Writing with authority : students' roles as writers in cross-national perspective / David Foster.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Foster, David, 1938 August 17-

Series:

Studies in writing & rhetoric

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Academic writing--Cross-cultural studies.

Academic writing.

Academic writing--Study and teaching (Higher)--United States.

Academic writing--Study and teaching (Higher)--Germany.

Rhetoric--Study and teaching (Higher)--United States.

Rhetoric.

Rhetoric--Study and teaching (Higher)--Germany.

Rhetoric--Study and teaching (Higher).

Academic writing--Study and teaching (Higher).

Cross-cultural studies.

Germany.

United States.

Physical Description:

xxiii, 193 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

Carbondale : Southern Illinois University Press, [2006]

Summary:

Writing with Authority: Students' Roles as Writers in Cross-National Perspective offers a comparison of student writers in two university cultures-one German and one American. David Foster demonstrates the effectiveness of using cross-cultural comparisons to assess differences in literacy activities and suggests teaching approaches that will help American students better develop their roles as writers in knowledge-based communities. He proposes that American universities make stronger efforts to nurture the autonomy of their undergraduates as learner-writers and to create apprenticeship experiences that more closely reflect the realities of working in the academic community.

This comparative analysis identifies crucial differences in the ways German and American students learn to become academic writers, emphasizing two significant issues: the importance of self-directed, long-term planning and goal setting in developing knowledge-based projects and the impact of time structures on students' writing practices. Foster suggests that students learn to write as knowledge makers, developing cumulative, recursive task development as reflexive writing practices. He argues for the full integration of extended, self-managed, knowledge-based writing tasks into the American undergraduate curriculum from the onset of college study.

A course model incorporates significant, self-directed writing projects to help students build sustainable roles as transformative writers, outlines "change goals" to help teachers develop curricular structures that support cumulative writing projects across the undergraduate curriculum, and shows how teachers can develop self-directed writing projects in a variety of program environments.

Contents:

Introduction

Studying student writers in cross-national contexts

The work of writing: student authorship roles in cross-national perspective

Shaping transformative writers: priorities for change

Teaching transformative writing

Building transformative opportunities in institutional contexts.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 185-190) and index.

ISBN:

0809327074

0809327082

OCLC:

62393001

Publisher Number:

9780809327072

9780809327089