HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 7 Sep 1992 14:37:45 --500
From:         "David E. Schwalm" <IACDES@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: Definition question for MBU

 *** Reply to note of 09/07/92 09:22
 The main trick to critical thinking is to avoid buying into the rhetorical
 situation or communication dynamic set up by a text. One needs to attempt to
 construct the rhetorical situation and attempt to understand what is going on
 as a sort of voyeur. You can then deiced whether or not you want to buy in.
 Rhetorical analysis (of whatever sort) is the best tool for critical thinking
 that I know of.

 -- David E. Schwalm, Assoc. Provost for Academic Programs
 ___Arizona State University West
 ___4701 West Thunderbird Rd.
 ___Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100___(602) 543-4500
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Tue, 8 Sep 1992 16:14:30 ADT
Comments:     <08SEP92.17534422.0029.MUSIC@UNB.CA>
From:         HUNT000 <HUNT@UNB.CA>
Subject:      Critical thinking & assigned tasks

     Lili says, with some justice, that "it seems a little smug
of us in Rhet/Comp to assume that we know best when students
should be asking particular kinds of questions."  I think there's
something else to think about here, though: questions are
situation-specific.  What's a good question for a working
biologist to ask isn't necessarily a good question for a student
to ask -- and we may know as much about that as the biologist
(I'm not suggesting we know MORE, just that it's a matter of
learning rather than a matter of biology).  I run my classes
almost entirely on student questions.  "Who was Sir Roger
L'Estrange?"  or "How much was a pound worth in 1665?" or "What's
Heroic Couplet and why did everybody who wrote poetry in 1700
write in that form?" aren't questions most scholars would ask --
but they're really useful ones in that situation.
     She also says, "I was rather surprised to discover that what
most of these students wanted was boundaries.  Constraints.  They
claimed that they felt more creative when they had some avenues
closed to them." That certainly matches my experience, but I
don't think it means necessarily that we should "start the
semester giving assignments and suggesting topics (with a
backdoor open for students who want to talk [us] into letting
them do something else)."  Strikes me that the way to learn to
ask questions is to ask them -- and try to answer them, and fail,
and get up and try again.  And be given the freedom to ask the
wrong ones.  I couldn't agree more fervently with Lili's closing
observation:  "There are times when I think that we teachers fall
in love with the things we think students ought to be doing, to
the point that we set students up to do these things at the rate
_we_ wish they would do them, rather than at the rate they can
best enter those activities...  " How do we know which rate is
appropriate?  I think by creating a situation in which they can
set their rates themselves.
                                    -- Russ
                                _~|__
Russell A. Hunt            _~|__)_ __)~|__   Learning and Teaching
Department of English      )_ __)_|_)__ __)     Development Office
St. Thomas University        |  )____) |        EMAIL: hunt@unb.ca
Fredericton, New Brunswick___|____|____|____/  FAX: (506) 450-9615
E3B 5G3   CANADA          \                / PHONE: (506) 452-7700
                       ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Sat, 12 Sep 1992 09:36:08 --500
From:         SLATIN@UTXVM.BITNET
Subject:      (Fwd: *C&CD*) RE: RE: Splitting

Point taken, Robert: and Jim Porter's reminder that there each site will have
to devise its own solutions to these general problems is useful, too.  As I
said yesterday, I very much appreciate everyone's taking the time to comment
so thoughtfully; local solutions arrived at with some awareness of national
context will, I hope, be richer, than local solutions arrived at in a
parochial vacuum.

