Number 10: for the week of March 25, 2010

My dear readers,

Generally speaking, the theme of this week's articles is computers in education. More specifically, however, they deal with what difference can computers make in a classroom and who gets to decide. I have enjoyed most of the articles we have read this semester. That being said, this week's offerings are, by and large, some of my favorites. That is because unlike some of the subjects we have talked about, like feminist theory, computers in education is a subject I deal with every day. Just for reference this entry which you are reading was constructed from the very start on a computer using software which transcribes my voice directly into Microsoft Word or any other similar program I choose.
Mind you, in that regard I am one of the lucky ones as I shall explain.
"On divides and interfaces" mentions, among other things, statistics of which I was completely unaware. I had not realized that barely one out of five persons with a disability had regular access to computers and the Internet of the kind which I enjoy.

Mind you, not that I haven't experienced that. My hometown, Yerington Nevada, was not only stuck out in the middle of godforsaken nowhere but was also, on the whole, exceedingly poor, and constantly strapped for cash even in the best of times. I don't know what it was like technology wise for those who graduated as part of the class of ‘98 here in the Las Vegas area, but I imagine they had it better than we did. Most of our teachers still did their attendance on carbon paper. That was also how I got any class notes. Virtually everything was done with paper and pencil. That meant I had to stay after school many more days than the average person just simply to get my schoolwork done. It got to the point where my teachers finally agreed to start giving me oral exams. (Thank God for that).

You could count on one hand the number of computers in our school outside of either the administrative offices (which had like two in each) or our one single computer classroom (which had 14 or 15, no more than about eight of which ever worked at any one time). I still remember how to run a computer through MS-DOS (how pitiful is that?) Oh, and if you're wondering why I didn't just use my computer at home it's because I didn't own one. We could not afford one and could not convince any state agency to help us pay for one at the time. I wrote all my papers throughout junior high and high school on a half worn out electric typewriter. Sometimes I wonder how I ever made it this far.

Of course, it is not only the disabled who often lack access to necessary technology but any minority or underprivileged group. Here we see a connection to Rose's ideas about society labeling those who don't fit the mainstream ideal as deficient. Nearly every one of my high school classmates was told upon graduation about just how much they would have to struggle to succeed in college because of what Yerington could not afford to provide for them. The Internet can be a wonderful vehicle for sharing and disseminating ideas but not if you never encounter it. That's the point of the article fewer people encounter this supposedly universal communication technology than the average person might believe.

I like the idea in Harris' article of socially constructed meaning and that each person must reach out to other communicators, by means, in this case, of computers and the Internet. The mentioning of the social constructionist thought is appropriate because if anything in life is constructed in a vacuum that something is not constructed online. Anyone roaming through cyberspace, could conceivably read this entry I am composing right now and comment on it. That hypothetical comment could lead me to post something else, and so on and so on and on. That's where scaffolding comes in I think one thing builds off of another. No, in this case were not talking about specific skills, but, still, ideas building off one another are just as important.

The notion of building and shaping ideas also comes through in McGee's article about Microsoft Word as a sort of surrogate English teacher. I must admit I see it everyday in almost everything I write. If I accidentally use the wrong word or leave a sentence fragment it lets me know. Mind you, I sometimes wonder who programmed the damn thing because some of the grammatical suggestions it makes just blow my mind. For instance, almost every time I put down "are you okay with this?" Microsoft Word wants to change "are" to "is". I guess I can see where something like spell or grammar check might make the traditional English teacher feel threatened, however if students are able to pick up even a little basic grammar from something like that isn't that a good thing? Actually, since I've started using voice transcription software I've realized I don't have to worry much about my spelling anymore. This is because the program either gets the word right and spells it correctly or just simply puts down the wrong word entirely and then I correct it by selecting the proper word. I must admit I liked that feature from the first moment I saw it. I've never been a very good speller.

Mind you I will admit I have learned how to spell certain words simply by seeing them come up on the screen over and over and over again. While I enjoyed Mueller's article, I have to admit I don't really get the difference between backchannel and underlife. I mean I get the point about things like instant messaging potentially being a distraction and that they fit into backchannel, if I'm reading the article correctly, but I don't get what all the extra fuss is about. As the article points out before computerized instant messaging people just passed notes or whispered to each other. Hell that's what we used to do. Whether hand written or electronic it simply up to the teacher to try to set a tone in his or her classroom where such things are minimized even if they can't be stopped.

