I suspect very few of us writing professionals practice what we
preach. (It would really be an interesting study to collect our
actual practices on the list. I'm not sure what kind of pedagogy
we'd end up with from that.) But as professionals, we've already
internalized so much of the process and product conventions, we
probably don't need to break much of it down. We freewrite (if one
ever does), draft, revise, proof, etc. as/when we first take fingers
to keyboard.
Freewriting, one of many invention techniques, works for some, not for
all.
Writing is self-motivated (for lack of a handier term), revision
"other." How many of us, that is, would revise without outside
pressure? Few of us write for ourselves alone; that is, we're
talking about a kind of writing (academic, public) for very
circumscribed audiences and purposes. I don't often go back to
revise my journal entries or letters. Any revision to my writing
is generally motivated by an editor, a reader--in Ruth's case, a
dissertation director--in short, by an "other."
Classroom-situated writing will always be artificial; there's no way around
that. No problem, however, all writing is artificial. Official
artifact.
Is there something about writing to email lists that is akin to the
confessional? The confessional goes professional?
Jane Lasarenko
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Jane Lasarenko
Dept. of English & Modern Languages
West Texas A & M University
Canyon, TX 79016
http://www.wtamu.edu/academic/finearts/english/jane.htm
Spoon feeding in the long run teaches
nothing but the shape of the spoon
E. M Forster
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