John Slatin
UT Austin
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 14 Sep 1992 09:47:00 CDT
From:         McDonald James C <jcm5337@USL.EDU>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Splitting comp

Jim Kinneavy told me a little about the argument he made to the Dean in June.
He argued that the success of the English 306 syllabus that he had implemented
last year--there had not been a single complaint about the syllabus in a year's
time (kind of astounding)--made it unnecessary to remove the writing program
from the English Department.  The English Department was doing a good job
teaching writing.  He also argued that the graduate rhetoric program would be
damaged by the shift.  The Dean, who said he was leaning toward supporting the
proposal but had not made up his mind, told Kinneavy that a big problem was that
much of the faculty throughout UT no longer trusted the English Department.
It's difficult to counter that.
    Jim McDonald
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Subject: (no subject given)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Wed, 9 Sep 1992 20:00:30 EST
From:         Stuart Selber <SSELBER@MTUS5.CTS.MTU.EDU>

set mbu-l mail
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X-Vmsmail-To: SMTP%"MBU-L%TTUVM1.BITNET@ricevm1.rice.edu"
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 14 Sep 1992 12:01:18 -0400
From:         R_CONNORS@UNHH.UNH.EDU
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Splitting comp

The history of special fields originally within English splitting off from
the central departmental structure has been interesting.  The last time
it was really done successfully was in 1914, when the speech teachers formed
the NAATPS (now the SCA) and demanded their own departments.  At that time
Speech Departments (Now usually Communications Departments) were formed at
many schools.  This secession worked for several reasons: departmental
 structures were relatively new in 1914 and not completely solidified; speech
 teachers
were numerous; graduate degrees could be bootstrapped from other disciplines
while Speech tried to put its own self-reproductive systems in place; there
were few vested interests who objected to speech splitting off.  The absence
of any of these factors makes the split much harder.  When linguistics made
its move in 1924, the move was much less successful.  There were fewer
linguists, there was less demand for their courses.  There are far fewer
schools with Linguistics Departments than with Speech Departments as a result.

Departmental structures are pretty solid now.  English is one of the baggiest
of disciplines, what with linguistics and journalism and creative writing
and folklore and comp and lit, but for reasons of economics it's not likely
that composition secession movements will be successful in too many places
at breaking away from it.  From John's postings it sounds as if the new
Division at UTA will be clearly subordinated to the English Dept.--the
Rhet and Comp Division of the English Dept.  Except for the few places which
already have split departments, the hassle of establishing a new degree-
granting grad specialty will be immense, and thus most of us will probably
be staying in English.

We will, I expect, gradually forget the embittered attitudes of the past as
we assume equality of status with other PhDs, lit or linguistics or folklore.
Much of the stress on separatism used to come from "them" (lit people,
with PhDs) looking down on "us" (comp people, teaching heavy loads).  Now
that comp people increasingly have doctorates, publication structures,
and all the trappings of academic acceptability, "we" (PhDs) wonder more
and more what our duty should be to "them" (comp teachers, teaching heavy
loads, for poor pay, with few benefits).  Who do we relate to more easily
these days--the young Cultural Studies prof down the hall doing social
construction of reality in Spender and Pound, or the fifty-five-year-old
woman teaching three and three comp courses in the basement?

I deliberately put this in extreme terms, but that's where we're going,
foax.  Whose side are you on?

Bob C.
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Organization: Samford University Writing Programs
X-Acknowledge-To: <DHROBERT@SAMFORD>
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Sun, 13 Sep 1992 19:32:59 CDT
From:         "David H. Roberts" <DHROBERT@SAMFORD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Splitting comp

Jeffery:  This comp/lit discussion has been the most interesting to me,
too.  Please send me a copy of all the postings and I will share them
with the two other comp specialists in my department.
--
Check with Robert Royar about getting the first few postings; he compiles
all for redistribution via his own list.  Also, Fred Kemp may have archives
of all the postings.

   __________________________________________
   David H. Roberts
   Director of University Writing Programs
   Samford University
   Birmingham, AL 35229-2207 USA
   Voice: (205) 870-2964; Fax: (205) 870-2384
   Bitnet:  DHROBERT@SAMFORD
   _______________________________________________
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Thu, 10 Sep 1992 14:50:28 EST
From:         Bob Child <vsf@SAGE.CC.PURDUE.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Listservs
              92 2:16 pm

Fred's on the $ when he says that local systems operators don't
advertise about having listserv software available.  It's often a
headache for them, and many of the requests that they get are from
folks who want to set up "recreational" lists (e.g., Joe Bob's Tips
for Packard Tuneups).

