Books by Sandra L . Tarabochia
Writers: Craft and Context, 2021
The words of a reviewer for this, the third issue of Writers: Craft & Context,
perfectly capture ... more The words of a reviewer for this, the third issue of Writers: Craft & Context,
perfectly capture the spirit of the writing gathered here; this collection “advances our understanding of how personal, embodied reality always bears down on our ‘work.’” While most of us know this, of course, the pieces in this issue “remin[d] us that writing is a tool for making sense and coping, not just for keeping our jobs.”We, too, are so grateful for this message, “especially now during this cultural moment shaped by so much loss and grief.” As editors working with the writers and reviewers involved in this issue, we marveled at the power of writing to comfort, inspire, connect,
heal, and transform. As many of the contributors attest, traditional academic spaces do not always invite or even allow writing that works in these ways. We can almost hear in the submissions a big sigh of relief for the opportunity to write something more authentic or creative or cathartic than a traditional research article.
Writers: Craft and Context, 2020
Our collective vision for Writers: Craft & Context began to germinate 1.5 years ago when the thre... more Our collective vision for Writers: Craft & Context began to germinate 1.5 years ago when the three of us looked around at the state of academic publishing. Like many, we were frustrated with the lack of equitable representation on editorial teams, editorial boards, among published authors, and in accepted expressions of scholarly writing. We saw an opportunity for those of us who write, teach writing, and study writers to draw more fully on the dynamic types of composing we do to more fully represent, support, and value the lived experience of writers. We craved a collaborative, generative space for scholars of all stripes-from across disciplines, from within and beyond the academy-to share and learn from poetry, interviews, letters, creative nonfiction, pedagogical reflection, parable, architecture, and more. Pursuing our vision for such a space was necessary and urgent, we realized, because although the field of writing studies boasts a long history of resisting standardization, those values do not always play out in published scholarship. The three of us were aware of meaningful work, including our own, that would never "fit" in the current landscape of scholarly publishing because it refuses to be standardized. That reality was troubling on many levels. Of course the field is missing out by failing to be shaped by those voices and projects; scholarly conversations remain untouched by insights that matter now more than ever; scores of readers are resigned to the fact that they will never read their stories, see their realities in the field's published literature. What's more, these "misfit" writers are forced to suffer a traumatizing, inhumane cycle of submission and rejection, compelled to try again and again to fit their feet into misshapen shoes crafted by a meritocratic system that was never designed to work for them.
WAC Clearinghouse Perspectives on Writing Series, 2020
Developed from presentations at the 2018 International Writing Across the Curriculum conference, ... more Developed from presentations at the 2018 International Writing Across the Curriculum conference, this collection documents a key moment in the history of WAC, foregrounding connection and diversity as keys to the sustainability of the WAC movement in the face of new and long-standing challenges. Contributors reflect on the history and ongoing evolution of WAC, honoring grassroots efforts while establishing a more unified structure of collaborative leadership and mentorship. The chapters in this collection offer a rich variety of practices, pedagogies, mindsets, and methodologies for readers who are invested in using writing in a wide range of institutional and disciplinary contexts. Boldly engaging such pressing topics as translingualism, anti-racism, emotional labor, and learning analytics, the 18 chapters collected here testify to WAC's durability, persistence, and resilience in an ever-changing educational landscape.
National Council of Teachers of English, Studies in Writing and Rhetoric Series, 2017
Reframing the Relational generates new understandings of the communication challenges and opportu... more Reframing the Relational generates new understandings of the communication challenges and opportunities that enable and constrain conversations about (teaching) writing. It offers literacy educators adaptable strategies and flexible habits of mind for communicating about teaching and learning and for embracing the pedagogical potential of the cross-curricular literacy interactions we encounter every day.
Papers by Sandra L . Tarabochia
The WAC Clearinghouse; University Press of Colorado eBooks, Jun 10, 2024
The Perspectives on Writing series addresses writing studies in a broad sense. Consistent with th... more The Perspectives on Writing series addresses writing studies in a broad sense. Consistent with the wide ranging approaches characteristic of teaching and scholarship in writing across the curriculum, the series presents works that take divergent perspectives on working as a writer, teaching writing, administering writing programs, and studying writing in its various forms. The WAC Clearinghouse and University Press of Colorado are collaborating so that these books will be widely available through free digital distribution and low-cost print editions. The publishers and the series editors are committed to the principle that knowledge should freely circulate and have embraced the use of technology to support open access to scholarly work.