I have often seen firsthand what Sullivan talks about in "Taking Control of the Page" when she says that not all teachers of writing have embraced the computer in a way that perhaps would be more beneficial to them. I agree with the explanation she gives. As I think about it, I'm not sure why you wouldn't embrace the computer and related technologies to teach writing (of course I say that, knowing that I have to embrace such technology in order to teach writing whether I want to do so or not). Maybe some people just aren't comfortable teaching with a tool that was not really around when they were beginning their education. In other words, maybe they think "well I did fine without the computer, why can't they?" Maybe some people just love the idea of writing all over papers in red pen or pencil. I have even heard of professors who will not use computers in their classrooms because they say the typing is too loud. To that, I say either invest in the kind of voice recognition software I use or wear earmuffs. I had a student asked me last semester, why it was that more professors would not accept papers submitted over with campus but instead continued to insist on having students print out several copies of every final draft. I didn't know what to tell her then and I still don't now. The only thing I can think of is maybe those teachers are so used to the old Harvard model and current traditional rhetoric, in other words, the old way of doing things whatever form it takes that they just can't break away.
Thank you so much for your time,

James Altman

Dr. Jablonski,

Here is my paper proposal, such as it is.

Title: Taming the dragon: effective use of Dragon NaturallySpeaking speech
recognition software.

Feng and Sears in their informative article “interaction techniques for users
with spinal cord injuries: a speech-based solution, make what I take to be
eye-opening claims about the voice recognition software Dragon
NaturallySpeaking. They claim seven out of every eight initial users eventually
abandon the program in short order, due to slow rate of production (17 to 20
words per minute, as opposed to 30 words per minute typing by hand, or 120 to
150 words per minute in casual conversation. Moreover, they claim that upwards
of 75% of an individual user's time is spent simply in correcting recognition
errors. Moreover, other issues such as the need for privacy during dictation
can also lead to abandonment the program by inexperienced users according to
Wobbrock and Myers.

I do not deny any of this. Moreover, I freely admit I am an experienced user of
Dragon NaturallySpeaking software having used five of its ten versions so far.
Voice recognition software is not a miracle worker. However, it is my intention
to show that with the proper expectations, Dragon NaturallySpeaking can be a
boon to those who are willing to employ it. I intend to show through scholarly
research and my own experience what I believe are the proper techniques for
employing Dragon NaturallySpeaking software most effectively including methods
of training the device including employing training texts which users are
encouraged to read into dragon when beginning using the program but many do not
leading to needlessly poor speech recognition. Moreover speaking in a
recognizable tone, that is to say learning when to employ pitfalls the device
will help to avoid speech recognition errors which often frustrate beginning
users especially those who are used to typing by hand.

I do not intend to be exclusionary in this piece. Far from it, I intend to show
through research and my own experiences how Dragon NaturallySpeaking software
can be used as a tool of universal access not only for the physically disabled
like myself but for everyone with a passion for writing. I believe from this
paper I will be able to show many able-bodied persons who might never think of
using voice recognition software the benefits of attempting it in their daily
lives.

Therefore, my audience is not simply physically disabled students like myself
but anyone involved in English composition or the other humanities in which
frequent writing is a necessity. In particular I believe special education
teachers will find my work most useful as they try to integrate new
technologies into their classrooms in order to help students expressed
themselves who might otherwise be unable to do so. Moreover, I believe the
teachers of composition at the 101 and 102 level will also find my analysis
useful as they increasingly find themselves both dealing with a diverse student
population and with less time in which to grade papers and provide feedback to
students. I believe voice recognition software like Dragon NaturallySpeaking
can be a great assistance in all these areas. I believe when properly
acclimated to voice recognition software anyone who loves to do for his
required to do a great deal of writing will eventually find it a great aid in
what they are doing.