When you contact your systems operator about setting up a bitnet
listserv, it will probably help if you can justify your proposed list
for instructional purposes *on site*  At Purdue, for example, anyone
can establish a listserv group if they show that it is educational
rather than recreational and that it will benefit campus students,
faculty, and/or staff.  If you can justify it as a university service,
then you can open it up to the larger community (as Tharon and Pat did
with Purtopoi).

Some sites aren't so strict, but remember that no matter how you set
up a listserv, it's gonna take up network resources that sys ops don't
always like (or have) to give away.


    --                                                          --
      Bob Child, Instructional Lab Coordinator, Heav 227 & SC 30
      Purdue University Computing Center / Department of English
      Internet: vsf@sage.cc.purdue.edu  /  Phone: (317) 742-7667
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Original_To:  BITNET%"mbu-l@ttuvm1.bitnet"
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 14 Sep 1992 19:59:00 EDT
From:         "Composition Digest (Robert Royar,
              Moderator)" <R0MILL01@ULKYVX.BITNET>
Subject:      (Fwd: *C&CD*) Back issues information on comp/lit split (5)

Date:         Mon, 14 Sep 1992 04:40:18 EDT
From:         IN%"RobertRoyar@Delphi.com" Robert Royar (C&CD Moderator)
Message-Id:   <1992Sep14.044018.2.Grendel.Lair@Cratylus>
Subject:      Back issues information on comp/lit split (5)
Reply-to:     IN%"R0MILL01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU"  C&CD
Organization: Cratylus Educational Software

Computers and Composition Digest is archived at
  compos01@finhutc.bitnet
FINHUTC (Helsinki) is a LISTSERV site.  The early postings in the UT Austin
issue may be available from them.  The issue first appeared Saturday, 05
September and was covered in issue 6.258 of the Digest (mailed Sunday, 06
September).  Because of the way mail goes through our system, I can't be
sure which responses came next.  I'm also not sure the Digest covered all
the early postings because we were having mail reception problems then and
I believe some mail was lost.

Additionally David Sewell, who is currently on leave from Rochester, was
maintaining an archive server for topics in MBU-L, C&CD, and others.  I'm
sorry I don't have his new "western US" address, but he has been on MBU-L
since his move.

We do not have the storage to keep back issues at this site.  But perhaps
the information above will make finding those issues easier.  BTW the
multicultural flap at UT Austin (about two summers ago?) is really the
beginning of this thread.  John posted some rather involved transcripts of
discussions and syllabi during that time.

 -- Robert Royar (RobertRoyar@Delphi.com) New York Institute of Technology

*************************************
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 14 Sep 1992 14:54:58 CDT
From:         McDonald James C <jcm5337@USL.EDU>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Splitting comp

I was going to say I'd kill for a regular 3/3 teaching load.  I teach 3/3 now
only because I have released time for running the writing center.  With some
exceptions, the research faculty here teaches a 4/4 load--the same teaching
load I had as an instructor at two schools in the late seventies and early
eighties.  Full-time instructors here have a 5/5 load.
  Except for LSU and a couple of other places in Louisiana, most English faculty
in Louisiana teach 4 or 5 classes a semester, and full-time instructors teach
five a term, despite ADE guidelines of a maximum 4/4 teaching load for faculty
without research responsibilities and 3/3 for faculty expected to do research.
Teaching loads at many schools were increased in response to drastic cuts in
university budgets during the oil bust of the mid-1980s.
  The class structure of English faculty is created not just within a department
but also in the competition for prestige, money, and good students among
institutions in a state.  LSU professors benefit not only from the money and
released time that they save with their adjuncts but also from the money and
time they get at the expense of institutions with smaller research missions and
larger teaching missions.  And as heavy as our load is here, our classes are
smaller and we don't have as many faculty with 5/5 loads as the institutions
that don't grant Ph.D.'s, let alone the junior colleges, where composition
classes sometimes top 50 students.
  Makes it hard to pass a good time, chers.
   Jim McDonald
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Sat, 12 Sep 1992 17:31:42 -0500
From:         "Gail E. Hawisher" <hawisher@UIUC.EDU>
Subject:      Re: wac-l

> Gail, could you tell us once more how to subscribe to wac-l.  Thanks.
>
> -- Allene Cooper

Allene,

To join WAC-L, send the following one-line message to

listserv@uiucvmd.bitnet

SUBSCRIBE WAC-L Your Name

To send a message, write to wac-l@uiucvmd.bitnet.  Hope this helps.