Peitho: Journal of the Coalition of Feminist Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition, 2021
This article utilizes poetic inquiry as a feminist research methodology to humanize and shed ligh... more This article utilizes poetic inquiry as a feminist research methodology to humanize and shed light on faculty writer development. More specifically, found poetry—a radical strategy for qualitative inquiry that blends humanities and social science approaches—is used to examine and represent the experience of resilience (adversity and perseverance) among faculty writers. It is widely acknowledged that faculty writers struggle to produce scholarship in a “publish or perish” climate intensified by the neoliberal agenda of higher education, especially women and scholars from marginalized groups who disproportionately suffer the effects of racist, sexist, ableist, homophobic, colonialist institutions. However, despite a few studies revealing best practices of publishing scholars, we know relatively little about the lived experience of faculty writers. In order to surface embodied realties of writers, interview data from an ongoing longitudinal study of faculty writers is presented as a composite found poem. Drawing on feminist critiques, the data poem is analyzed to reveal problems with resilience as a framework for faculty writer support. Critically interrogating writers’ experiences of adversity, the article suggests how mentors (institutionally appointed mentors, chairs, tenure committees, journal editors, and peers) can change the discourse and practice around resilience in our support of faculty writers.
Written Communication
Writing and communication researchers are in the early stages of developing procedures for reusin... more Writing and communication researchers are in the early stages of developing procedures for reusing and maximizing the analytical potentials of qualitative data. Contributing to this effort, we critically reflect on our methodological decision-making process in developing innovative procedures for cross-analyzing two distinct studies. Our reflection responds to the need for published guidance on how to undertake methodological adaptation, the lack of which limits opportunities for other researchers to develop new study procedures to address complex problems. By discussing how and why we made particular methodological choices and adaptations in our collaborative study of faculty and doctoral student writers, we propose collaborative secondary data analysis as a fruitful avenue for qualitative writing researchers and show its potential to enact richer and more equitable research designs.
Routledge eBooks, Jul 5, 2022
Developed from presentations at the 2018 International Writing Across the Curriculum conference, ... more Developed from presentations at the 2018 International Writing Across the Curriculum conference, this collection documents a key moment in the history of WAC, foregrounding connection and diversity as keys to the sustainability of the WAC movement in the face of new and long-standing challenges. Contributors reflect on the history and ongoing evolution of WAC, honoring grassroots efforts while establishing a more unified structure of collaborative leadership and mentorship. The chapters in this collection offer a rich variety of practices, pedagogies, mindsets, and methodologies for readers who are invested in using writing in a wide range of institutional and disciplinary contexts. Boldly engaging such pressing topics as translingualism, anti-racism, emotional labor, and learning analytics, the 18 chapters collected here testify to WAC's durability, persistence, and resilience in an ever-changing educational landscape.
Across the Disciplines, 2013
Interdisciplinary collaboration is a cornerstone of WAC/WID efforts and integral to productive re... more Interdisciplinary collaboration is a cornerstone of WAC/WID efforts and integral to productive relationships between writing specialists and disciplinary content experts. Such collaboration, however, suffers from well-documented challenges. In this article, I use textual discourse analysis to build a deeper understanding of the discursive spaces through which interdisciplinary collaboration takes place. Drawing on Norman Fairclough's (2001) framework for interactional analysis, I examine the linguistic features of a handout I composed to facilitate a WID meeting with biology faculty. Applying Fairclough's elements of social practices-representing, relating, identifying, and valuing-I trace connections between language use and themes in WAC/WID scholarship in order to investigate the complex process by which writing specialists operationalize disciplinary values in local contexts. My analysis shows how linguistic and rhetorical properties of communication can enable interdisciplinary relationships in WAC/WID contexts by strategically bridging disciplinary differences, as well as constrain relationships by confounding participant roles and responsibilities. Mapping links between discourse, language, and social interaction, I argue, allows writing specialists to critically examine our communicative strategies and their impact on the professional relationships we broker, empowering us to more creatively navigate the challenge of interdisciplinary collaboration.
Writing & Pedagogy, 2018
This article investigates the learning trajectories of graduate students and early career faculty... more This article investigates the learning trajectories of graduate students and early career faculty – a group we refer to as emerging scholars. Taking a developmental perspective, our mixed-methods study employs surveys and interviews to understand emerging scholars’ writing needs and experiences. This research is significant because although literature suggests emerging scholars struggle with new writing practices, perceptions, and identities, researchers rarely take a developmental perspective on the learning needs of emerging scholars, which ultimately limits access to the educational enterprise and perpetuates a gatekeeping culture in higher education. Further, no studies that we know of consider graduate student and faculty writers’ needs in relation to one another. In this article, we present an innovative method for cross-analyzing data from these two groups in ways that reveal recurring/diverging features of lifelong writing development. Our preliminary findings reveal connections and variations in the needs and experiences of these two groups that could inform pedagogy, programming, and institutional policy geared toward graduate student and faculty writers. Finally, we discuss methodological implications for studying groups of writers with proximate developmental relationships and explain how future applications of our method will contribute to research on writing development across the lifespan.
