ENGAGING CONVERSATION(S): FINDINGS FROM THREE MULTI-METHOD STUDIES OF STUDENTS…

Engaging Conversation(s): Findings from Three Multi-Method Studies of Students and Faculty on the Challenges of Writing across Texts and Contexts In this presentation, I will describe findings from three mixed-method studies of student writers and faculty across disciplines on expectations for “good” writing, the challenges involved in meeting these expectations, and what these challenges imply for our instructional practices. The first two studies I will discuss concern advanced undergraduate English L1 and L2 writers, while the third concerns PhD dissertation writers, with the latter comprising the major focus of my talk. As I will explain, teachers’ expectations for their undergraduates’ school (or apprenticeship) writing derive from a complex, often unacknowledged, mix of variables. Moreover, the generic terminology they use to describe the characteristics of good writing in their disciplines and programs often hides basic differences in purposes, audiences, genres, and linguistic conventions. When expectations are not made explicit, student writers use various means to decode what their teachers want, often from the most minimal of cues.

English L2 writers, in particular, are at an even greater disadvantage as they struggle to access the correct language along with the expected rhetorical, discoursal, and sociocultural conventions.

Turning to my current research on dissertation writers, I will next present a subset of survey, focus group, and interview data to explain that, although these students have had more sustained writing experiences in their doctoral studies, they still report many of the same challenges as the undergraduate writers, including challenges related to the generic or vague terminology their supervisors use to describe the writing they expect.

As I will explain, the challenges described by the dissertation writers and supervisors who participated in this study have much to do with the cognitive, rhetorical, and linguistic demands of writing in the increasingly complex communities of practice of their doctoral programs, a point not always recognized by the supervisors. For many of the supervisors, the writing itself was transparent, something to be dealt with by a generalist editor or tutor, especially in the case of English L2 writers, rather than understood as integral to the analytic process. I conclude by describing what these findings suggest for me and my co-researcher as we work towards articulating a pedagogy of dissertation supervision.