Gail
________________
Gail E. Hawisher
Department of English
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
hawisher@uiuc.edu and 217-333-2989
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Sun, 13 Sep 1992 15:57:44 --500
From:         "David E. Schwalm" <IACDES@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Splitting comp

 *** Reply to note of 09/12/92 07:09
 It is really important that any rhet/comp unit that is dependent or idependent
 have a research mission. Good teaching of composition depends on having
 faculty who are current in the field and contributing to its growth. We all
 know how willing others are to insist that anybody can teach writing, to leave
 it to people who are poorly trained or overworked to the point where they
 cannot remain current in the field. We all know how hard it has been (and
 still is) to get what we know about teaching writing implemented in the
 classroom at any educational level. For an independent (or dependent unit),
 one of the best ways to get a grip on a research mission is to build in an
 institutional research subunit--call it assessment if that is useful. Get your
 faculty (and grad students if you have them) working together to assess the
 effectiveness of what you do in your own program (not common in lit depts).

 -- David E. Schwalm, Assoc. Provost for Academic Programs
 ___Arizona State University West
 ___4701 West Thunderbird Rd.
 ___Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100___(602) 543-4500
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Thu, 10 Sep 1992 12:24:24 -0500
From:         "Joe Amato" <jamato@UX1.CSO.UIUC.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Texas

From an outsider's pov, but one thoroughly "educated" (e.g., via grad. work
at SUNY/Albany) in the politics underwriting the history of composition as
(dare I say it?) a field of study, seems to me that an attempt to resolve
composition out of a specifically english environs is potentially both
blessing and curse.  On the one hand, this *blatantly* political move
represents both formal recognition of how marginalized comp. is and has
been within english.   On the other, I can detect immediately a sort of
administratively sanctioned "needs assessment" approach to better "account"
for one or another presumed increase in "literacy rates" correlative to
"new and improved" writing instruction.

In other words, while it's nice to see ideologies raised to the surface of
deliberation, this does not necessarily preclude a functionalist rationale
from capitalizing on the consequent institutional division.  Without
meaning to sound too fashionably liberal, I must observe that splitting
comp. off from english, however much this may  represent de facto
operation, is likely to give english folk that many fewer opportunities to
redefine their respective pedagogies in terms of composition insights
(something I find woefully lacking in most "literature" instruction) at the
same time putting  comp. folk at the mercy of ruthless administrative
imperatives (both in terms of their pedagogies and their tenure trekking).
 Placing comp. within english has at least the advantage of viewing these
as interrelated...

Writing to learn?  Pshaw.
Writing to administer skills?  Now yer talkin'...

Joe Amato
From: R0MILL01@ULKYVX.BITNET (Composition Digest (Robert Royar,
              Moderator))
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Subject: (Fwd: *C&CD*) About setting up list servers (9)
Date: 10 Sep 92 01:12:00 GMT
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Original_To:  BITNET%"mbu-l@ttuvm1.bitnet"

Date:         Wed, 09 Sep 1992 20:09:18 EDT
From:         IN%"RobertRoyar@Delphi.com" Robert Royar (C&CD Moderator)
Message-Id:   <1992Sep09.200918.2.Grendel.Lair@Cratylus>
Subject:      About setting up list servers (9)
Reply-to:     IN%"R0MILL01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU"  C&CD
Organization: Cratylus Educational Software

Dickie Selfe <RSELFE@MTU.EDU> <01GOL2HNIYMO9ULN56@ulkyvx.bitnet> writes
>Unix systems have 'aliases' I believe.
>but this is all seems very piddly compared to the efforts made by Fred Kemp
>and Robert Royer.  If we want some interesting advice on the setting up of
>virtual spheres of public (?) discourse, we should ask them.  Perhaps they
>can tell us about the techniques they have tried and in what sense those
>attempts were effective.

