Writing Analytically, 6th Edition - Rosenwasser, David & Stephen, Jill.original_ [80]
The moment: A reading is a response to the world conditioned by the writer’s particular moment in time. In your attempt to figure out not only what a piece says but where it is coming from (the causes of its having been written in the first place and the positions it works to establish), history is significant. When was the piece written? Where? What else was going on at the time that might have shaped the writer’s ideas and attitudes?
The Pitch, the Complaint, and the Moment: Two Brief Examples
Here are two examples of student writing in response to the request that they locate the pitch, the complaint, and the moment for a famous essay in the field of Composition and Rhetoric, “Inventing the University” by David Bartholomae.
Bartholomae’s complaint seems to center around the idea that writing is typically taught at a grammatical, not intellectual level. ‘Basic’ writers are identified by their sentence level compositional errors, not by the content of their ideas or ability to present a complex argument. Bartholomae argues that students must be drawn into the language and mindset of academia before they have the authority to confidently expand upon more complicated ideas. Students are expected to fluently participate in academic discourse long before they have the authority to pull it off with ease. Therefore, students should be familiarized with the world of academia and led through the preliminary steps towards becoming proficient in its language. This is the only way to make them more authoritative writers.
And here is another example that treats the moment in particular:
The moment, or the specific time in which the essay was written, offers some valuable insight into what might have shaped Bartholomae’s perspective. First, it is important to note the other writers and thinkers Bartholomae cites throughout the essay. Take the author’s frequent mention of writer Pat Bizzell whom Bartholomae deems “one of the most important scholars now writing on ‘basic writers’” and whom he recognizes as “owing a great debt to.” He credits Bizzell with seeing how difficult it is for young writers to learn the complex vocabularies and conventions of academic discourse.
There are most likely other, more broadly cultural influences at work as well, such as the American political scene in 1985. In 1984 Ronald Reagan was re-elected president. His presidency and the conservative climate it fostered sparked change in Americans’ attitude toward education. Reagan’s policies mandated spending cuts and, it can reasonably be assumed, invited certain antiacademic and more pre-professional attitudes. In this moment, then, Bartholomae’s concerns about higher education and the need for students to gain access into the privileged world of the educated begins to make more sense.
Audience Analysis: A Brief Example
Consider the following paragraph of student writing on the same essay, this time focused on how the essay’s author establishes his relationship with his target audience. Here is the assignment the writer was responding to: Write a brief analysis of the essay’s rhetoric—the various methods it employs to gain acceptance with its target audience. (a) Who is the target audience? How can you tell? Cite and analyze evidence. (b) What decisions has the author made on how best to “sell” his argument to this audience? How do you know?
Bartholomae often uses the inclusive “us” to describe academia, putting the reader (presumably, academics) above the level of those being discussed. Students must be taught “to speak our language,