An NEH Fellowship Examined: Social Networks and Composition History

Until now, histories of composition studies have been predicated on the idea that discipline formation stems solely from textual evidence generated by individual scholars; few histories, however, take into account the influence of social networks formed by the field's professionals. Addressing what Janice Lauer refers to as "loopholes" in composition history, this dissertation constructs a working definition of social networks while it also offers an extended example of their historical significance. I focus on the 1978-79 NEH Fellowship, "Rhetorical Invention and the Composing Process," directed by Richard Young at Carnegie-Mellon University. From oral and print sources including interviews with or texts written by the fellowship participants, I gathered information concerning the social network that developed from the 1978-79 fellowship. I present this history of the fellowship as a conversation among the participants and the director. In addition, a section of commentary following the conversation indicates social networks' integral position in composition studies. In composition history, a discussion of discipline development is always complicated by its seemingly dissonant components which include journal formation, professional projects, conference presentations, and the role of networking among the field's professionals. A history of the field based on social networks, however, gathers these components and addresses them in relation to professional activity. This dissertation proposes a new way to examine traditional areas of inquiry within composition history.

ABSTRACT Until now, histories of composition studies have been predicated on the idea that discipline formation stems solely from textual evidence generated by individual scholars; few histories, however, take into account the From this re-evaluation, historians have begun to call for more than the "discovery" of textual evidence, which, for too long, has been the sole remnant of the field examined for historical purposes (Connors 1991). James Berlin, a noted composition historian, reflects on the limitations of contemporary histories of the field when he writes, "All accounts are 2 partial, but all reveal something about history and the movement of our thought in coming to terms with it ("Revisionary History" 59). Berlin goes on to suggest that historians should resee the nature of writing history as series of narratives, thereby denying that processes such as discipline development occur on a seemingly linear and neat timeline. This appears to indicate a need for episodic histories of the field, histories that tell multiple stories of a single event.

