FINDING UNIVERSALS THROUGH DIFFERENCE: DISABILITY THEORY’S POTENTIAL TO EMPOWER COMPOSITION STUDIES

Abstract

While much attention has been paid to the borders between those within and beyond the discipline of composition, the primary goal of this project is to examine the discourses which exist within composition and, subsequently, how these discourses might work to undermine pedagogy and scholarship. I take the position that even those working directly in composition do not offer clear, consistent consensus regarding concepts which are fundamental to the legitimacy of composition as a discipline. Thus, as we strive to meaningfully frame our work for our students and stakeholders, it is imperative that we confront the ambivalences in our own discussions. Throughout this project I use critical disability theory to reconcile underlying concepts of composition, such as instability and the contextual nature of language, with competing concepts that often undermine effective pedagogy. Addressing these gaps via disability theory illustrates various conceptual similarities between the two disciplines and highlights the problematic tensions found in composition. Chapters two, three, and four here confront gaps between composition theory and practice and offer ideas from disability studies as a means of exploration and potential resolution. I first examine the specific notion that writing centers are intended to foster student autonomy through a long-term focus on creating better writers, rather than better writing. By exploring the deeper theoretical implications of the writer versus writing dichotomy, I hope to expose as destructive one of its key assumptions—the possibility of writerly autonomy—and consider its effects on writing center work and composition practice more generally. From here, disability theory offers a means to decentralize autonomy as a defining term, via specific theories of representation and dependence. I then focus on what we can accomplish, given this rejection of autonomy, and how to most effectively share and build knowledge with students. I explore the relationship between knowledge transfer and narratives of overcoming disability through analysis of scholarship on first-year writing courses. I argue that a belief in easily generalizable knowledge, like a belief in autonomy, manifests in misconceptions of the successful first-year writing course and thus that knowledge transfer should be reconceptualized as agency, and offer a brief discussion of threshold concepts as one potential source for transfer-as-agency pedagogy. Building on these concepts, I then consider how to most effectively locate composition within the university structure, focusing specifically on WAC/WID programs and the disability concepts of accommodation and universal design. Theories of universal design illustrate that composition must be integrated into the curricula beyond first-year writing; this sort of comprehensive curricula is not without complication, however, so I also explore issues of authority which arise out of universal design perspectives. Finally, I offer three imagined scenarios meant to illustrate how individuals working within this disability theory-based framework might address different challenges related to writing instruction and to reinforce the enormous value of a disability studies approach to the work of composition.