Writing Studies (composition textbooks, scholarly articles and presentations, awards, etc.), are based on values from several sources: personal beliefs, institutional goals, and societal norms. Consideration of any proposal for new curricular guidelines requires first examining whether there is agreement with intended learning goals. (2-3)

An emphasis on one set of values and assumptions or another about the goal(s) of academic writing classes leads to different research agendas and different curricular emphases. (3)

Underlying values and assumptions about academic writing courses influence outcomes. Furthermore, those statements of course goals on our syllabi contain code words for our values and assumptions in teaching writing. Students don’t know how to decode our language, so they are less than fully equipped to understand the particular framework for a writing class and the instructor’s biases.

In the introductions to both of my ethnographies I state the problem I am seeking solutions to, namely, writing curricula that will prepare students with the analytic skills and rhetorical skills to write clear, convincing arguments, as well as give students knowledge of the fundamental concepts necessary to be able to adapt, change, and add writing skills in new contexts for writing. Lack of these skills and knowledge, witnessed in my ten years in corporate communications with a technology company and in the data from both ethnographies, drives my choice of goals for academic writing classes. Although I value self-expression as a humanizing act, become almost ecstatic when encountering creative, artistic written expression, and take seriously the need for informed citizenry equipped with the critical thinking and rhetorical skills to evaluate social needs, hegemonies, and policies, my highest priority in academic courses is the pragmatic goal.

Whatever the choice of aims for academic writing courses, teachers and program directors, myself included, will develop the best possible curricula for their particular goals if they are clear with themselves, with colleagues, and with students about what those overarching goals are. Furthermore, transfer of learning goals need to merge with, interweave with any skills-development or knowledge acquisition goals of a given curriculum. (3)