Comments on: Crowley and Class http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/09/24/crowley-and-class/ faults | sins | abuses Fri, 21 Nov 2008 13:54:26 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.1 By: john http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/09/24/crowley-and-class/#comment-229 john Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000 http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/archives/2003/09/24/crowley-and-class/#comment-229 "Current-traditional" is one of those terms that irritates the hell out of me. I first encountered it in linguistics as a way of describing the kind of grammar taught by those who didn't study--or at least buy into-- modern grammar systems. Then the term gets extended in this way by compositionists to characterize some set of practices that presumably are widespread and presumably not up to date. But most compositionists are data averse, so these claims are based on anecdote and one's personal institutional experience. Like you, Mike, I have the impression that lots of high school programs emphasize the 5-paragraph essay, a form that seems to have developed in the 60s or later. I have no recollection of it in high school or college (completed 1960) or even in my first years as a graduate teaching assistant. It's a refinement of the old intro-body-conclusion, which had it's expression in the military model of presentation: tell 'em what you're gonna say, say it, and tell 'em you said it. I've speculated that the 5 paragraph essay was a simplified pedagogy developed by teachers in the face of the baby boomers. The schools get overwhelmed by numbers and they find simple, mass techniques. But I don't really know if that's the case. It's another empirical question that could be a great dissertation topic, except I don't think comp theorists want to do anything heavily empirical. I guess my point here is that Crowley's suggestion that the "current-traditional" practices reflect genteel literacy practices and I'm thinking that's not a sufficient explanation. Teaching practices are more likely to emerge from specific circumstances than from philosophical claims, IMHO. John “Current-traditional” is one of those terms that irritates the hell out of me. I first encountered it in linguistics as a way of describing the kind of grammar taught by those who didn’t study–or at least buy into– modern grammar systems. Then the term gets extended in this way by compositionists to characterize some set of practices that presumably are widespread and presumably not up to date. But most compositionists are data averse, so these claims are based on anecdote and one’s personal institutional experience.

Like you, Mike, I have the impression that lots of high school programs emphasize the 5-paragraph essay, a form that seems to have developed in the 60s or later. I have no recollection of it in high school or college (completed 1960) or even in my first years as a graduate teaching assistant.

It’s a refinement of the old intro-body-conclusion, which had it’s expression in the military model of presentation: tell ‘em what you’re gonna say, say it, and tell ‘em you said it. I’ve speculated that the 5 paragraph essay was a simplified pedagogy developed by teachers in the face of the baby boomers. The schools get overwhelmed by numbers and they find simple, mass techniques. But I don’t really know if that’s the case. It’s another empirical question that could be a great dissertation topic, except I don’t think comp theorists want to do anything heavily empirical.

I guess my point here is that Crowley’s suggestion that the “current-traditional” practices reflect genteel literacy practices and I’m thinking that’s not a sufficient explanation. Teaching practices are more likely to emerge from specific circumstances than from philosophical claims, IMHO.

John

]]> By: Mike http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/09/24/crowley-and-class/#comment-230 Mike Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000 http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/archives/2003/09/24/crowley-and-class/#comment-230 John, I'm with you on not liking the term -- it seems to me to be another data-averse composition inexactitude that, as you say, one uses to express dislike for those "practices that presumably are widespread and presumably not up to date". And I actually had the same sense you did about the 5-paragraph theme, and one semester used my old soldier's basic skills training manual to show students how the 5-paragraph theme has the same exact structure of the block of instruction on how to clear a jam or call for fire. It showed, I thought, that the 5-paragraph theme is basically idiot-proof (or soldier-proof) and powerful, but also incredibly limited. And also really easy to grade. And I think the power and the template sense and the ease in grading -- the simplicity of the mass technique, as you say -- are what have made it such a tenacious and enduring form. As far as the teaching practices and philosophical claims -- I think I'd go back to Plato (I'm with Alfred North Whitehead here in his claim that Western philosophy is a set of footnotes to Plato) to argue that philosophy itself emerges from specific circumstances in an attempt to find something that holds true for any number of specific circumstances. I think teaching, if it's to have any hope of being something other than purely instrumental, <em>must</em> at times take the long view, and look to theory as well as to the quotidian (and essential) realities of practice. John, I’m with you on not liking the term — it seems to me to be another data-averse composition inexactitude that, as you say, one uses to express dislike for those “practices that presumably are widespread and presumably not up to date”.

And I actually had the same sense you did about the 5-paragraph theme, and one semester used my old soldier’s basic skills training manual to show students how the 5-paragraph theme has the same exact structure of the block of instruction on how to clear a jam or call for fire. It showed, I thought, that the 5-paragraph theme is basically idiot-proof (or soldier-proof) and powerful, but also incredibly limited. And also really easy to grade. And I think the power and the template sense and the ease in grading — the simplicity of the mass technique, as you say — are what have made it such a tenacious and enduring form.

As far as the teaching practices and philosophical claims — I think I’d go back to Plato (I’m with Alfred North Whitehead here in his claim that Western philosophy is a set of footnotes to Plato) to argue that philosophy itself emerges from specific circumstances in an attempt to find something that holds true for any number of specific circumstances. I think teaching, if it’s to have any hope of being something other than purely instrumental, must at times take the long view, and look to theory as well as to the quotidian (and essential) realities of practice.

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