Response to Bizzell and Royster

Multiple Academic Discourses

It is compelling to read a third piece by Patricia Bizzell as she continues to make sense of what she now calls “mixed forms” in academic discourse. What is useful about reading her work over time is that she borrows concepts from her previous work to justify or further explain the nuances that are academic discourse; in each piece, she tries to add a new spin on the topic as well. Bizzell says “slowly but surely, previously nonacademic discourses are blending with traditional academic discourse to form the new “mixed” forms. These new discourses are still academic in that they are doing academic work of the academy” (2). She also says that new “discourses are gaining ground because they allow their practitioners to do intellectual work in ways they could not if confined to traditional academic discourse” (3). I think that these statements are interesting as Bizzell continues to make distinctions (playing into an old system) in her own language use about multiple discourses. Moreover, her new spin (or example) in this article has to do with a closer look as a history professor’s work on race and lynching in the South.

What I find fascinating about her use of Joel Williamson’s story is that Bizzell includes information about who reviewed the publication and why they chose to accept it or reject it. Further, she points out that there were three reviewers, one white female and two black males, who were more familiar with “mixing forms” and using/reading alternative discourses. Although there were problems with the tone Williamson’s piece, the lack of historical research (including voices from other researchers who have done similar work in the field), as well as the military metaphors that Williamson makes, according to the mentioned readers, his work was still accepted (I guess it was because it met the traditional idea of “correctness”). However, I think that there are some missing pieces here. To whom is Williamson writing? Is his writing for the entire academic community about the historical, how the historical impacts the psyche of Southern white men …is it written to a general public? I think that it is interesting that Bizzell does not go into detail about how Williamson engages in mixed form writing (as she does with Villanueva in an earlier piece). It is evident, to me, that there are some problems with Williamson’s work in this particular article.

Furthermore, Royster’s piece “Academic Discourses or Small Boats on a Big Sea” brings readers back to the origins of their own thinking, the root of the problem. She makes a huge point about how labeling has helped academics grapple with academic language and the variations within it, but she notes that “over time these binaries have also engendered a since of primacy” (24). I think that she is right. Although labeling has helped us to understand language, culture, and ideas, in a new way, it has also helped to undermine the point of understanding language, culture, and ideas in a real way because it creates a hierarchy. Thus, Royster calls for readers to move their thinking by “acknowledging the inconsistency with which we have accepted what we know about the nature of language and the formation…of language communities” (24) and to give up assumptions about discourses (or what constitutes a good discourse….lists).

I like Royster’s article because it does not talk about alternative discourses or mixed discourses as separate from the traditional. However, she uses the term multiple academic discourses to show that engagement happens in a lot of ways and that one should not be privileged over the other. Royster’s focus on pedagogy, then, is valid because she wants teachers to help students negotiate gaps that academia has “ignored as a sea because we could” (28). Royster’s article brings up a good question about change…will academics actually engage in new methods, new ideas and new pedagogies to create possibilities and opportunities for multiple viewpoints?

Response to Bizzell

Voices

Bizzell’s “Hybrid Academic Discourse: What, Why, How” speaks to a growing need for academics to understand (and employ) hybrid discourses in academic settings/classrooms. Bizzell cites Dr. Villanueva, and Dr. Gilyard, Puerto Rican and African American scholars, respectfully, as people who use hybrid discourses in their own writing to convey complex issues in academe, and the world, in innovative and important ways. The author also offers suggestions as to how teachers can use the hybrid model to help students experiment with writing and language. Bizzell makes some interesting moves in this article, and I think that the list is really the one that is worth teasing out.

The list … I think that making a list of what constitutes a hybrid discourse automatically makes it less like a hybrid discourse and more like the traditional discourse. In a way, the list (a bulleted list that one can check off) reifies the formats and outlines for writing that have been and continue to be called for and accepted in academe. Bizzell notes that the list is one that “describe[s] writing that does serious intellectual work” (16). But, who makes the gauge for serious work? The traditional holds the power to spit one into an abyss of nothingness or to invite them to dinner. So, the contact zone comes into play, but it all depends on which end of the spectrum one is in; it depends on how well points of identification, communication, or understanding match in the contact zone. I think that this point is clearer in Bizzel’s second article.

“Basic Writing” takes issue with some of the ideas that Bizzell presents a year earlier in “Hybrid Academic Discourse” as she speaks about issues of “correctness.” She does a good job with problematizing notions of hybrid discourses and has to cover her back by talking about the list that she made in the earlier piece. Bizzell notes that the list “seems to suggest that traditional academic discourse was a fixed and unchanging entity until recently … it is difficult to demonstrate that academic discourse has continuously evolved over time” (6). I would add that although traditional discourse changes with time, creating a list plays into the power structure by giving traditional academic discourse a say in what even constitutes a good hybrid. She cites Michelle Hall Kells as she realizes that “such a representation tends to give academic discourse an air of superiority” which brings up issues of power and borders. Who is really able to gain access? This notion brings up a need for writers and teachers of writing to understand the historical, the cultural, and the isms. It also speaks about the idea of the use of the term hybrid as “essentializing people’s language use” (8) and making assumptions about a student based on arbitrary “imagined” ideas.

