DISSONANCE PAPER

February 14, 2010

My dear readers,

As I have been considering what topic I'd choose for my final conference length paper, I have felt myself at something of a disadvantage. That disadvantage does not come so much from an inadequacy in the quality of our discussions as much as from my own unfamiliarity with most areas of composition theory. Granted, I took English 711 Studies in Language as a master’s student but honestly I am a neophyte when it comes to theory. In other words, even though I have read ahead in our book I do not have a huge theoretical background to draw on when trying to think of what topics might not only be of interest to me but also to others in the field of composition. In any case, here is what I have come up with. I considered several topics before settling on the one which will serve as the basis for my conference length paper.

When I first read the syllabus for this course and realized I would have to write this type of a paper I initially thought of a couple of topics in education that I absolutely hate. These are the Bell curve and standardized testing. Throughout my career as a student and an education undergrad, both of these topics were a source of much frustration and fascination with me. Both as a student and teacher I often felt stymied by both of them. I felt that they both pigeonholed both me and my students. For instance, when I was very young I was given a supposedly unbiased standardized test which labeled me mildly mentally retarded. It took several months for my family to prove that the contents of the test set me up to fail because they involved identifying objects that only a child that could walk normally would encounter regularly. Where would I be if my family had not fought as hard as they did for fair testing? For that reason I initially wanted to look at how student writing differs in grades when they are administered standardized tests and grades in which they are not.

Also, I want to explore if there were any alternative models to the Bell curve for measuring student progress. As far as the Bell curve, I have always considered it a sheer tool of convenience. In other words, if you lump everyone in the middle you don't have to pay much attention to those on either end. I say this having been on both of the extremes of the Bell curve. Along with being in special-education until the end of fourth grade, I was also in GATE (gifted and talented) from the start of sixth grade until graduating from high school. While in special-education I mostly felt neglected. I felt that the teachers didn't care about my intellectual development. In fact, several of them told me so. It was at that time in my life that I began doing the outside research and study that I continue to this day just to try to get the intellectual stimulation I didn't feel like I was getting the classroom.

You might think that once I got into GATE the situation would change but he didn't. Oh, sure, ostensibly I was treated better because I was "gifted" but it really meant no extra intellectual stimulation. The teachers in charge of the program are overworked and under funded. Therefore, nothing much ever came of the experience beyond being able to mention it on University applications. However, I quickly decided the topic could far too easily degenerate into a simple rant against standardized testing. Therefore, I moved on.

Secondly I thought about doing my paper on the idea of healing through writing. That resonated with me particularly because of my recent stint in the hospital and my subsequent desire to try to return to some semblance of normalcy in my life. However, the little research on the topic that I have had time to do shows me, that unless there is something I missed, healing through writing does not necessarily talk about what I want to talk about. The only examples I could find concerned cancer survivors. Now that's all well and good but I am not a cancer survivor, and since the paper is supposed to resonate with me that won't work.

And I considered doing something looking at the general topic of how and why orality has been marginalized in modern American society. For most of my life the physical act of writing has been difficult and painful for me. Oral communication, therefore, has usually been preferable. Unfortunately, I wasn't entirely sure what I could do with the topic other than trying to examine the differences in products produced with oral and written methods. Luckily, however, that basic idea led me to the topic that I feel confident I want to do my paper on.

Let me preface this by saying I have had next to no time to research and therefore my reading list is at this point nonexistent. That being said I would like to look at composition methods. In other words, what if any of the differences in text produced, say, with pen and paper, by typing manually, using talk and type software, and/or speaking into a tape recorder. I have no idea at this point what these differences might be or what they might entail I just know there must be some. Also the fact that one of my favorite poets, Allen Ginsberg, composed many of his later poems into a tape recorder and commented that he thought the method lent "something" to his verse interests me to try to discover what that "something", that I have also felt, might actually involve.

Thank you so much for your time,

James Altman