The six papers in this journal issue were presented at the 1977 spring meeting of the Missouri Association of Teachers of English, the theme of which was "Tradition and the Popular Arts." The papers deal with suggestions for texts and equipment for a film-production course; formal writing in the language arts curriculum; the teaching of a mass-media language arts curriculum at the secondary level; teaching science fiction to secondary students; a description of an English honors program at a Missouri high school; and a high school humanities program. (GW)