Proquest Llc, 2010
for your encouragement, support, and tireless engagement with my work. My past and present commit... more for your encouragement, support, and tireless engagement with my work. My past and present committee members, Chris Gallagher, Joy Ritchie, and Margaret Latta for offering your courses as spaces of wonder, experimentation, and deep inquiry and for modeling the revisionary spirit as teachers and scholars. The amazing women of Andrews 202, Elaine, Sue, LeAnn, Linda, and Janet for your cheerful demeanor and constant patience. Students, TAs, and faculty of the biology department, for welcoming me into your classrooms and your discipline, and challenging me to see teaching and writing in new ways. Committed writing group members Whitney Douglas, Eric Turley, Dana Kinzy, and most especially Alison Friedow. Your thoughtful feedback and stimulating conversation continually inspired and energized my thinking. My family, Tony, Linda, Robin, and Marty, for having faith in me and supporting my decision to be a "lifetime student." And to my husband Craig and son Gabriel for giving me reason to persevere, reminding me what really matters, and for making me laugh when I needed it most. v
Composition Studies, 2020
Writing researchers know relatively little about the needs and experiences of faculty writers. As... more Writing researchers know relatively little about the needs and experiences of faculty writers. As a result, institutional approaches to improving scholarly productivity fail to account for vital components of writerly development and in doing so limit access to the academic enterprise. Drawing on an interview-based longitudinal study of faculty writers and the construct of selfauthorship from the field of human development, this article reveals epistemological, interpersonal and intrapersonal dimensions of faculty writer development. Invoking Paul Prior, I call for inclusive support strategies that acknowledge and sponsor faculty writers' complex trajectories of becoming.
In this article, we investigate a new construct for conceptualizing learning transfer with writin... more In this article, we investigate a new construct for conceptualizing learning transfer with writing knowledge: Transformative Experience (TE). With origins in educational psychology, TE has been effective for promoting transfer with scientific concepts in previous research, but not yet considered in relation to writing or other presumably procedural subjects. To investigate the usefulness of TE for revealing new dimensions of writer development, we present a brief case study focused on faculty members writing for scholarly publication. We use qualitative responses to a survey about faculty members’ experiences in a formal writing group to illustrate the three dimensions of TE in the context of writer development: active use, expansion of perception, and experiential value. Although we study advanced faculty writers, findings have implications for teaching and learning writing more broadly. Specifically, we argue that using TE as a framework for interpreting what learners do with writ...
This volume emerged out of a desire to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Internationa... more This volume emerged out of a desire to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the International Writing Across the Curriculum (IWAC) conference and mark this significant moment in time. When the call for proposals to host the 2018 conference came out, Margaret and Lesley were working together in the Office of University Writing (OUW) at Auburn University. IWAC had played a significant role in launching and sustaining the still-young WAC program at Auburn, and both OUW staff and other campus stakeholders agreed that it was time to give back to the community that had been so helpful to Auburn's writing initiative. The OUW staff appreciated the wide range of work represented at IWAC that happens at all levels and in all disciplines, work that supports a broad understanding of literate practices, so they proposed the theme of "Making Connections" and sought to continue the tradition of bringing many people with different types of expertise out of their institutional silos to learn together. When Margaret realized that the 2018 conference would mark its twenty-fifth anniversary, she suggested that Lesley invite other early-career colleagues whose work focused on WAC to co-edit a volume to commemorate this important milestone. Sandra and Andrea accepted Lesley's invitation, and the results of their collaboration are in the pages that follow. Like the IWAC 2018 conference at Auburn University, this volume seeks to connect the diverse ideas, practices, teachers,
Diverse Approaches to Teaching, Learning, and Writing Across the Curriculum: IWAC at 25
Written Communication, 2021
Writing and communication researchers are in the early stages of developing procedures for reusin... more Writing and communication researchers are in the early stages of developing procedures for reusing and maximizing the analytical potentials of qualitative data. Contributing to this effort, we critically reflect on our methodological decision-making process in developing innovative procedures for cross-analyzing two distinct studies. Our reflection responds to the need for published guidance on how to undertake methodological adaptation, the lack of which limits opportunities for other researchers to develop new study procedures to address complex problems. By discussing how and why we made particular methodological choices and adaptations in our collaborative study of faculty and doctoral student writers, we propose collaborative secondary data analysis as a fruitful avenue for qualitative writing researchers and show its potential to enact richer and more equitable research designs.