I am giving you this now because I do not know if I will be in class this
Thursday. I have begun experiencing the same types of headaches that led to my
hospitalization at the beginning of the semester, only they are worse than
before. I do not know for certain if I will wind up having to have surgery
again but it is looking more and more likely. It is all I can do to concentrate
long enough to type out this proposal and e-mail to you. I intend to post my
blog entry for this week right now before I forget. Again, here is my proposal,
hopefully it is good enough, because right now I do not have the strength to
produce another. With any luck I will be healthy enough to see you at our first
class meeting after spring break.

Thank you for your time,

James Altman

Number 9: for the week of March 18, 2010

My dear readers,

The main theme I see running through this week’s readings is the question of what is literacy? What does it involve? Who has it? How do we measure who has it? Most importantly, who gets to make that determination?

By its very title "sponsors of literacy" gives a name to the persons and/or entities who exert the most power over what literacy has meant or will mean. I deeply enjoyed Brandt’s historical overview of the printing and publishing process. She is right when she says that by the arrival of mechanized steam powered printing you had an entire class of society which had previously had pretty much unfettered access to the composition and dissemination of knowledge who were now cut off. It seems to me, that it was not just the printer’s apprentices she refers to that suffered in the evolution of the process. The eventual consolidation of ever larger newspapers not to mention conglomerates, like Random House and Turner Broadcasting, means that an ever smaller percentage of the population is deciding what the rest of us see and think about. Though it doesn't have to do with big media I do like Brandt's example of parents demanding reading and math instruction be taught in some Sunday schools along with religious and moral training. That is the point, when you are an entity, however large, that is providing resources by which others can become literate you are able to set the terms of what must be done in order to acquire said literacy.

"The public intellectual servant" picks up on this idea. The article believes that intellectuals must turn their eyes outside of the safety of academia and try to focus their research on the problems of the real world. When the article talks about intellectuals serving underprivileged neighborhoods, I wonder if the late Hal Rothman would qualify? I don't know much about the man but he was certainly an intellectual whom I saw on television and giving lectures many times before he died. The article is correct that someone underprivileged in any way normally is not thought about very much in academia. If they are thought of it all, they are usually thought of as deficient. When Mike Rose talks about the language of exclusion he makes the same kind of point, namely, if you don't fit in a nice little window that intellectuals can easily wrap their minds around then you don't count.

"Inventing the University" brings up the same type of idea in its assertions that students must learn to fit in. In other words to be middle-class intellectuals throughout the writing they do at the university level in order to succeed. "A stranger in strange lands" talks about the same idea. This is particularly true when the student who is the subject of the case study talks about having to figure out what the teacher wants and likes and the difficulty that is often inherent in trying to do so. Unfortunately, students feel like they have to figure out what the teacher likes or believes about a subject and then spoon feed it back to them.

That's mostly true I have to admit. One of the things my mother first told me when I was in perhaps the second or third grade has stuck with me ever since. It was on a day when the teacher and I disagreed about a particular subject (I don't recall what it was) and I ended up receiving a lower grade presumably because the teacher favored her own opinion. When I brought home that bad test paper my mother told me (as she has periodically throughout my life ever since whenever a similar situation has come up) “James, if the teachers say ‘the sky is red’, and make clear to you that the only answer they will accept to the question ‘what color is the sky?’ is ‘red’, and you want a good grade, you had damn well better say ‘the sky is red’ even if you have piles of evidence to the contrary.” I have never forgotten that and it has helped me survive more courses than I care to remember. All the same in my own teaching I have tried to make clear to my students that they do not need to please me in order to get a good grade. This is because I know how stomach churning it was in many cases for me to have to write to please teachers and professors with whom I profoundly disagreed. But, I did what I had to do to fit in.

Of course, not every means of fitting into the university actually involves writing something down. As Heath points out in her article many times people assent orally to information they haven't actually read themselves but which instead has been read to them. When one of my students volunteers to read a short poem or passage from a novel to the rest of the class as part of our daily writing activities can I guarantee that every student either is reading along or has previously read what they are hearing? No I cannot I have to judge by their ascension, in this case, their participation, or lack thereof, in the discussion directly following the oral presentation. Many times in life we can gain information that is written down somewhere in some form by hearing someone else who has read it talk about it. Status reports or summaries presented to a group or an important part of many professions. (I'm including conference type presentations as well).

