From: Martin E. Rosenberg [mrosenbe@earthlink.net] Sent: Monday, April 23, 2001 1:25 PM To: cwonline@nwe.ufl.edu Subject: Re: Martin's Larger Vision for WAC
Dickie and Michael: Dickie as always is on the mark. And Michael, I think that you have an answer of sorts for your sabbaticalizing (?) colleague. First of all, I see something like "systems thinking" as a form of pedagogy rooted in rhetoric, a rhetoric of the same level of ambition seen in the Iowa rhetoric study group and its series at Wisconsin, but with a different methodology, a different rigor. I used to think that a WAC/CAC person should have training in r&c (and in c&c) but also the equivalent of an doctoral exam in a separate discipline--in order to communicate with those from disciplines across the academy with a certain "legitimacy." I no longer think that its necessary to be a practicing economist in order to teach economics students how to write. But with "systems" per se, you have a critical thinking methodology that can be shown to cut across disciplinary boundaries, enable students to think synthetically and globally about local (disciplinary) problems, and provide the perfect kind of perspective to stimulate exercises that would require the capacity to think about and write about different kinds of situations and disciplinary cultures--all with real world implications. And the best place to offer this kind of training for future WAC/CAC specialists is in a graduate seminar and in directed study leading possibly to an exam or other preparatory hurdle. Now Dickie of course raises the question about vulnerability, but I think we've all seen at least second hand the consequences of being on the cutting edge of technology enhanced education (or literary theory, or rhetorical theory or social science methodology within English and r&c studies etc...). Dickie and Cindy have, and I certainly have. But..... Sometimes you just have to commit to a line of conceptual flight that you believe in. Especially if what you believe in has to do with the ethical perspective that line of flight provides. best wishes.....mer