Being on the academic job market, technically a week or so past my MFA confirmation, I thought it would be clear that the MFA in Film and Digital Technology was earned so that I might teach rhetoric and move away from academic, first-year composition.
I’m only going to teach composition if I can rebel against tradition.
I have not had a phone interview so far, and it is early in the search, but I have received emails asking if I am interested in other posts within some departments or programs. Rhetoric is often within English and, to my surprise, so are film studies and theater. When English houses so many things, it all comes back to composition.
Asked why college composition isn’t my primary interest, I responded with the question, “Is your program goal to teach the APA and MLA formats required by other departments or to teach self-expression?”
Answer: “Honestly, we are judged on how well students prepare term papers in their major courses. Demonstrating knowledge and citing sources. That sort of thing. Academic style is important. We are a service program.”
Service? Service to whom? (I know: “We serve students by…”) Yeahhhhh. How’s that TPS report coming along?
I might as well be in Office Space filing pointless reports to meet empty metrics. We can teach the value of citations and then teach the software and websites that generate those citations. Microsoft Word does an acceptable job, overall, and few of our students need more than the basic citation formats. I admit that since returning to graduate school in 2004, I have developed a bit (a lot) of cynicism towards the field of composition, which claims to want to change and then remains stuck with its four-paper cycles and citation obsessions. Teach the value of citations, demonstrate the tools available, and move forward. Mention the value of reference casually throughout the course. Students will also notice when we mention sources for our claims during discussions and lectures.
The tension between teaching the tools for self-expression and argument vs. service to the majors. I understand. Fighting through MLA for my thesis and quibbles over non-specified MLA formatting (headings), I do understand there’s value to learning the basics. But I’d rather have a student write something engaging than spend time avoiding anything that might violate a rule. Fear of being marked wrong leads to repressed, bland writing.
I can teach a four-paper cycle in a guided curriculum, but I don’t want to. It’s heartbreaking. I’d still end up with students making videos or performing poetry slams.
Citing sources helps scholars and enhances the authority of a work. But swapping a comma for a period in a citation or using the wrong verb tense in a sentence? Not my passion. Yet, that’s often what I observe of FYC courses. The FYC course is where we hold up the traditions of the past, from the correct margins to the proper citations. We claim to do much more, but are we doing it? Is there empirical evidence, not based on self-reflective scholarship, that demonstrates a lasting change in the student after we teach our standardized content in a near-universal order?
I realize my dark view of composition isn’t shared by many of my colleagues and peers. But I also hear many voices asking if composition is meeting its goals. Cheers to those engaged in trying to reform FYC programs; given the opportunity, I would revamp composition significantly. But teaching composition in a guided curriculum is not for me, even if that is the only way to resume my academic career.