International Advances in Writing Research: Cultures, Places, Measures

(1 review)

Charles Bazerman, University of California, Santa Barbara

Chris Dean, University of California, Santa Barbara

Jessica Singer Early, Arizona State University

Karen Lunsford, University of California, Santa Barbara

Suzie Null, Fort Lewis College

Paul Rogers, George Mason University

Amanda Stansell, University of California, Santa Barbara

ISBN 13: 9781602353541

Publisher: WAC Clearinghouse

Language: English

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eBook

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Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs
CC BY-NC-ND

Reviews

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Reviewed by Estansialdo Barrera, Assistant Professor, Louisiana State University on 2/8/17

Comprehensiveness rating: 4 see less

Overall, significant concepts related to writing are addressed throughout the selected sections and chosen pieces that make up the chapters. In attending to the parameters of the title—International Advances in Writing Research: Cultures, Places, and Measures—the editors did an excellent job of curating a representation that offers insight into those three distinct categories and do so in the six sections of the text. The table of contents makes it easy to find content. The one thing that the book does not have is an index, which would make navigation of the text much easier and user-friendly. Also, in the e-book version, the section heading is at the bottom of a page with the chapters of the section on the next page. I felt that might cause some confusion.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

The chapters presented accurate information. It is important to note that these chapters were conference presentations that went through a blind peer review process and were then reviewed again by the editorial board. I feel that this process helped in vetting the quality of the contributions.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

Although all aspects of writing and the modes in which we produce writing constantly evolve, the content represented in the chapters will remain relevant as models to draw from and will also inspire future research and ways of exploring writing—especially on an international level and with respect to culture, setting, and assessment.

Clarity rating: 5

The chapters selected represent quality academic writing consistent with the level of research and the reputation of the editorial team. Again, since each chapter is written by contributing authors, the writing style varies some, but this does not interfere with the clarity.

Consistency rating: 5

The text is as consistent as an edited book with chapters written by various authors can be.

Modularity rating: 5

The book is organized into six sections that could be addressed as a whole or easily broken and used according to the specific needs of a course or even across courses.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

The text offers a sensible organization as it moves from pedagogy and assessment to writing in diverse settings and for specific purposes.

Interface rating: 4

I noted no significant interface issues. All of the chapters are clear and it is easy to navigate through the e-book. Again, the one issue I saw was in the table of contents in the e-book because the section heading was at the bottom of one page with the actual chapters of the section on the next page.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

I found no grammatical errors in the sections or select chapters of the book that I read.

Cultural Relevance rating: 5

Given that the book is about international advances in writing and one of the areas being addressed is culture, I would have to say this book does an excellent job of not only representing diversity, but it also provides insights into how writing is occurring within diverse settings.

Comments

This book offers substantial contributions with respect to the six sections it is addressing and there is enough variance among the chapters to use this book at different levels of a graduate course or program. The international perspective also helps to expand the scope of most research in writing and offers new paths in which to explore writing.

Introduction, Charles Bazerman, Karen Lunsford, and Paul Rogers

Section 1. Pedagogical Approaches, Paul Rogers

Chapter 1. Academic Writing Instruction in Australian Tertiary Education: The Early Years, Kate Chanock
Chapter 2. Teacher's Perceptions of English Language Writing Instruction in China, Danling Fu and Marylou Matoush
Chapter 3. Access and Teachers' Perceptions of Professional Development in Writing, Sarah J. McCarthey, Rebecca L. Woodard, and Grace Kang
Chapter 4. Multimodality in Subtitling for the Deaf and the Hard-of-Hearing Education in Brazil, Vera Lúcia Santiago Araújo

Section 2. Assessment, Charles Bazerman

Chapter 5. Rethinking K-12 Writing Assessment to Support Best Instructional Practices, Paul Deane, John Sabatini, and Mary Fowles
Chapter 6. Automated Essay Scoring and The Search for Valid Writing Assessment, Andrew Klobucar, Paul Deane, Norbert Elliot, Chaitanya Ramineni, Perry Deess, and Alex Rudniy
Chapter 7. Construct Validity, Length, Score, and Time in Holistically Graded Writing Assessments: The Case against Automated Essay Scoring (AES), Les Perelman
Chapter 8. The Politics of Research and Assessment in Writing, Peggy O'Neill, Sandy Murphy, and Linda Adler-Kassner
Chapter 9. Prominent Feature Analysis: Linking Assessment and Instruction, Sherry S. Swain, Richard L. Graves, David T. Morse, and Kimberly J. Patterson
Chapter 10. "A Matter of Personal Taste": Teachers' Constructs of Writing Quality in the Secondary School English Classroom, Helen Lines

