This essay argues that a trend in histories of literary and writing studies is to bifurcate the origins of the fields and so engage in those modernist narrative fallacies described by Jean-Francois Lyotard. Such works limit our understanding of past practices and the longstanding connections between disciplinarity and labor. (Contains 2 notes.)

An outside evaluator can help an institution open up dialogue and bring about change by focusing the attention of top administrators, faculty, and students on goals seen as important by groups within the institution. Bringing in an outside evaluator to colleges and universities, English departments and writing programs, can be a touchy, often…