This article begins by asking readers to make a modest supposition: HBCUs are, perhaps, one of the last frontiers for sustained feminist praxis-administratively and pedagogically. The authors write that they struggle with the situation, and find it both lamentable and paradoxical, since many HBCUs were originally founded and/or administered by…

Henry W. Sams served on the editorial boards of "College English," "College Composition and Communication," and the "Journal of General Education." He was able to influence the kinds of articles on composition and rhetoric being published throughout this period, and he and his colleagues increased broad awareness of…

This dissertation examines how nomenclature and the act of naming shapes disciplinary identities for scholars and teachers of rhetoric and composition. The discipline is named differently by many of its members, sometimes called "composition studies," "writing studies," "composition and rhetoric," "rhetorical…

In the last 15 years, writing center scholars have increasingly called for more evidence to validate writing centers' practices. Work by Paula Gillespie (2002), Neal Lerner (2009), and Isabelle Thompson et al. (2009) underscore this need. Missing from these discussions, however, is a thorough understanding of the past and current research…

This study yields a broader understanding of the "development of rhetorical instruction in the American college" (Gold 15) by focusing on the composition programs at two little studied universities. This dissertation addresses the descriptions of composition courses as these appear in the course catalogs of two different kinds of…

This essay provides an account of The Ohio State University's (OSU) rhetoric department during the tenure of Joseph Villiers Denney, arguing that he appropriated and repurposed national trends in education and rhetoric in ways that complicate the narrative of rhetoric and composition's decline in the late nineteenth century. In this essay, the…

The number of first-year writing and writing­-across-the-curriculum programs has been increasing at institutions across the United States, but a similar rise has not been seen in the growth of concentrations in rhetoric and writing as an undergraduate major or minor. In this program profile, the authors describe how the Discourse Studies faculty…

In this article, the authors use two sets of terms--"chronos/kairos" and strategy/tactic--to frame the way they tell the story or the "case" of Professional Writing and Rhetoric's (PWR's) developing identity at Elon University. In doing so, they offer to the readers a framework for identity development that is portable across contexts. The authors…

The authors describe their individual and collective experiences reconstructing their New Orleans-based university composition program in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. They emphasize how the concept of "floating foundations" helps account for changes in their students' interests, and they suggest that this idea is applicable to the…

A symposium in the November 2006 issue of "College English" addresses the question, "What should college English be?" In this article, the author presents his answer to this question--it should be a functional approach to English studies. By English studies he means everything that is done in English departments. Most English departments teach…

Summarizes the current state of the English curriculum and calls for a renewed emphasis on rhetoric and student writing for its own sake. (HTH)

Contends that rhetorical study is the key to the integration of reading and writing in the college English department and discusses problems created by pigeonholing literature by periods and genres. (DD)

Argues that, although a split between literature and composition may create major problems and involve major risks, it can and must be done for the future of the profession. (JK)

Argues that the antagonism which exists between rhetoricians and literary scholars derives partly from the disciplines' differing approaches to the act of writing. Suggests that literature and composition can most clearly be seen as compatible arts within the framework of the theory and history of rhetoric. (MS)