Fracturing essayist conventions in comp I
Candace Mitchell · Revista Linguagem & Ensino · 2019
This article first analyzes the differing responses of three individuals who have read the same first draft of a paper assigned in an ESL college composition class. The analysis highlights the multiple ways in which a text can be read and how these “readings” are ideologically driven. The first reader reads the text from the perspective of a prescriptivist, the second reads for meaning though is sidetracked by mistaken assumptions regarding text structure, and the third reads the text for what it is: a poem. The author then provides a detailed thematic and linguistic analysis of the same student text and, in so doing, fractures preconceived notions of how meaning is conveyed, cohesion maintained, and sense made of experience, in this instance, when a student has been asked to write a memoir. The highly detailed analysis illuminates the complexity inherent in a text that in some contexts might draw little, if any, attention other than a request for a rewrite. In theend, the article raises concerns about the constraints academic essayist literacy imposes on some of our most basic and potentially, creative writers.