Writing across the Curriculum (WAC)

Writing Centers have traditionally been viewed as marginalized facilities within their institutions. This book challenges that view by examining the evolving theoretical, practical, and institutional relationships between Writing Centers and Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) Programs at the secondary and postsecondary levels. Based on their experiences at particular institutions, expert contributors present a variety of approaches for establishing and developing effective partnerships between Writing Centers and WAC Programs. These partnerships have been given relatively little consideration in the larger field of composition and rhetoric. By deepening our knowledge of the merging of these two specialized areas of scholarship, the volume sets the foundation for more advanced research. The contributors present different perspectives that accurately portray the true diversity of Writing Center/WAC partnerships and their compatibility with larger institutional missions.

This annotated bibliography is the first to trace the history of the Writing Across the Curriculum Movement (WAC) and to assess the state of scholarship and pedagogy on the subject today. Professors Anson, Schwiebert, and Williamson carefully describe 1067 important sources taken from bibliographies, books, monographs, journals, textbooks, and other documents. Their research guide reviews the history and implementation of WAC, research and theoretical studies, and the teaching of writing across the curriculum in general and in diverse fields. Author and subject indexes provide easy access to the reference materials for the use of researchers in composition, education, arts and humanities, physical, social and behavioral sciences, and business.

Courts argues that while by society's standards many people can read well, they are unable to create meaning from the world of oral and written language. His theory derives from psycho- and sociolinguistics, cognitive psychology, philosophy, literary criticism, and "whole language" theory. Courts criticizes programmed activities, texts, and workbooks--challenging the control that commercial textbook publishers and test-makers exert on education. He shuns overemphasis on methods, and offers an alternative approach firmly grounded in theory and aimed at empowering teachers and students.

Breaking with the still-dominant process tradition in composition studies, post-process theory -- or at least the different incarnations of post-process theory discussed by the contributors represented in this collection of original essays -- endorses the fundamental idea that no codifiable or generalizable writing process exists or could exist. Post-process theorists hold that the practice of writing cannot be captured by a generalized process or a "big" theory.

Most post-process theorist hold three assumption about the act of writing: writing is public; writing is interpretive; and writing is situated. The first assumption is the commonsensical claim that writing constitutes a public interchange. By "interpretive act, " post process theorists generally mean something as broad "making sense of" and not exclusively the ability to move from one code to another. To interpret means more than merely to paraphrase; it means to enter in a relationship of understanding with other language users. And finally, because writing is a public act that requires interpretive interaction with others, writers always write from some position or some place. Writer are never nowhere; they are "situated."

Leading theorists and widely published scholars the field, contributors are Nancy Blyler, John Clifford Barbara Couture, Nancy C. DeJoy, Sidney I. Dobrin, Elizabeth Ervin, Helen Ewald, David Foster, Debra Journet, Thomas Kent, Gary A. Olson, Joseph Petragl George Pullman, David Russell, and John Schilb.