I just purchased a book from Digital Press _Writing Real Programs in DCL_.
Fot those of you on a Vax system, DCL (Digital Command Language) is the
default command shell that gives you the familiar `$' prompt and interprets
your commands.  I've been using DCL to attempt to further automate the Digest
work.  I now use Delphi to handle most of the file transfering.  But they
cannot support giant lists nor do they allow access to the programming level of
DCL.  So on the U of L Vax (900 miles from my house) a little mailer "daemon"
watches my mail box and forwards mail, extracts mail from Delphi (technically
shar files which contain command procedures).  I find it real fascinating how I
can write these little scripts and mail them to another computer which has the
little daemon running on it, and it then unpacks and routes the whole thing to
the readers--returning the status to me in mail files and sending me any new
in-coming messages.

David Sewell has created something similar (but I believe a bit more robust and
elaborate) to handle archives on his system.

Anyway, I'd love to get a sustained conversation about this techy stuff going.
It just reminds me so much of what fiction does to my head--buit these scripts
and mail servers are working in the computers' "heads".

As Dickie said " I ramble."

 -- Robert Royar (RobertRoyar@Delphi.com) New York Institute of Technology

------------------------------
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 7 Sep 1992 20:05:02 -0400
From:         Dorothy H Ross <dross@BRAHMS.UDEL.EDU>
Subject: Re: WAC-L (Writing Across the Curriculum)

sounds interesting, I'll tell Gilda about it and maybe I will as well.
Thanks for thinking of me
Dorry
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Wed, 9 Sep 1992 12:44:53 -0500
From:         sm51@PRISM.GATECH.EDU
Subject:      Slime molds

Hypertexts as slime molds?  (Like, uh, jell-o molds?)  What CAN young
Chapman have been reading?  Could it perhaps have been a certain fairly
harsh review of Landow's _Hypertext_ slated to appear in an upcoming _Comp
Lit Review_?

I used to know a guy who was actually doing slime mold research.  He was
trying to write an algorithm to predict the critters' behavior.  Don't ask
me how,
but it had to do with image processing and pattern recognition.  He told me
that, on encountering another of its kind, a slime mold decides to do one
of three things: clone it, f*** it, or eat it.  Is that hypertextual or
what?

And then there's my favorite slime mold story, P.K. Dick's _Clans of the
Alphane Moon_, featuring among its characters Lord Running Clam, a
sentient telepathic slime mold from Ganymede.

Just wanted everybody to be up on their MOLD CULTURE.

Stuart
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Sat, 5 Sep 1992 17:22:26 --500
From:         "David E. Schwalm" <IACDES@ASUACAD.BITNET>
Subject:      audiences

 *** Reply to note of 09/05/92 07:28
 Yeah, Pirsig (as Phaedrus) is trying to get his comp students to write by
 sending them out to look around town and describe what they see. One student,
 as I recall the incident, complains of having "nothing to say." (Anyone ever
 hear that before?) Phaedrus tells her to sit down and look at the city hall or
 opera house and describe it, starting the the brick in the upper left hand
 corner. This focusing strategy appareant helped the students to "see" and
 unleased many pages of interesting and interested writing.

 -- David E. Schwalm, Assoc. Provost for Academic Programs
 ___Arizona State University West
 ___4701 West Thunderbird Rd.
 ___Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100___(602) 543-4500
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Organization: University at Buffalo
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Mon, 14 Sep 1992 18:49:58 -0400
From:         ENGMYLES@UBVMS.BITNET
Subject:      Re: (Fwd: *C&CD*) Splitting comp

I guess what I don't understand is why the English Dept did not respond.
Despondency?  Sloth?  Anger beyond words?
Myles
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