Social Networks & Collaboration
In keeping with the persistent perception of composition studies as .a social field, a growing body of work examines collaboration as both a pedagogical tool (Bruffee; Reither and Vipond) and as strategy for knowledge production and division of labor of professionals (Odell and Goswami; Lunsford; Lunsford and Ede; Roen and Mittan); however, environments supporting collaboration among 4 students and composition professionals have not been adequately addressed in composition histories. The limitation of collaboration becomes one of visibility and invisibility; some professional activity has remained unnoticed, unseen, invisible because source citation, for example, includes only the most formal intellectual partnerships, and because methods of writing histories value only the information that source citations include.
In Singular Texts/Plural Authors, for example, Lisa Ede and Andrea Lunsford write that assertions about the importance of collaboration are marginalized by appearing in prefaces or acknowledgments, rather than in the bodies of texts. Though many writers are convinced of the crucial importance and benefits of collaboration . . • they generally have not yet found ways to incorporate these concerns in the body of their texts, which as a rule do not challenge the conventions of single-authored documents. (1990; 239 -40) The question for this dissertation remains, then: how can a history of composition studies discuss social networks which have been sustained by previously invisible collaboration? 5 Oral History as Methodology Unlike other histories of the field which focus on events more than a generation old and which can only be substantiated by textual evidence, my focus on a relatively current event opens a space for oral evidence to corroborate my central claims.
Because the seminar ended only fifteen years ago, I was able to contact and interview the director and four of the surviving seven participants concerning their work during and after fellowship.
Oral history's place has been established as a viable method of information retrieval in various disciplines.
Paul Thompson, a British oral history expert, writes: Oral history is a history built around people. It thrusts life into history itself and widens its scope.
It encourages teachers and students to be fellow co-workers.
It brings history into, and out of the community . • . • Oral history offers a challenge to the accepted myths of history, to the authoritarian ·judgement inherent in its tradition. It provides a means for a radical transformation of the social meaning of history.
Or to put it another way "The goal is to save sources from oblivion, to come to a first assessment of the event/ situations studied and to promote consciousness among the 6 actors of the happenings themselves" (Vansina 13  George Campbell, whose treatise, Philosophy of Rhetoric (1776), was widely used in America and remained influential and popular into the nineteenth century is credited with seeing rhetoric as a science (see Ehninger 1950, 1955, Bevilacqua 1964, and Berlin 1984.
The second member of this cluster is Hugh Blair. His Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres (1783) was known for its practicality, more so than Campbell's, and is credited with 130 American and English editions between 1783 and 1911. Blair is significant historically for a focus on Belles Lettres, a move to focus on written rather than oral discourse for the classroom, and the utilization of literature for teaching of writing (Berlin 1984;Corbett 1954Corbett , 1956Corbett , 1958andEhninger 1955 &1963).
Richard Whately, the last of this cluster, published Elements of Rhetoric in 1828; this text was specifically designed for classroom use and, consequently, became an 21 influential model for subsequent textbooks.
Credited with an emphasis on correctness and style, Whately's legacy today is our concern with an essay's unity and coherence (Ehninger 1955(Ehninger & 1963Berlin 1980Berlin & 1984 written work as something vital, "as a living product of an act iv e , c r eat iv e mi n d " (Be r 1 in 1 9-8 4 ) . The s i 1 enc in g of h is voice for over 100 years set the stage for the hegemony of current-traditional rhetoric; now, however, he has been receiving attention primarily from Stewart (see Stewart 1978Stewart , 1979Stewart , & 1982 Child "took a struggling elective subject [English] and turned it into a major discipline" (120-21; Also see Douglas 1976;Reid, Paul 1960& 1969Reid, Ronald 1959;Stewart 1982 (1991) is an exception (also see Allen;Ettlich 1966;Berlin 1981 (Aley 1994;Lunsford 1982;Rodgers;Kitzhaber).
In addition, Barrett Wendell, a contemporary of Child , (Douglas ;Self 1975;Newkirk), John Locke (Corbett 1981), John Dewey (Fishman 1993), and Joseph McKean, the second Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard (Reid 1960), have also been subjects of individual historical inquiry.
Of the contemporary field's first generation of rhetoric and composition scholars, Edward P.J. Corbett (Connors 1989), and Janet Emig was interviewed in 1983 by Dixie Goswami and Maureen Butler.
Textbooks are not the only aLtifacts available to composition historians; an analysis of journals' positions in the field also sheds light on discipline formation. In "Journals in Composition Studies," Connors' traces the history of journals in order to indicate rhetoric and composition's legitimacy as an independent field of inquiry. He suggests three reasons why journals develop: the formalization of the existence of an academic discipline (manifesto foundings), the creation of "new outlets for scholarship" (developmental foundings), and personal needs (expansion foundings); moreover, these stages could also be said to correspond to the field's early history, its "adolescence," and its "maturity." Other textual evidence of discipline development relies on hard-to-find material such as student papers and specialized magazines dating back to the nineteenth century (Connors 1991, 59). Field (North 1987), Rhetoric and Reality (Berlin 1987), and Composition as a Human Science (Phelps 1988 concerning the significance of social networks on the development of composition studies. What's missing from the above quotations, therefore, is a footnote reminding readers that even epic histories are partial accounts.

Histories of Extracurriculum
The last cluster of histories is one of the most recent historical approaches to the field. In Writing Groups (1987), Anne Ruggles Gere examines the social networks both in and outside of academic institutions. Although she doesn't label the work done in writing groups as "social networking," she does posit that writing groups influenced written work produced not only by school boys but also by members of Benjamin Franklin's Junto, for example (32-33).
In a more recent article, "Kitchen Tables and Rented Rooms: The benefits of the polylogue concern the presentation of information and the lively juxtaposition of voices.
When beginning this project and choosing a method to present the voices of the fellowship participants, I chose a style that allowed a topical arrangement of information.
To give the sense of an actual conversation moving in girls," and they were "asked to compose out loud into a tape recorder as he or she worked" (Flower/Hayes 1980, 23-24).

Not all fellowship members participated; the Flower and
Hayes work, however, went on to become significant not only for its topic, but also for the protocol analysis (see Flower and Hayes 1980and Cooper and Holtzman 1983 published by Freshmen English News (1980). The piece has become affectionately known as the "Jim-Bob" essay.

