Questions regarding “knowledge transfer” are increasingly central to Composition Studies, engaging some of the core issues involved in the study and teaching of writing and in the development of writing ability. They also get to the heart of fundamental debates about the place and purpose of first-year composition (FYC) courses; about whether or not (and what kinds of) knowledge and skills developed in FYC and in writing in the disciplines (WID) courses connect to other contexts within and beyond the academy; whether there are generalizable writing skills that traverse contexts or whether writing skills are so situated in ideological and epistemological contexts that they can only be acquired in those contexts. Indeed, questions surrounding the issue of transfer-ability and writing are at the heart of what we study and teach in Composition Studies, yet we are only beginning to understand this complex social and cognitive phenomena and what it involves.

Research on writing transfer has begun to shed some light on the challenges writers face as they traverse disciplinary and professional writing contexts, and while this research has generally ranged from mixed to pessimistic regarding the transfer-ability of writing skills, this has only raised the stakes for the need to articulate what transfers from FYC and how we might re-imagine FYC in light of such research. As Elizabeth Wardle recently put it, we “would be irresponsible not to engage issues of transfer” (66), a charge that follows David Smit’s identification of “transferability” as a primary consideration for writing instruction, in his book The End of Composition Studies.

So how does one study and develop a more robust understanding of such a complex cognitive and social phenomenon, one that involves processes that are so context variable and meta-cognitive? In this seminar, we will be reviewing scholarship on knowledge transfer, reading studies of writing development, examining research on the transfer of writing abilities across contexts, debating the implications of this research on the status and role of first year composition courses, and exploring methodologies and pedagogies for studying and teaching for transfer.

Texts:
Anne Beaufort, College Writing and Beyond: A New Framework for University Writing Instruction
Rebecca Nowacek, Agents of Integration: Understanding Transfer as a Rhetorical Act
Davit Smit, The End of Composition Studies
Readings on e-reserve