I hate to take the Midwestern and mom-like position of "You're both right!" However...
Selfe's argument is well-thought out and compelling. In Eng. 501, we just read about some of the English department's history in the university, and as a Communication Studies major, it saddens me that most of my classmates have never had the joy (and terror and apprehension) of taking a class in public address. I found that the best speeches I gave started extemporaneously, with me just talking to myself, leaving the writing process until dead-last. While my background in learning how to formulate a written argument played a role, the students who struggled the most in public speaking are those who don't adapt their content to their presentation's form. It's true that aurality has taken a backseat to writing, and students (including us current grad students) may be handicapped for that. Learning about as many different modes of communication as possible would serve to enrich our students' lives - along with giving them tangible, real-world composing skills that all sorts of companies would love to have.
However, Hesse also makes a good point. What Selfe is calling for is a drastic re-thinking of composition. While this new definition might fly within English departments and Rhetoric and Composition, it would be necessary to sell this idea to not only other departments, but the administration and students as well. It certainly runs the risk of being seen as taking away from the "serious" work of writing. Another point on which I agree with Hesse is his questioning of just how much composing (not just writing, but creating videos, web pages, sound clips, etc.) students are actually doing outside the classroom. Personally, and before this class, I had a Twitter, Blogger, and Facebook account, and in all three I spent much more time consuming than composing. Sure, I tweeted and blogged every once in a while, and commented or changed my status once a day - but I wouldn't say that I (or most people I know of) are really utilizing all these modes. Perhaps Selfe might respond by saying that is all the more opportunity to teach these kids how to engage more fully in their world - a point I'd be inclined to agree with.
In the end, I side more with Selfe, but I like the cautionary approach of Hesse. He brings up practical problems that would need to be addressed for these changes to be implemented fully, things that can be easy to ignore when caught up in the frenzy of academic theory.
Jill,
ReplyDeleteI always have the same worry as you and Hesse in thinking about how much people are actually using this stuff. This semester I am teaching a film class and we are blogging each week. Last week, out of curiosity, I asked all 40 of them how many had blogged before. To my surprise, well only kind of to my surprise, I guess, only one person raised their hand. Out of 40 people only one person had blogged or currently blogged. Now, they might not realize that posting on Facebook might be considered microblogging, but still. If this technology is really ubiquitous and student's success really does depend on their literacies and understandings of the technology, than I guess I just wonder why more people are not involved.
I'm not sure what this story really supports my anxieties over how many people use this stuff, because the sampling of students could be all skewed. But it at the very least does not highlight some of the concerns and questions: who uses this stuff? who is this for? who does this benefit? If, as Yancey says, we are anachronistic, is our way of becoming relevant? Are we like a grandma getting a Facebook account?
Tim
Jill,
ReplyDeleteI appreciated your honesty in that you weren't able to decide which argument you "sided" with, in that they both had merit. I didn't blog this time, but would probably have said something similar.
This is bouncing off of Tim's comment a little, but my mom just got a FB account and asked me (just tonight actually) to give her "lessons." What I was curious to hear your thoughts on is that, does this generation of students, due to sheer exposure to "tech-stuff" learn how to use sites like Facebook more easily?
I guess I'm not really convinced - and I don't think Selfe does a great job convincing us - that aural texts really have that much over written texts. And if the examples she gives us on her website are to be looked at as exemplary models of what we should be doing, I think they fall flat. Particularly "Yelling Boy," which is delivered in a monotone not even worthy of This American Life. I don't think I gained anything by hearing it instead of reading it. I don't think that aural text is stupid, but I don't think Selfe does a very good job convincing us to bring it back.
ReplyDeleteAlso, in all her history of how aurality used to play a larger role in composition, she neglects to point out the fact that since both types of text were at one time present together, we have in effect already been where she wants to go, and decided to move away from it. I don't think English departments would have dropped a superior method of communication for an inferior one. In particular, the constraints she mentions seem extremely relevant to me, at least academically: "the difficulty of going back to review complex or difficult passages, to convey change not marked by sound, to communicate some organizational markers like paragraphs," (643). I would not want to "read" a journal article in sound form without being able to reread passages, make notes, or stop to reference other texts, so why should we teach students to create critical writing in such a difficult to use format?
I do think that multiple modalities have a place in English departments, but I do not think that they belong in introduction composition classes, any more than they already are (in presentations and discussion).
Jill,
ReplyDeleteI'm definitely on board with you as far as seeing value in the arguments of both of our readings for tomorrow. Hesse's emphasis on context and application offers a fine balance to some of Selfe's more ambitious claims, while the refusal to consider the full range of resources that we could supply to students seems to run counter to both positions. Still, I'd like to problematize the appearance of harmony between Hesse and Selfe - which the latter seems to strive for while reiterating the expansive need to "compose texts that communicate meaning in a variety of rhetorically effective ways for a variety of audiences" in her "Response" - by noting some of the limitations that are couched in Hesse's point (Selfe 608). Hesse is concerned with the "ethical" questions of "'what's good for the student'" and "'what's good for the various cultures and subcultures' in which decisions are made," all matters which seem to dissolve before the totality of Selfe's all-encompassing multimodal classroom (605). Really, "Movement" is about more than aurality - it addresses all multimodal expressions. Do you think we can be mindful of context - "ethics" - while attempting to be all-inclusive? Is the "Selfe classroom" even possible in a purely practical sense? If we aim for what she proposes, when should we try to "temper" our methodology with execution and effect in mind?
Scott