Table of Contents: Book (3)

Collect a number of quotes like this and use them to set up my Introduction:

Roy Peter Clarke, (here):

A decade later, he returned to UNH as a writing teacher and became one of the founding parents of an approach to composition teaching that emphasized process as well as product.

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• Pearl of Wisdom #1: Many times writers have to start down a road before they can know if this topic or idea must be abandoned for the present. (WTW 13)
• Pearl of Wisdom #2 A piece of writing does not have to be constructed in logical fashion. It can be written in chunks, in the same way that a prefacricated house is manufactured. Then the writing can be assembled into a coherent whole (WTW 49)

Started as a chance to explore the roots of my own educational background... but also provides an opportunity to

a. better understand the writing process movement of which UNH was a key player
b. better understand a key figure in the field of composition, Donald Murray

Problem: Trying to tell two stories, one about Murray and one about how the writing process came to UNH, which involves Murray to a significant degree...

The basic story: The UNH English Department is controlled by literature scholars whose temperament is shaped by what Berlin calls the rhetoric of liberal culture from the 1930s through the early to mid-1960s. Writing and its teaching is largely marginalized within the department, but creative writing thrives under the leadership of Dr. Carroll Towle--both inside and outside the department. A tradition of creative writing is established during the pre- and post-war years. As what I am calling the department's second epoch slides towards a close in the mid-1960s as a result of a number of factors, new faculty members arrive, including and especially creative writers, who begin to instigate changes. The department also professionalizes, creating a doctoral program. Additionally, the department initiates contacts with English teachers in the state and engages in a tentative way with English education and professional development initiatives (laying the groundwork for projects to come). The utmost upholder of the liberal culture tradition steps down as chair in 1966 just as enrollment at the college is peaking and a new General Education program is being initiated. Into this fray steps Donald Murray, who was brought to teach journalism. Murray makes a remarkable transition from journalist/freelancer to writing teacher/coach/reformer. Soon after his arrival, Murray, dissatisfied with the existing infrastructure for writing instruction, begins to partner with other new faculty members (i.e. Carnicelli, Fisher) and they begin to make a name for themselves (regionally and then nationally, in Murray's case) as both the writers who teach writing and the writers who teach writing teachers to teach writing. Murray straddles borders--creative writing, English education, journalism, Freshman English. Then around 1974 Donald Graves arrives and now, for the first time, there is someone at UNH systematically investigating writing, not in the way Murray has (with his own writing process) but with other writers, children, in fact. UNH becomes a place where writing is not just taught but also researched. Graves receives a sizable Ford Foundation grant to study writing and initiates an ambitious research project in Atkinson. The arrival of Graves, who partners with Murray, leads to innumerable developments. English hires its first compositionist (Newkirk) and then its second (Connors). A UNH writing Conference is initiated. Books are written (i.e. Nuts and Bolts). Articles are written. Soon doctoral programs are established (2, in fact). UNH itself becomes a site of research in the form of numerous masters theses and doctoral dissertations. Meanwhile, UNH has developed a national and even international reputation for writing and its teaching, drawing teachers and scholars from all around as a significant site of writing research and pedagogy.

So perhaps I give away the basic outline of the story upfront and then back into some questions:

Who was Donald Murray? What were his key influences as a teacher and scholar of writing?
Who did the institutional culture of UNH in the 1950s and 60s create the conditions for the writing process to emerge at UNH?
What was the nature of Murray's transition from freelancer/journalist to "writer teaching writing"?
How did writing process emerge or develop at UNH during the early years?
How did writing process evolve at UNH during later years?

Part 1: Influences

1. Literacy Autobiography (school failure/struggle)
2. UNH English Department, as student and faculty member (rhetoric of liberal culture snobbery and writing as an art)
3. Freshman English, circa 1963 (a model of how writing should be taught that he sought to push back against)
4. Testimony of Published Writers (Commonplace books)

Part 2: Transitions

1. A Writer Teaches Writing
2. A Writer Teaches Teaching

Writerly Transitions (Murray)
Institutional Transitions (UNH English)

UNH
UNH English
Murray

Consulting

Part 3: Contributions

Reforming schools
Reforming teaching
Reforming writing

The Writing Process Movement Comes to UNH (is this one section or two?) or Transforming an Institutional/Departmental Culture

Writers
Teachers

Begins with teaching institutes in 1950s/60s?

The Things Donald Murray Should Be Remembered For (Reforms)

What gets slotted into these two periods?

Early Period: 1963-1977/78--perhaps this period is focused more on teaching and less on research

Collaborations with schools/teachers
Crises in Freshman English
A Writer Teaches Writing (1968)--collaboration with school teachers
NESDEC Workshops
NDEA Workshop
Bowdoin Workshops
Garrison Workshops
First Grad Courses in Comp Pedagogy
Creation MST program (year?)
Change of English major
Arrival of "the writers"
Failed MFA proposal
Creation of 401 Staff Meetings under Murray as WPA-L
Creation of ENGL 501
Hiring of first compositions (see Carnicelli annual report 1976/77)
MA Theses on Composition (Carnicelli references master's papers on "pedagogical subjects" as a "departure" for the department in his 1977/78 Annual Review (p. 2).
Creation of ENGL 817 (year?)