Hull’s article kind of takes us back to discussions we've had in previous weeks about the idea that students can't write or that they lack literacy. Well, as we discussed there are different kinds and levels of literacy and writing ability. A person who flourishes in one arena or type of class, say mathematics, may struggle in English. Is that person inherently stupid? Some apparently would say yes but I say no. I'm a firm believer in the idea of multiple intelligences. Mind you, mine is mostly verbal. That's why I chose the line of work I did, but not everyone is that way. Mind you, when teachers or employers say there is a lack of literacy what they are really saying is that many of the people they are encountering had not been trained to write or think in the fashion that they particularly privilege. That may give you an example. My late grandfather was to my knowledge entirely illiterate. I mean the man could not read. But he could feed an army with the knowledge about farming and fishing and hunting he had in only his little finger. He raised four healthy children, one of whom is my mother, yet by the standards of our educational system he was a complete failure. I can't put my finger on it but there's something about that that bothers me.

Moreover, I also enjoyed the little interview that begins Hull's article where the two girls discuss whether literacy is needed in order to be a bank teller. They're very disagreement comes from the fact they don't really know how to define literacy to begin with. My second semester teaching English 101 I had a group of about three or four students who from the very first day of class told me flat out that they did not believe writing skill was necessary for any major except English. When I challenged them to show me one career which did not require the ability to write and communicate effectively, every one of them swore to me that they would eventually show me just how wrong I was. Not one of the aforementioned students made it through my class with a passing grade. This is not because of any disdain for them on my part. Rather it comes from the fact they did not turn in any of the required papers because they chose instead to use their energy in trying to research various careers in order to try to find even one where effective writing skills were not important. I wish I were making that up but I'm not.

Thank you so much for your time,

James Altman

My dear readers,

Well, here is what I have of my bibliography so far. I wasn't sure if we were supposed to include articles out of our textbook yet so I didn't. However, I will definitely use a few in my conference paper. In any case, enjoy.

ENG 701 ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Johnston, Linda, Lawrence A. Beard, and Laura Bowden Carpenter Assistive technology: Access for all Students. Upper Saddle River, NJ. : Pearson/Merrill Prentice Hall, 2007.

This book provides an excellent overview of the different types of assistive technologies available at the time of its publication. Included are descriptions and relative evaluations of not only speech recognition technologies, but also adaptive computer equipment such as different types of keyboards and mouses. These are most likely the type of technologies I will focus on in my paper because they are the sorts of technology I use most frequently myself. That is not to say that technologies for those with visual and hearing impairments are not discussed at great length in this volume. I found reading the sections quite illuminating they are just simply less relevant to what I'm doing.

2. Scherer, Marcia J. Connecting to Learn: Educational and Assistive Technology for People with Disabilities. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2004.

This volume also provides an overview of assistive technologies of various types. However, it also takes the extra step of addressing at least in part the reasons certain assistive technologies are necessary in some situations and not others. Moreover, there is a brief discussion (too brief in my estimation) of what it took to draw attention to the need for assistive technology both inside of and outside of the classroom. I think this will provide a good basis.

3. Wilson, James C. and Lewiecki-Wilson, Cynthia. “Constructing a Third Space: Disability Studies, the Teaching of English, and Institutional Transformation” in Disability studies: Enabling the humanities. Ed. Snyder, Sharon L.; Brenda Jo Brueggemann and Rosemarie Garland Thomson,; New York: Modern Language Association of America 2002.

In conjunction with the entry directly following in this bibliography, this article appears to focus most of its energy on the struggle to include physically disabled students more fully in humanities classrooms. I have not yet had a chance to fully go through this piece but its ideas that including the disabled necessitates a fundamental change not only in education but in all areas of life is very powerful for me. I am eager to see exactly what transformations are referred to. If they refer to policy (as I think they do) or the different applications of various assistive technologies (which what I have read also indicates) then it will help me to make clear that there is not one single “super-technology” that will suffice for everyone.

4. Brueggemann , Brenda Jo. “An Enabling Pedagogy” in Disability studies: Enabling the humanities. Ed. Snyder, Sharon L.; Brenda Jo Brueggemann and Rosemarie Garland Thomson,; New York: Modern Language Association of America 2002.

