The four essays in this exam portfolio are representations of my research interests and expertise in Composition and Rhetoric following the exam portfolio structure. The first essay is a revision of two essays I wrote during fall 2001 about Robert Zoellner's 1969 talk-write theory. I argue that Zoellner's ideas lay the foundation for social constructionist theory and have similarities with process pedagogy. Many of Zoellner's critics dismissed talk-write because of its behaviorist base, but I believe that the problems with writing pedagogy Zoellner brought to the forefront are the same problems writing teachers and theorists struggle with today. The second essay is a bibliographic essay in which I review the recent literature on online writing labs (OWLs). I use the bibliographic essay to inform the third essay, which is an original essay written for this portfolio that offers tips for writing center directors who are interested in setting up an OWL, but are apprehensive. I point out the benefits of reaching students online, as well as the challenges of OWL set-up, maintenance, theory, and practice. The fourth essay is my teaching philosophy. I explain that my teaching philosophy is continually evolving, and with each semester, new experiences influence my growth and teaching identity. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of English in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2003. / April 1, 2003. / Composition and Rhetoric, Talk-Write Theory, Process Pedagogy / Includes bibliographical references. / Wendy Bishop, Professor Directing Thesis; Deborah Coxwell-Teague, Committee Member; Dennis Moore, Committee Member.

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According to Deborah Britzman, a queer pedagogy enables a destabilization of identity, a destabilization of various socio-cultural and economic norms, and recognition that language reflects current dominant socio-cultural ideologies. While queer pedagogies have been applied to courses in various disciplines and queer texts and readings have been presented within a range of literature courses, the role of a queer text in the composition classroom bears further examination. To answer the question, "What purposes can be served by using a queer text in a composition course?" I conducted qualitative research, using interviews, observations, and textual analysis in three first-year composition classes as three teachers and nine students read, discussed and wrote about Eli Clare's text, "The Mountain," for the first time. The language and style of the text disrupted assumptions about how texts should function and exposed students to stylistic techniques they challenged, critiqued or used to achieve specific rhetorical effects of their own. Students had a stronger sense that authors make specific choices and that those choices affect how an audience reads a text. However, students' and teachers' enactment and understanding of academic norms may contradict the possibilities presented by a queer text like Clare's. Understandings of academic discourse based upon an ethos of certainty tend to work against the destabilization of identity and the questioning and uncertainty Clare's text fosters. While queer scholars claim that certain pedagogical approaches to texts reflect and encourage a queered understanding of identity norms and knowledge, critics of queer theory express skepticism about its applicability with undergraduate students. This study illustrated that a queer text can enable composition teachers (even those unfamiliar with queer pedagogical techniques) to enact goals those of us who teach and study composition value, including: reading texts for multiple purposes; extensive use of revision; experimentation with substance, style and audience. Yet, the study also demonstrated that we need a better understanding of how and why a queer text works (and how to communicate that to students), a better understanding of what constitutes academic writing and more self-reflection about how identities shape and are shaped by socio-cultural and discursive ideologies and material reality.

In this dissertation I make a case for multigenre essays to be made more available to students in all disciplines, but especially to students in freshman composition classes. I also present the results of a case study where I acted as teacher/researcher investigating how students experience the writing and reading of multigenre essays. By multigenre essays I mean essays that include creative elements such as lists, letters, and interviews, in addition to traditional academic prose. By combining creative elements with academic prose I propose that writers will be able to express more of what they want to say in an essay by using both analytical and associative ways of thinking. The benefits of having students write multigenre essays are three-fold: (1) when students are given the option of including such things as dialogs, poems, and vignettes in addition to standard academic prose, they gain in rhetorical flexibility---experimenting with and finding the right genres and combination of genres that best fits what they want to say; (2) they also gain in their ability to take a more personal stance on an issue by having more options for positioning themselves in reference to a given topic; and (3) they gain in their ability to push at the perceived boundaries of a discourse. In this dissertation I discuss how eight students in an experimental writing class responded to the writing and reading of multigenre essays, to what extent they found them worthwhile and/or pleasurable, their thoughts in reference to audience and subject matter, how they used multigenre essays for cognitive travel, and how writing multigenre essays gave them a way to push against the perceived boundaries of their discipline. My data come from four essays the students wrote, reader response assignments, reflection letters, and from interviews with five of the students. Overall students found the writing and reading of multigenre essays more difficult but more satisfying than that of standard academic prose. In some cases multigenre essays made them think in new ways about audience and subject matter; for almost all students, multigenre essays made them think differently about an essay's form and how a change in form allowed them to position themselves differently within their discipline.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Bowling Green State University, 2007. / Document formatted into pages; contains xii, 242 p. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2000. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 295-301). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2000. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 295-301). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (M.A.)--California State University, Dominguez Hills, 1999. / Typescript (photocopy). "Fall 1999." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 25-26) and abstract.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 375-398).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994. / Vita. Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 198-213). Also available via the Internet.