No one during this period was actually trained from doctoral program in composition. So, perhaps the first era ends with the arrival of newkirk, the first person hired in composition theory? Is that a meaningful end date? Sort of. Hiring of both Graves and Newkirk seem like meaningful moments...

Tom N said this last week and I'm reminded of it this afternoon as I read Tom C's annual eval from 1980/81--the collaboration with schools and school teachers (that year, Tom C embedded in and taught at a public high school--for the entire year). Note that the introduction to Murray's Writer Teaches Writing book talks about his work with teachers at length, as well. Also, Murray writes about the importance of that first semester/year, teaching freshman comp and also the teacher training course...

Later Period: 197?-1986

Graves arrives (1974) (?)
establishment of Ph.D. Reading/Writing
establishment of Ph.D. in comp
UNH conferences
Publications (i.e. Nuts and Bolts, etc.)
Doctoral research into UNH program (Tobin, Sunstein, etc.)
Writing Process Laboratory ("an interdepartmental campus group which meets every two weeks throughout the year. I wrote a paper entitled "Academic Writing and Freshman English" for this group." Carnicelli Annual Review, 1977/78)
Ford Foundation Research

--perhaps this period more seriously establishes research as a concern of the community

Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: State of Composition Instruction at UNH During the Post-War Years
Chapter 3: Enter: A Writer Teaches Writing (Donald Murray)
Chapter 4: The Writing Process Movement at UNH: The Early Years
Chapter 5: The Writing Process Movement at UNH: The Later Years

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As Prepared for SKYPE w/Newkirk:

Origin stories... (challenging)
Murray: A story of ongoing reinvention

Research Questions:

How did the institutional culture of UNH in the 1950s and 60s create the conditions for the writing process at UNH to emerge in the 1960s/70s/80s?

Who was Donald Murray? What was the nature of Murray's transition from freelancer/journalist to "writer teaching writing”? What were his key influences as a teacher and scholar of writing?

How did writing process emerge or develop at UNH during the early and later years?

Possible TOC:

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: State of Composition Instruction at UNH During the Post-War Years

source for ch. 2: see Daly Goggin for help contextualizing, also this blog post 

and this quote:

Ch. 3 (1965-1980): [this chapter] shows that this period was marked by self-conscious attempts of scholars and researchers to foster particular kinds of empirical theoretical, and historical research agendas that would move rhetoric and composition beyond the practical day-to-day considerations of writing instruction to larger, generally more speculative, considerations of literate practices and pedagogies. (xxiii)

Note "liberal culture" reference in Goggin p. 6

Chapter 3: Enter A Writer Teaches Writing (Donald Murray)

Chapter 4: The Writing Process Movement at UNH: The Early Years

Chapter 5: The Writing Process Movement at UNH: The Later Years

Chapter 6: Conclusion

The Basic Story

The basic story: The UNH English Department is controlled by literature scholars whose temperament is shaped by what Berlin calls the rhetoric of liberal culture from the 1930s through the early to mid-1960s. Writing and its teaching is largely marginalized within the department, but creative writing thrives under the leadership of Dr. Carroll Towle--both inside and outside the department. A tradition of creative writing is established during the pre- and post-war years. 

As what I am calling the department's second epoch slides towards a close in the mid-1960s as a result of a number of factors, new faculty members arrive, including and especially creative writers, who begin to instigate changes. The department also professionalizes, creating a doctoral program. Additionally, the department initiates contacts with English teachers in the state and engages in a tentative way with English education and professional development initiatives (laying the groundwork for projects to come). The utmost upholder of the liberal culture tradition steps down as chair in 1966 just as enrollment at the college is peaking and a new General Education program is being initiated. Into this fray steps Donald Murray, who was brought to teach journalism. Murray makes a remarkable transition from journalist/freelancer to writing teacher/coach/reformer. 

Soon after his arrival, Murray, dissatisfied with the existing infrastructure for writing instruction, begins to partner with other new faculty members (i.e. Carnicelli, Fisher) and they begin to make a name for themselves (regionally and then nationally, in Murray's case) as both the writers who teach writing and the writers who teach writing teachers to teach writing. Murray straddles borders--creative writing, English education, journalism, Freshman English. Then around 1974 Donald Graves arrives and now, for the first time, there is someone at UNH systematically investigating writing, not in the way Murray has (with his own writing process) but with other writers, children, in fact. 

UNH becomes a place where writing is not just taught but also researched. Graves receives a sizable Ford Foundation grant to study writing and initiates an ambitious research project in Atkinson. The arrival of Graves, who partners with Murray, leads to innumerable developments. English hires its first compositionist (Newkirk) and then its second (Connors). A UNH writing Conference is initiated. Books are written (i.e. Nuts and Bolts). Articles are written. Soon doctoral programs are established (2, in fact). UNH itself becomes a site of research in the form of numerous masters theses and doctoral dissertations. Meanwhile, UNH has developed a national and even international reputation for writing and its teaching, drawing teachers and scholars from all around as a significant site of writing research and pedagogy.

Challenge: 

Trying to tell two stories, one about Murray and one about how the writing process came to UNH, which involves Murray to a significant degree…

What kind of place was the UNH English Department at the time when Murray joined it as a professor in 1963?

When and why did Donald Murray join the UNH English Department?