The New Work of Composing

Edited by Debra Journet, Cheryl E. Ball, & Ryan Trauman

Book overview. This edited collection explores theoretical and practical questions about multimodal, digital production through lenses of rhetoric/composition, digital writing studies, English studies, and the humanities.
- Computers and Composition Digital Press
- Utah State University Press
Not Your Mother's Argument

Morgan Gresham and Roxanne Kirkwood Aftanas

Abstract. This chapter explores how identity and expectations change audience responses to our work as scholars. Using our own compositions as a point of departure, we argue that authors cannot use the master's tools of traditional argument to look at the new work of composition scholarship. As our discipline transitions to new compositions, we see the increasing expectation of a "second shift" of work that requires remediation into traditional argument if our work is to be viable. We push against this expectation, using our digital compositions to create feminist identities and scholarship.

APA Citation: Gresham, Morgan, & Aftanas, Roxanne Kirkwood. (2012). Not your mother's argument. In Debra Journet, Cheryl E. Ball, & Ryan Trauman (Eds.), The new work of composing. Computers and Composition Digital Press/Utah State University Press. http://ccdigitalpress.org/nwc/chapters/gresham-aftanas/
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Value Collaboration

The Double Bind

or: How much does that sparkle count?

Those of us who teach at trailing edge institutions face a double bind when it comes to digital scholarship. We know that our field trends toward the bleeding edge; we are bleeding edge at heart. The bleeding edge is where the technology is still fun, a site of play, the place where we know that we can make a contribution. But because we have limited access and time, we often cannot afford to follow a technology as it advances. If we try to maintain the scholarship’s edge, we are behind on the other theories. If we try to go through all the steps to try to get it perfect, we’re going to become further and further behind the field. In essence, we have to work that much harder for the same initial payoff that those with technology resources can do on the first trial run. Can we—should we—level the playing field?

We need to create and maintain a space (spaces) that allow for us trailing edge folk to say, to hell with it, I am gong to make my movie because that’s the best rhetorical context I’ve got, and if it’s not as sparkling as the folks who have the technological support, so be it, but it is still the right way and the right time and the right space to create this text.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

What does feminist composing in a digital world value?

The New Work of Composing

Edited by Debra Journet, Cheryl E. Ball, & Ryan Trauman

Not Your Mother's Argument

Morgan Gresham and Roxanne Kirkwood Aftanas

Metadata