Hairston: sample critical summary
Hairston, Maxine
(student sample)
In "The Winds of Change: Thomas Kuhn and the Revolution," Maxine Hairston uses Kuhn's idea of educational "paradigm shifts" to describe a fundamental change experienced as writing instruction moved away from an old set of ideas about writing. According to Hairston, the old paradigm was characterized by: 1) a stress on expository writing; 2) reliance on "an unchanging reality which is independent of the writer and which all writers are expected to describe the same way, regardless of the rhetorical situation"; 3) a neglect of invention; 4) an emphasis on style; 5) belief that "writers know what they are going to say before they begin to write"; 6) belief that the writing process is linear; 7) belief that "teaching editing is teaching writing." By contrast, Hairston explains that the emerging paradigm stresses 1) a recursive writing process; 2) invention and discovery; 3) audience, purpose, and occasion; 4) the role of writing in discovery of ideas and learning; and 5) the principle that "writing teachers should be people who write."
Comments
(sample comment)
I experienced Hairston's "old paradigm" in my middle and high school years where I wasn't asked to do much substantial revision but was instead, corrected almost exclusively on my grammar. I assumed that learning to write meant learning a list of rules and of building a paper word by inflated word, comma by pesky comma, page by tortured page. As a reaction to this emphasis, I developed a formulaic and cynical attitude about academic writing and dreaded having to assign and respond to papers my writing-intentive history section.
I think that Hairston's description of a new writing paradigm represents moves in the right direction but her representation of the situation seems a little black and white. I don't think that Kuhn meant to imply that paradigms shift instantly...for the sake of our students I think that it might be more useful for us to consider a more gradual shifting process. I expect that some of the scientific and technical disciplines haven't experienced much action on this front at all. Hairston seems to be trying to persuade readers using "either/or" logic. Either use this useless antiquated form or use our new great idea.
In my history course, I'd like to teach student writers to trust themselves as thinkers and writers and to trust their organic processes while at the same time helping them to become familiar with some of the rhetorical forms familiar to and expected by academic historians. How can we balance the two paradigms? How can we help our students see that it is not which but a balance of both--how can we enable them to make intentional choices?
Posted by: pamela | January 22, 2006 7:24 PM
Hi there, just became alert to your blog through Yahoo, and discovered that it is truly informative. I’m going to watch out for brussels. I will appreciate if you keep going this in future. Lots of people will be benefited from your writing. Best wishes, Olene Crim!
Posted by: Olene Crim | July 8, 2011 2:12 AM