Like the previous entry in this bibliography this essay lays out some of the pitfalls which have unfortunately come along with trying to make the classroom more inclusive. It also gives good analysis and critique of many assistive technologies and the ways that they are currently implemented. This includes a rather scathing review of the very voice recognition software I am using to construct this very bibliography. If nothing else this essay will help me to demonstrate a fact I sometimes forget, namely, that assistive technology is not perfect and that it is not a cure-all.

5. Berninger, Virginia W. and Winn, William D. “Implications of Advancements in Brain Research and Technology for Writing Development, Writing Instruction, and Educational Evolution” in Handbook of writing research Ed. MacArthur, Charles A.; Steve Graham; Jill Fitzgerald. New York: Guilford Press, 2008.

this article discusses continual advances in research as to how the brain works normally, and also how it might be expected to work with varying degrees of different disabilities. This includes my own condition, cerebral palsy and hydrocephalus. Just as importantly, if the idea that due to the differing degrees of brain function between disabilities the use of speech recognition software may yield wildly different results. Thus, speech recognition software is not necessarily the best for everyone. As such, the article details not only how research is continuing to try to make speech recognition software more usable for different types of disabilities, but also alternatives such as word prediction software, and motion sensitive writing programs. These will allow me not only to interweave my own experience with what I have read it again to show that one type of assistive technology is not necessarily perfect for everyone.

6. MacArthur, Charles A. “The effects of new technologies on writing and writing processes” in Handbook of writing research Ed. MacArthur, Charles A.; Steve Graham; Jill Fitzgerald. New York: Guilford Press, 2008.

This article’s themes are sort of what I had in mind when I wrote my dissonance paper and talked about Allen Ginsberg using his tape recorder. It talks about how parts of or the whole of the composition process can be fundamentally altered based upon the composition media employed by the writer. It talks about how the relative speed and ease of composing on a computer or another media beyond paper and pencil has opened up writing beyond the traditional academic and literary fields. It will help me I believe to show the fundamental differences I perceive in the writing process when composing by voice as opposed to by hand.

7. Quinlan, Thomas. “Speech Recognition Technology and Students with Writing Difficulties: Improving Fluency” Journal of Educational Psychology 96.2 2004.

As the title implies this article deals with the use of speech recognition technology by and with writers, disabled and otherwise, who might otherwise be reluctant to write. It discusses particularly how many struggling writers and given access to this type of technology are able to write much more freely and coherently because they perceive less of a disconnect between the thoughts in their heads and their words on the page. In other words, by not having to take the intermediate step of physically writing anything down and all which that involves, these writers are more fully able to concentrate on delivering their thoughts in a more well constructed manner. Some of the implications of this article concerning relative physical ease and the ability to focus more fully on the thoughts needed to construct interesting prose I have thought about for many years. It will be nice to interweave my own experience using this type of technology with the experimental type experiences of someone looking at it from a more objective point of view.

8. McNaughton, David. “'You Talk, it Types?'--Not Quite: Speech Recognition Technology for Post-secondary Students with Disabilities” Journal of Post-Secondary Education and Disability 13.2 1998.

This article centers around what I would have to say is the one Achilles' heel of the sort of speech recognition technology I use. That is, the fact that its recognition is not always accurate. That certain level of inaccuracy the article contends has stopped this type of technology from thus far been more widely adopted in education and elsewhere. With this I agree, but I believe that once I have had time to fully combine the article's criticisms of this type of software with my other research and personal experience I can still show that for many students like myself speech recognition software is a tool with many more advantages than disadvantages.

Thank you so much for your time,

James Altman

Number 8: for the week of March 11, 2010

My dear readers,

The overall theme I see in this week's articles is the idea of inclusion. Namely, what does it involve, and how should it be done? Moreover, what would be the result if and when it is done? This is a type of subject that resonates with me deeply given my physical condition and the sorts of adaptations to the composition process and the thinking that goes with it that I have had to make as a result. In a nutshell, this week's articles remind us that the world is changing no longer are the literary or composition assumptions of dead white males sufficient for everyone. Mind you, while traditional Anglo-American culture is not as world dominating as it used to be, its perceived dominance can lend a sense of marginality to other voices in literary and composition studies.

