Re: bawking

[Don Socha <347hqx7@cmich.edu>]

Dear Bobbie, while I could assert that the letter 's' was tapped a bit too lightly in my
last post, I choose to apologize for the gendered typo instead.

Yes, my concerns have mostly to do with context.  Analogies of medicine and physical
therapy are both inwardly oriented about what is 'wrong' with the student writer or with
hir product.  Because I prefer to think of myself as more consultant than tutor, I am
guilty of having an inordinate faith in how a greater interest in writing can outwardly
enhance a person's life;  that of any person at any level of skill.  The same goes for
the more wholistic principles of macrobiotics, which to my mind, have more to do with
the enhancement of sensual awareness, and learning to live more harmoniously and
compassionately with our environment, than with mere nutrition.  Does this mean that the
majority of writing center clients would have to be taught the value of changing their
Standard American Discourse (SAD)?  Yes, and chiefly by example.

Because I think the context for basic writers has to be 'rewritten', to my mind, this
necessarily involves your 'already successful writers'.  What makes them successful
should be evident in our appreciation of their discourse.  It's less what they've
consumed than what they produce, but less what they produce than the affects of that
production.  Initially, a more healthy, wholistic change of context would involve a
reconsideration of writing itself as, for example, always healthy, never "sickly".

bobbie silk wrote:

> Don (not Dawn?), as a quick aside and eventhough there are times when I
> wouldn't mind being considered to have b**ls, I have to tell you that this
> Bobbie is female.
>
> I'm not sure I fully understand what you're saying about context.  I do
> understand that "prevention is worth a pound of cure," but few writers
> come to us as true beginners.  If we're shifting our metaphors from
> medicine and physical therapy to nutrition, most of our clients come to
> us after years of the Standard American Diet (SAD).  They think mashed
> potatoes, peas, and cream corn are the only palatable vegetables.  I
> suppose, picking up on your experience with Macrobiotics, we could say
> that the writers who come to the Writing Center have to be taught both the
> value of a changing their diet and how to appreciate the taste of miso,
> gomasio, and sea-vegetables (aka seaweed).  Too often, though, what brings
> one to the point of changing life-long eating habits is illness.  So we're
> kind of stuck with the illness/medicine metaphor again.
>
> I'm also not sure how we could apply the nutrition analogy to already
> successful writers--is it what they have consumed that has made them
> successful?  Since they are frequently offered the same writing "meals" in
> school as the students who aren't successful writers, why is their writing
> "healthy" and the writing of the other students "sickly"?
>
> Nutrition could be an informative metaphor, I think, but I'm having some
> difficulty making it work in relation to writing centers.  Suggestions?