Composition Studies, 2020
Writing researchers know relatively little about the needs and experiences of faculty writers. As... more Writing researchers know relatively little about the needs and experiences of faculty writers. As a result, institutional approaches to improving scholarly productivity fail to account for vital components of writerly development and in doing so limit access to the academic enterprise. Drawing on an interview-based longitudinal study of faculty writers and the construct of self-authorship from the field of human development, this article reveals epistemological, interpersonal and intrapersonal dimensions of faculty writer development. Invoking Paul Prior, I call for inclusive support strategies that acknowledge and sponsor faculty writers’ complex trajectories of becoming.
Diverse Approaches to Teaching, Learning, and Writing Across the Curriculum: IWAC at 25 , 2020
Writing Across the Curriculum scholars are well positioned to improve educational access and main... more Writing Across the Curriculum scholars are well positioned to improve educational access and maintain the free exchange of ideas by developing pedagogy, policy, and programming rooted in research on faculty and doctoral student writers' needs and experiences. This chapter uses results from a study of emerging scholars' writing development to examine the effects of emotional labor in mentorship experiences. Although emotion is a natural aspect of writing, learning, and development , our analysis reveals how institutional discourses impose norma-tive expectations that create additional labor for writers in managing emotions; this labor impacts some groups of writers more significantly than others. The chapter concludes with recommendations and structural interventions for revising writing mentorship practices. Historically, WAC researchers have not focused on graduate student and faculty writers. Two decades ago, WAC for the New Millennium (McLeod et al., 2001)-much like this volume-sought to document a moment in time. In that collection , "faculty writers" did not appear in the index at all. Faculty were treated as potential allies in cross-curricular writing instruction but not as writers in their own right. Graduate student writers garnered slightly more attention. Thankfully , interest in graduate student and faculty writers has expanded. The call for increased attention to graduate student mentorship, in particular, is represented in this collection; Rachael Cayley (this volume) describes a genre systems approach to mentoring publication-based thesis writers and Alisa Russell, Jake Chase, Justin Nicholes, and Allie Sockwell Johnston (this volume) highlight the need for mentorship as a factor leading to the founding of WAC's growing graduate
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Books by Sandra L . Tarabochia
perfectly capture the spirit of the writing gathered here; this collection “advances our understanding of how personal, embodied reality always bears down on our ‘work.’” While most of us know this, of course, the pieces in this issue “remin[d] us that writing is a tool for making sense and coping, not just for keeping our jobs.”We, too, are so grateful for this message, “especially now during this cultural moment shaped by so much loss and grief.” As editors working with the writers and reviewers involved in this issue, we marveled at the power of writing to comfort, inspire, connect,
heal, and transform. As many of the contributors attest, traditional academic spaces do not always invite or even allow writing that works in these ways. We can almost hear in the submissions a big sigh of relief for the opportunity to write something more authentic or creative or cathartic than a traditional research article.
Papers by Sandra L . Tarabochia
perfectly capture the spirit of the writing gathered here; this collection “advances our understanding of how personal, embodied reality always bears down on our ‘work.’” While most of us know this, of course, the pieces in this issue “remin[d] us that writing is a tool for making sense and coping, not just for keeping our jobs.”We, too, are so grateful for this message, “especially now during this cultural moment shaped by so much loss and grief.” As editors working with the writers and reviewers involved in this issue, we marveled at the power of writing to comfort, inspire, connect,
heal, and transform. As many of the contributors attest, traditional academic spaces do not always invite or even allow writing that works in these ways. We can almost hear in the submissions a big sigh of relief for the opportunity to write something more authentic or creative or cathartic than a traditional research article.
graduate student and faculty writers. Finally, we discuss methodological implications for studying groups of writers with proximate developmental relationships and explain how future applications of our method will contribute to research on writing development across the lifespan.
My presentation described my process of developing a book manuscript for publication. I explained my decision to design and carry out a new research project post-graduate school and the subsequent challenge to align tenure clock with publication timeline. In particular, I discussed drafting a proposal during data analysis, considering reader/editor responses to the book proposal while drafting the manuscript, and using comments on the full manuscript to refine my vision for the project.
Relational: A Pedagogical Ethic for Cross-Curricular Literacy Work.'