Flynn makes the assertion in "Composing As a Woman" that composition studies has been marginalized because those who teach it are marginalized both socially and politically. I mostly agree with this, I would simply caution her if I could, that it is not only women who teach composition or literature. Regardless, I believe that the marginality of composition studies comes as much from a lack of understanding of its importance as from the gender demographics of its dedicated instructors. After all, as we have read over and over again there is still a strong segment in English that believes writing is a finite skill that can be ultimately mastered very early on in a person's academic career and therefore should be flawless by the time a student reaches college. Well, anyone who has taught English 101 or 102 knows that this is not the case. I admit, the bulk of comments I have to put on student papers do not have to do with content but instead with mechanical issues. What can I do? I can't just ignore such mistakes, or else the students may never stop making them, and that isn't a good thing either.

I am all in favor of including women writers in discussions of composition and literature in the way described in "Feminism in Composition". When I introduce my students to various literary styles and movements through their 10 minute writings I do my best to have a good balance of male and female writers. The trouble with it is, partially owing to the fact that I am a male when I introduce my students to a female writer, many of my students, both male and female, seem to cop an attitude that I am only introducing said female writer for the sake of "political correctness". I assure you this is not the case, but I sometimes have a hell of a time convincing them of that. Is it just that they are so conditioned to accept male writers as legitimate and female writers as marginal?

Royster's article touches on the same idea of marginality when she describes having to sit through diatribes about her own experience by people who know little about her. You might think as a white male of Southern lineage that I would have no experience with this. However, as a physically disabled student I have had to deal with this many times throughout my life. Particularly, in junior high and high school my teachers often made assumptions about what they thought I could and couldn't do based on their own estimations of disabled people they had previously known but who had not had the same or even a similar disability to my own. Yet because they were the authority figures I had to, at least in the beginning, conform to their expectations and only gradually be able to show them what I could actually do. Frustratingly, coming to college did not end this scenario. In college though at least I had the option of dropping a course if the professor seemed unwilling to accommodate me physically.

I love how "on the rhetoric and precedents of racism gives the example of the Spanish missionaries talking to the Incan wise men, and how when the natives did not automatically understand and agree with what the Spaniards were saying the Spaniards became angry, attacked, and robbed them. In an academic sense, isn't that what happens every time a teacher runs across a student who just can't or won't get with the program? Most professors, when faced with a student who just cannot manage to grasp the ideas behind standard English will first try to pawn the student off on anybody they can, and then invariably when that doesn't work will become frustrated with the student and probably issue a bad grade. I can say this, knowing that I have done it myself.

It's like the second teacher comment in the Zamel article where the professor says that the ESL students he has encountered are not adequately prepared to do the work he asks of them. Well no, if you focus only on surface correctness, standards of which can vary from language to language and even dialect to dialect then maybe they aren't prepared, but is that all there is? How are these same students performing other aspects of the class? Like it talks about in "the Place the world Englishes" English is now a truly multi-national language. England America Canada and Australia no longer necessarily are the standard bearers of English. The Caribbean and other parts of the former British Empire have begun to take over that role.
Despite this, standard English composition as almost wholeheartedly refused to adapt to any other dialect than that of upper-class white bred Anglo America. Please understand, as I say this I am fully aware that I am a white male of European American ancestry but the fact remains high, and those like me are no longer a majority. Although I found the article by Silva the least comprehensible of those we dealt with this week I do think it made some important points. This is especially true when he talked about the idea that second language students appeared to expel more of their energy on trying to achieve surface correctness. Well, of course, if you're trying to fit into a culture that is not your own because you think it would benefit you to do so then you are going to try to emulate those whose position you desire as much as possible.

It hasn't necessarily to do with composition, but the entire time I was growing up, my family, particularly my mother, insisted I appear as "normal" as I possibly could in every aspect of my life. That included entering mainstream classes several years before I thought I was ready, and after a while even refusing to associate with many of my former special-education classmates. Why did I do this? Because that's what "normal" people were supposed to do, I thought. It's funny to think back on it now, but in the late 1980s and early 1990s, I considered it the greatest compliment in the world for someone to say to me "you don't act disabled". I would smile ear to ear every time someone said that. It was not until years later that I realized how ridiculous that was. Of course I act disabled, because I am disabled. The people giving me that "complement" were the ones who didn't act disabled because they weren't. I can only imagine that ESL students and other minorities go through the same types of situations everyday.

