Mayers: second half

Mayers gives us a whole chapter on Heidegger. Not a lot to report from that.

Then a chapter on his terms for a possible alliance between comp and CW. Mostly institutional, which is not really my bag.

But he does finally give up his remedy for institutional-conventional wisdom. This is Mayer's big moment, as far as my interests are concerned:

The relation of poetic craft to rhetoric...is a potentially productive direction. Closer attention to rhetoric—to poetry's potential for persuasion or to the myriad variations in audiences for poetry, for example—would not force poets, in their institutional roles as teachers of creative writing, to abandon any concern with formalism. But it would certainly move formalism into a different context. Assuming a rhetorical perspective on poetic production would compel those in creative writing to consider poetry as a social practice, to consider the material conditions that regulate the publication of poetry, and to work through the consequences of these conditions for those who write poetry and those who read it. In short, the rhetorical perspective...would align creative writers much more closely with their colleagues in composition. (122)

He goes on later about his plan for reforming English. He wants "Writing Studies" as a separate department, which takes care of the intro comp course, and all the writing courses. Makes sense, but it's a huge power grab, and I can't imagine the English folks going for it.

He does some decent work when talking about his suggestions for revising the introductory creative writing course:

the New Critic's insistence on the autonomy of the poem persists more tenaciously in creative writing classrooms than anywhere else...Creative writing pedagogy...primarily focuses on the text's formal and aesthetic qualities, letting social and political considerations into classroom discourse infrequently, intermittently, and usually only with the implication that such considerations are of a lower order than formal and aesthetic ones. (139)

Later in the chapter, he paraphrases another CW instructors story regarding a student who wrote a poem about being abused by her Uncle when she was a child. When the instructor attempted to offer constructive criticism of the technical aspects of the poem, the class looked at her with scorn and one of her students suggested that the author should be praised for her courage, not critiqued for her art.

Mayers feels this type of situation

provides an excellent opportunity to raise questions about the function of poetry within a larger culture. Such a poem—a narrative of abuse—can provide an entry point for class discussion geared toward clarifying the uses and purposes toward which such rhetoric might be employed. Students might be asked to consider, for instance, whether there is a significant difference between narrating childhood abuse in a poem—then submitting the poem for consideration in the rhetorical context of the classroom—and talking about such abuse on a daytime talk show or in a support group. Students might be asked to consider the rhetorical effects of submitting such a poem for classroom discussion...[The teacher] might have asked the class members to think critically about their own reactions to the poem. Why were they inclined toward silence or praise? Ultimately, the class could consider the following questions: Is poetry a particularly effective medium for // confession or for narratives of abuse? How does poetry differer from other media in this regard? When someone writes a narrative of abuse in the form of a poem, what social and rhetorical consequences are being sought? In the case of this particular poem, what—if anything—must be done in order for such a consequence to be realized? (147-148)

These last two questions seem to me to the be the heart of Mayers's pedagogical approach. Student creative work is to be considered from a social and rhetorical perspective, and these questions are central to that type of consideration.

Mayers book is helpful in its suggestions of the value of a rhetorical emphasis for CW. His ambitions for institutional reform I have no use for. Which means there are only a few key quotes to pull. A few leads here and there.

Rhetorical emphasis ties into the political consideration of creative production in the U.S., so I think this may turn out to be a useful piece.

Leads

Bawarshi, Anis S. "Beyond Dichotomy: Toward a Theory of Divergence in Composition Studies." JAC: A Journal of Composition Theory 17.1 (1997): 69-82.

This one looks good. It's an effort to balance ideas that writing comes from an individual mind with ideas that writing is purely socially constructed.