As a special topics course in composition, ENEX 495: "Women, Writing, and Rhetoric" is a program elective for graduate students in the English department, English majors, Gender and Women's Studies students, and a writing-intensive elective for non-majors at The University of Montana, a doctoral granting institution located in the Rocky Mountains in western Montana with about 12,000 undergraduates and 1,700 graduate students. ENEX 495 is described in the university catalog as "English: Expository Writing. Offered intermittently. Experimental offerings of visiting professors, experimental offerings of new courses, or one-time offerings of current topics." The course is capped at 24 students and has a prerequisite of first year composition for undergraduates. Prior to this offering, the course had never been taught. The reason the course had not been taught is emblematic of material conditions that reflect the fact that there is currently no place for composition as a discipline in the cultural imagination of the department. In addition to the fact that the course fulfills no departmental requirements, advising materials do not include advanced ENEX courses as elective options. For most students, staff and faculty, the designation "ENEX" calls up negative associations attached to the required general education writing course not a potential area of study. This situation is in part due to the fact that there had never been a need or desire on the part of a faculty member to teach any ENEX courses. The author contends that her experience teaching this course twice in the past year; reflecting on students' performances, informal responses to readings, assignments and activities; and gathering insights through course evaluations have reinforced her commitment to "Women, Writing, and Rhetoric" and underscored the necessary work to better position the course and teach it at her institution.