INKSTER:
It is probably worth saying that while it was the Jim-Bob paper, its very name, and the familiarity it suggests, shows the affection and ownership the whole group had on it. When Jim and I were working on the Jim-Bob Although other annual events like Janice Lauer's "Rhetoric seminar: Current Theories of Teaching Composition" also assisted faculty in professional retraining, the NEH funded innumerable projects until the mid 1980s; Richard Young's "Rhetorical Invention" seminar is just one example.
As faculty, who were trained primarily in literature,  representative told me that The Endowment ran these events because few graduate programs in English granted extensive study in rhetoric and composition, and with the current proliferation of programs granting degrees in the area, the NEH sees no reason to duplicate this work (Couturier 1993). This comment is ironic, however, in light of the fact that the NEH continues to fund programs in literature.
Composition professionals seem to enjoy a challenge.
When funds for professional enhancement programs Groups within composition studies are beginning to see the need for histories to do more than place events on a timeline, and social network histories, such as the one presented in this dissertation, are accepting the challenge. It may not be until after the turn of the century that someone writes a history of scholars meeting and forming social networks via the Internet, but until then, this history of the 1978-79 NEH fellowship, offers a vocabulary with which to discuss previously invisible networks of scholars.
Furthermore, it offers one way to discuss the relationship between these networks and discipline development.
Social network histories offer space to include personal narratives and discussions of interpersonal relationships of the field's professionals; they also incorporate recollections of the private processes behind the the field's polished textual artifacts, which, for too long, have constituted one of the only areas of historical examination.
As writing instruction changed its orientation from product to process, so too should the histories of the field. Historians must keep in mind more than composition's current manifestation, but historians need to recognize how we have reached this point. Social network histories will assist in the identification of factors and discussions supporting crucial decisions in the When asked why the NEH no longer sponsors rhetoric and composition fellowships, as they continue to do with literature, Couturier said that she believed that interest was waning on the part of rhetoric and composition faculty to direct these fellowships (the same senior faculty were proposing fellowship topics each year), and that graduate schools were doing the work that the fellowship had done to train former literature faculty to "retool" as rhetoric and composition faculty (Couturier 1993 Despite the delay and the untimely death of Jim Berlin, I am finally going forward with this phase of the project. Below are 12 questions concerning the fellowship (a different set of questions has already been sent to the former fellows).
The questions may require extended answers, so feel free to answer them in any order, with as much detail as you think necessary. You can send you answers to me via e-mail or snail mail anytime before CCCC next month.
Thank you in advance for your contribution to this project.
The central focus of this dissertation is on the collaboration among the fellowship participants. trying to discover how the discipline of rhetoric composition has developed from collaborative work has developed from work generated by individual scholars.

INVENTION
I'm and as it 1. how did the topic of invention affect the structure of the work within the fellowship.
2. what kinds of projects or assignments generated "invention"? 3. was invention ever collaborative? in other words, did the theories of invention presented in the fellowship affect the kinds of invention that the fellows used among themselves? for example, I know that Sharon was very influential in Victor's early articulations of PRE/TEXT. Can you comment on this or off er any other concrete examples of collaboration affecting the work of . the fellows even after the fellowship ended?
4. In what ways did the form or topic of the fellowship itself lead to the development of these 10 fellows as leaders in the rhetoric and composition "movement"? THE FELLOWSHIP ITSELF 5. What were your goals for the fellowship? Were they met despite the fact that you were beginning a new phase of your career with a move to CMU?
6. In what ways do you think that your 1978-79 fellowship affected the development of rhetoric and composition as we know it today? 7. What do you see as the direct results of the fellowship on the rhetoric and composition as a discrete discipline? THE FELLOWSHIP PARTICIPANTS 8. What do you remember about the fellows specifically. How did they work together? I understand that their dexterity wit~ rhetorical theory was at very different levels, but could you see them growing and developing?

9.
Rumor has it that the fellowship participants were known as "The 10 Disciples" ostensibly of you and tagmemic invention. What's your reaction to this characterization?
10. Did Linda Flower and John Hayes need your permission to use the fellowship participants as their "expert" writers? How did you feel about their use as subjects for the protocol analysis? 11. In memoriam: what would you like people to know about the ways that Jim Berlin, Bill Nelson, and Charles Kneupper affected the field.
Any anecdotes or stories that otherwise may not be known to the rhetoric and composition community would be particularly helpful.

MISCELLANEOUS
12. what do you think is the NEH's rationale for no longer sponsoring fellowships in rhetoric and composition?