In this article, the author asserts that whether we write creatively or academically (or both) it takes time to understand the reasons why we "want" to write, and the more we write, the more we fully begin to appreciate why we have to write in the ?rst place. From an early age, nearly every day, Rachel Hains-Wesson actively participated in…

Objects are rich sources of inquiry; they invite individuals to observe closely, pose questions, forge connections, and anchor ideas in the concrete. By examining a son's craft project, a family photograph, and an image of tectonic plates, the authors demonstrate how objects can elicit rhetorical invention. While this venture started as a writing…

In this article it is argued that the development of young people's skills in using spoken language should be given more time and attention in the school curriculum. The author discusses the importance of the effective use of spoken language in educational and work settings, considers what research has told us about the factors that make group…

A recent book that appeared a few years ago, "How Early America Sounded" by historian Richard Cullen Rath, connects well with much of the new, exciting, interdisciplinary and rhetorical research that the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) have supported, promoted, and…

Academic fame is an even stranger goddess than her nonacademic counterpart. In this article, the author contends that academic fame is not easily lost, compared with other kinds of fame. In the world of films or novels, one's fame is fleeting--one is often only as good as his last production. Films that splashed across marquees in the summer are…

Most every writing teacher can relate to the curse of reading yet another incoherent essay, the contents of which resemble an unorganized junk drawer of thoughts. Such essays cry out for a main idea. The remedy is a thesis, and teachers rightly take pains to help students discover this. Yet in spite of this, writing teachers ought to bear in mind…

Central to the future of rhetoric and composition (or writing studies or whatever label we use) is the service mission of composition: to teach students to write. But that term "service" has not and will not serve us well. This essay examines the limitations and dangers of a service mission and explores a different model, that of a franchise, a…

This essay examines women's commencement addresses presented from 1910 to 1915 at Vassar College. These addresses are significant because they reveal the students' rhetorical education and the "available means" upon which these women drew in developing a public voice. By prompting reflection and the potential for change, the commencement…

This article presents a written version of the address the author gave at the Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC) meeting in San Francisco on March 12, 2009. In this address, the author talks about the wonder of writing and discusses how writing has been considered sacred. Reading and writing are associated with inwardness…

M. Karen Powers and Catherine Chaput's ""Anti-American Studies" in the Deep South: Dissenting Rhetorics, the Practice of Democracy, and Academic Freedom in Wartime Universities" begins a much needed discussion about the current and ongoing assaults against academic freedom in American universities, which have not received…

This essay provides a brief account of selected performances of Australian refugee policy in the domains of politics and theatre. In the domain of politics, it considers rhetorical performances by government ministers and military personnel in relation to the so-called "children overboard" scandal of 2001, and the scandal's parliamentary…

In this article, the author argues that Emerson repudiated the formalism of nineteenth century belletristic, mechanistic, reason-centered, American rhetoric influenced by Hugh Blair. Instead Emerson promoted a rhetoric with imagination at its center, which calls for civic duty. (Contains 33 notes.)

In this article, I trace appropriations of the Bengali bandit Devi Chaudhurani as she is transfigured within the Indian nationalist novel "Devi Chaudhurani" and the contemporary feminist street play "Meye Dile Sajiye" or "Giving Away the Girl." These representations are characterized by an eclecticism and a hybridity…

High school teacher Melissa Troise challenges students to recognize the relationships that exist between literary theories, such as Marxism, feminism, and postcolonialism, and urges students to expand their contexts for reading texts by accessing and combining theories. Troise believes theory provides students with the potential to better…

The article explores writing-centered pedagogies that deepen student learning in literature survey courses. More broadly, the article also responds to Richard Fulkerson and Maureen Daly Goggin, who challenge professors of English studies to find disciplinary unity within the diverse epistemologies of rhetoric. (Contains 5 notes.)