Thank you so much for your time,

James Altman

Number 7: for the week of March 4, 2010

My dear readers,

The main idea I encounter in this week's readings is the idea of audience. What is an audience in terms of writing? How should it be addressed? What are the consequences of addressing it in certain ways and not in others? So I found each of the articles for this week interesting and informative, I also found them contradictory and on first reading confusing. Maybe that is emblematic of the idea of audience in thought concerning composition studies of late.
I agree with Lunsford that the "audience response model" put forth by Mitchell and Taylor is a good try but doesn't cover everything. I could see her point that they tried to play up the strength of their argument while ignoring the weaknesses. Though the way the article was written it was difficult for me to tell which was which. Other that is in the idea that there is not nearly as much consensus about what features constitute "good writing" as many teachers of composition might think. Such disagreement can lead to the fixation on surface correctness we have read about previously in the course.

I have to agree with the idea behind "The Writer's Audience Is Always a Fiction". That is, that even though you have to have something or someone on which to focus your writing purpose you're always just guessing. I love the reference to Henry James since I do believe that in most of his fiction he had in mind a reader who was not me. When we say writers write for an audience what we really mean I think is that they have a focus group in mind. In other words there are people they specifically want to reach, and as long as they reach them anyone else they also impact is just a bonus. I would be willing to bet (and not just because I do it myself in my own writing) that most writers imagine their ideal audience is composed of people very much like themselves. I'm reminded of the ancient Egyptians, who, when they created their ancient hieroglyphics had in mind a future audience that they thought would be able to easily understand them. The fact that it took the Rosetta Stone for us to make any headway in the department shows that imagining one's audience is an inexact science.

Moreover so are the often conflicting contradictory ideas of collaboration and originality. On the one hand in the opening of the article by Porter we see an offshoot of collaboration, a sort of intertextuality with the monk gathering up the remnants of previously larger texts. There is no real indication whether he has any idea who wrote the pieces he is scooping up. Now, by modern standards, if he did any kind of compiling without citing the author (and in some cases even that isn't enough) then he is a plagiarist. But, keep in mind that era of history would not have seen him that way. The whole idea of originality as we know it today mostly comes out of Romanticism. Up until just a couple of hundred years ago, it was expected that a writer will work very closely with established models and would show his or her skill by adapting those models to the conditions of the time. Think about it, if modern standards of plagiarism had existed throughout history many of the greatest writers and thinkers would probably have been kicked out of school. I'm thinking of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Thomas Jefferson, and William Shakespeare among many others. None of them did what they did exclusively by themselves they all borrowed from and learned from what came before them. Now, don't misunderstand me if I write something that becomes famous I want to receive the credit. However, I have always believed that good thought will breed more good thought. That is the point of so many of these articles we have encountered. Nothing happens in a vacuum. Therefore, why then do we expect our students to produce writing in a vacuum (that is, writing that is supposedly entirely original) when we know such things do not really happening in other areas of life? The article by Johnson essentially says that the only place we still seem to think in terms of the lone genius is in student writing when searching for plagiarism. That strikes me as strange.
Concerning the article "collaborative learning and the conversation of mankind", I can identify with the idea stated on page 417 that many students refused tutoring help when it was offered. I actually lived the situation though not in literature. I initially refused to take advantage of tutoring services in math 120. This is even though I knew I needed the help. I am not stupid. So why would I do this? Simply because I saw having to ask for help as a sign of weakness, of academic unworthiness. Moreover, I remembered the trouble I had had trying to graduate from high school after having been in special education as a child. I did not want to be tutored and then have someone, somewhere along the line trying to withhold my bachelor’s degree simply because I had "broken down" and gotten tutoring.

The fear I've just described may sound stupid but please remember when the situation arose where I needed to ring as a freshman the scenario was still very real in my mind. This is especially true since at the time I had no idea how UNLV's administrative procedures work at all. More generally speaking I find that many students are reluctant to work together even in peer review until they know precisely how and to whom credit will be distributed. That is how nervous many of them are that something they may share with someone else might be called academic misconduct.

Thank you so much for your time,

James Altman