Journal of Basic Writing 41.1–2 Released

The Journal of Basic Writing (JBW) volume 41.1-2, the journal’s sole volume for 2022, highlights the weight of legacies and assumptions that continue to occlude pathways toward access and equity.

Sean Molloy and Alexis Bennett return to Basic Writing’s inception at City College to reveal steps that undermined SEEK and constructed a BW population in need.

Stacy Wittstock takes an ethnographic look at high-stakes exams as “boss texts” and their impact on faculty, students, and writing programs.

Margaret E. Weaver, Kailyn Shartel Hall, and Tracey A. Glaessgen explore the ways our assumptions about basic writing students overlook students’ own formed sense of need around writing support, which is reflected in some students’ choice for a prerequisite writing course.

Finally, Amanda Sladek offers a kind of classroom self-study on the complexities of translingual grammar instruction, confronting its challenges and navigating a spectrum of student attitudes and preferences around equity-centered feedback.