Section 3. Writing at the Borders of School and the World, Paul Rogers

Chapter 11. The Reality of Fiction-writing in Situations of Political Violence, Colette Daiute
Chapter 12. Naming in Pupil Writings (9 to 14 Years Old), Christina Romain and Marie-Noëlle Roubaud
Chapter 13. Does the Internet Connect Writing in and out of Educational Settings? Views of Norwegian students on the Threshold of Higher Education, Hávard Skaar
Chapter 14. Sponsoring "Green" Subjects: The World Bank's 2009 Youth Essay Contest, Anne E. Porter
Chapter 15. Metaphors of Writing and Intersections with Jamaican Male Identity, Carmeneta Jones and Vivette Milson-Whyte

Section 4. Writing the borders of school and professional practice, Karen Lunsford

Chapter 16. Transcending the Border between Classroom and Newsroom: An Inquiry into the Efficacy of Newspaper Editing Practices, Yvonne Stephens
Chapter 17. Teachers as Editors, Editors as Teachers, Angela M. Kohnen
Chapter 18. Academic Genres in University Contexts: An Investigation of Students' Book Reviews Writing as Classroom Assignments, Antonia Dilamar Araújo
Chapter 19. Learning Careers and Enculturation: Production of Scientific Papers by PhD Students in a Mexican Physiology Laboratory: An Exploratory Case Study, Alma Carrasco, Rollin Kent, and Nancy Keranen

Section 5. Scientific and Academic Practice, Charles Bazerman

Chapter 20. The Life Cycle of the Scientific Writer: An Investigation of the Senior Academic Scientist as Writer in Australasian Universities, Lisa Emerson
Chapter 21. Publication Practices and Multilingual Professionals in US Universities: Towards Critical Perspectives on Administration and Pedagogy, Missy Watson
Chapter 22. Immersed in the Game of Science: Beliefs, Emotions, and Strategies of NNES Scientists who Regularly Publish in English, Nancy Keranen, Fatima Encinas, and Charles Bazerman
Chapter 23. Critical Acts in Published and Unpublished Research Article Introductions in English: A Look into the Writing for Publication Process, Pilar Mur-Dueñas
Chapter 24. Towards an Integrative Unit of Analysis: Regulation Episodes in Expert Research Article Writing, Anna Iñesta and Montserrat Castelló
Chapter 25. Producing Scholarly Texts: Writing in English in a Politically Stigmatized Country, Mehdi Riazi
Chapter 26. The Evaluation of Conference Paper Proposals in Linguistics, Françoise Boch, Fanny Rinck, and Aurélie Nardy

Section 6. Cultures of Writing in the Workplace, Karen Lunsford

Chapter 27. Genre and Generic Labor, Clay Spinuzzi
Chapter 28. Construction of Caring Identities in the New Work Order, Zoe Nikolaidou and Anna-Malin Karlsson
Chapter 29. Online Book Reviews and Emerging Generic Conventions: A Situated Study of Authorship, Publishing, and Peer Review, Tim Laquintano
Chapter 30. Coming to Grips with Complexity: Dynamic Systems Theory in the Research of Newswriting, Daniel Perrin

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About the Book

The thirty chapters in this edited collection were selected from the more than 500 presentations at the Writing Research Across Borders II Conference in 2011. With representatives from more than forty countries, this conference gave rise to the International Society for the Advancement of Writing Research. The chapters selected for this collection represent cutting edge research on writing from all regions, organized around three themes—cultures, places, and measures. The authors report research that considers writing in all levels of schooling, in science, in the public sphere, and in the workplace, as well as at the relationship among these various places of writing. The authors also consider the cultures of writing—among them national cultures, gender cultures, schooling cultures, scientific cultures, and cultures of the workplace. Finally, the chapters examine various ways of measuring writing and how these measures interact with practices of teaching and learning.Edited by Charles Bazerman, Chris Dean, Jessica Early, Karen Lunsford, Suzie Null, Paul Rogers, and Amanda Stansell.

About the Contributors

Authors

Charles Bazerman, Professor of Education at the University of California, Santa Barbara, is the author of numerous research articles and books on the social role of writing, academic genres, and textual analysis, as well as textbooks on the teaching of writing.

Chris Dean has recently co-authored a writing textbook, Terra Incognita: Researching the Weird, and is a Lecturer in the Writing Program at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Jessica Singer Early is an assistant professor of English at Arizona State University. She is author of Opening the Gates: Creating Real World Writing Opportunities for Diverse Secondary Students and Stirring up Justice: Reading and Writing to Change the World.

Karen Lunsford is an associate professor of Writing at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She has published on a wide range of interests, including multimodality, science writing, and policy issues that affect writing research.

Suzie Null is an assistant professor of Teacher Education at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. Her publications include the co-edited collection, Traditions of Writing Research.

Paul Rogers is an assistant professor of English at George Mason University and served as co-chair of the Writing Research Across Borders II conference. His publications include the co-edited collections, Writing Across the Curriculum: A Critical Sourcebook and Traditions of Writing Research.

Amanda Stansell teaches Writing at the University of California, Santa Barbara as a lecturer. Her publications include the co-edited collection, Traditions of Writing Research.

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