In the first article, Bizzell uses Dr. Villanueva's work to explain how he is able to use distinctive hybrid moves. I like the way that she pulls information from Villanueva's work. Further analysis and more connections about the importance and use of such scholarly work instead of just saying that he uses the traditional and hybrid would have been nice. I also like the quote from bell hooks in both articles as hooks speaks about her own experience with coming into to consciousness about her “sense of versatility” (8) by listening to ways in which jazz musicians use many voices to make music. The music metaphor could have created a piece that really shows the idea of multiple voices (the physical voice, the drums, the trumpet, the violin, etc) as ones that all coalesce to make one sound. This metaphor to explain culture, to understand language, to sift through the many influences that make a person who they are, would have the potential for fruitful discussion regarding her notion of helping students to experiment with language.

By the end of the second article, Bizzell takes a more realistic approach to speaking about pedagogy and issues with correctness. She clears up many points that she made in the previous article and her book which speaks to further study about hybrid discourses and she notes that “successful pedagogies must take local circumstances into account … this would engage students” (10). She even acknowledges that she contradicts herself in her work, which is an extremely humble thing to say. Bizzell ends on a hopeful note, saying that “democratizing access may help the changes in academic discourse …thereby serving social justice” (11). I wonder, however, if democracy in regards to access will continue to include a select number of people and further essentialize people’s language use?

Response to Pratt and Kaplan

In one of my first graduate seminars, a fellow colleague asked me, “does Toni Morrison’s novel represent the whole African American experience?” This question made me uncomfortable for many reasons. The question suggests that there is only one experience, and it dismisses everything that we discussed in the classroom, among other things. I responded by saying “is William Faulkner’s work representative of your experience?” At the time, it seemed like an appropriate response.

After much time and after reading our texts for the week, I see this experience as more of a contact zone experience, one that allowed cultures to really “meet, clash, and grapple with each other” (Pratt 4). In many ways, I was forced to engage a person who wanted to know, I think, more about me, but who did not understand the bigger picture or how to approach the situation. The question falls somewhere between the cultural deficit and the cultural difference realm that was presented to us in our first Contact Zones class.

Moreover, my experience, coupled with the readings, got me thinking more about the need for effective/clear pedagogy and truly engaged learners when ideas about culture, cultural experiences, and people are presented. Pratt says that we should “reconsider the models of community” (5) in a pedagogical sense to reach a contact zone where difference will be understood and praised, and where the context can facilitate discussion from all parties involved. I understand that the zone is supposed to be a space where both identification and difference meet, but it seems that there is always an inherent hierarchy, where someone will always feel isolated or alienated in some way, particularly when a systematic approach is used (one that parrots a system steeped in oppression). I’m not sure if true “cultural mediation” can be accomplished in a “traditional” setting, as Pratt suggests. Similar to my own experience above, some people may just miss the point because “persons are not from a culture; they do culture” (Monroe). So, I think that one must have a genuine interest to really be able to have cross-cultural communication that is meaningful.

The Kaplan piece, “What in the World is Contrastive Rhetoric?” made me think more about the emic/etic fallacies and the photo that was presented to us in class. What both mediums are saying is that poor teaching about culturalism reifies stereotypes and reduces what culture means to groups of people. Kaplan’s piece best exhibits notions of culture presented in our class because it calls for a more practical approach to learning and understanding language. Kaplan alludes to the fact that a teacher must understand multiple histories, in many ways, and ask critical questions in order to best engage all students. He notes “traditional composition teachers have tended to assume that they are addressing a monolingual, monocultural population” (vii). First of all, teachers should not make assumptions about students, period. Having preconceived notions about language and culture are equally bad as well.

What all of the readings bring up is that language and language production are not in a vacuum. There are many symbols and symbol systems which echoes Kenneth Burke’s notion of people as “symbol using animal [s]” (3). Once teachers and students can identify and appreciate difference, moves can be made to grasp the final pedagogical implication, cultural production.

Nerves

I have posted a picture of nerves. There are many different types of nerves and they all help to make body parts work to the best of there ability. I think that this picture represents culture and cultural contact because it shows that culture is made up of many different “nerves” that work together to make a full person. Thus, when people come in contact, they will not see culture (just like one does not physically see nerves). However, people must be invested and genuinely interested in learning about the different parts of a person’s culture. There are many nerves that make a person work, and there are many parts of one’s culture that makes them who they are.

Burke, Kenneth. A Rhetoric of Motives. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.
Print.

Kaplan, Robert. "Foreword: What in the World Is Contrastive Rhetoric?" Contrastive Rhetoric Revisited and Redefined. Ed. Clayann Gilliam Panetta. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2001.

Pratt, Mary Louise. "Arts of the Contact Zone." Reprinted in Ways of Reading. Eds. David Bartholomae and Anthony Petroksy. New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999.