This article considers the complex ecosystems of Basic Writing programs through the lens of resilience science, particularly William E. Rees' work in the field. The author uses critical discourse analysis to analyze articles published in The Journal of Basic Writing from 1995 to the present and identifies institutional narratives that illustrate…

Presents a holistic method for describing basic writers and their writing to encourage classroom research at two- and four-year colleges and enables comparisons of basic writers across institutions. Offers some preliminary results from the pilot study to illustrate the type of findings this approach yields and highlights the importance of such…