Conference on Community Writing Recap

NOTE: This post is written by GA Delasha Long. This past quarter, I attended and presented at my first academic conference, The Conference on Community Writing (CCW). The CCW is a three-day conference that explores how communities write and how writing can be used for community organizing and change. The 2017 conference was held at the University of Colorado in Boulder, CO. Students, instructors, and community organizers from all over the country participated in panels, talks, workshops, and think tanks. Topics ranged from “The Prison Story Project: On the Row”—which provides writing workshops for inmates and converts their writings into theater scripts

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Candice Rai speaking at DePaul WRD

Candice Rai Recap

As part of the Writing and Rhetoric Across Borders speaker series, the WRD Department hosted Dr. Candice Rai on Friday, October 27. Rai is an associate professor and the director of the Expository Writing Program at the University of Washington. As well as the author of the book Democracy’s Lot: Rhetoric, Publics, and the Places of Invention. Rai’s talk, titled “On Hope, Invention, and Politics in the Ruins of Democracy,” drew on the research she did for Democracy’s Lot—an ethnographic study exploring the complex negotiations of everyday democracies here in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood.

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Professor Kalin in seminar with students

Contemporary Rhetorics: Course Spotlight

Until the mid-20th century, our understanding of rhetoric was dominated by the foundational theory of Greek thinkers, and focused mainly on a speaker addressing an audience for persuasive purposes. Out of this tradition, we find descriptions of rhetoric as something discrete and narrowly defined: Cicero calls it “speech designed to persuade” and Quintilian says that rhetoric is “a good man speaking well.”  However, during the cultural turn in the 1960s and 1970s rhetorical scholars took an interest in the work that rhetoric does in the everyday and in the world at large

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WRD Receives Department Initiative Grant

Writing, Rhetoric, & Discourse recently received a Department Initiative Grant from DePaul University to enhance the teaching of WRD 202: Professional Writing for Business. WRD 202 is unique given that its student population is unlike most WRD courses; it is taught by WRD faculty but taken by students in DePaul’s Driehaus College for Business. As part of the Driehaus Business Core, WRD 202 teaches students the conventions of writing in business contexts. Additionally, the percentage of multilingual students who take courses in the Driehaus Business Core is substantial. As a result, a primary goal of the grant is to create

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Recap: Sara Wachter-Boettcher’s Talk on Design for Real Life

DePaul’s Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and Discourse hosted a talk on Thursday, May 11th featuring content strategy consultant and coauthor of the book Design for Real Life, Sara Wachter-Boettcher. In her talk, she recounted the many ways our designs can be offputting to users, and how designs can leave some users feeling left out. She also delivered solutions on what we can do to mend and prevent setbacks like this. Many users believe that the term “algorithm” evokes a sort of frigid and unbiased truth that only computers could posses. An algorithm is thought to be born with no natural flaws, unlike

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Photo of Kristin Arola

Recap: Professor Kristin L. Arola’s Talk on Composition and American Indian Rhetorics

On Friday April 21, Dr. Kristin L. Arola from Washington State University visited DePaul to present a talk titled “Slow Composition: American Indian Rhetorics and Mindful Making Practices.” This talk was part of the WRD Department’s Writing and Rhetoric Across Borders Speaker Series. Arola’s described the implementation of a composition theory based on story, what she referred to as “story as methodology.” By using an American Indian lens, Arola discussed our current conceptions of the composing process and opened up new critiques on how to improve. Pointing out the current fast-paced nature of rhetoric in our society, Arola advocated for

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WRD Alumna Sarah Hughes to Start PhD Program in the Fall

Sarah Hughes, a 2012 graduate of the MA in WRD program, was recently accepted into the Joint Program in English and Education at the University of Michigan! Ultimately, Sarah’s goal is to attain a tenure-track faculty position in Composition & Rhetoric. WRD was able to catch up with Sarah and learn more about the PhD program she’ll be starting in Fall 2017 as well as her research plans. Congrats, Sarah! Can you tell us about the Joint Program in English and Education at Michigan and why you chose it? The Joint Program in English & Education is a Composition and Rhetoric

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Flyer for Kristin Arola talk

Kristin Arola to Visit WRD on April 21

On Friday, April 21 from 1 to 2:30pm in the Lincoln Park Campus in McGowan 104, Dr. Kristin L. Arola from Washington State University will be visiting DePaul and taking part in the Writing and Rhetoric Across Borders Speaker Series. Arola will be delivering a talk entitled, “Slow Composition: American Indian Rhetorics and Mindful Making Practices.” Abstract: This presentation explores what writing studies can learn from American Indian epistemologies. By bringing together stories of the crafting and gathering practices of the Anishinaabe peoples of the Upper Great Lakes and the concept of composing as culturing, Arola offers a framework for

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Kyla Patterson: Fulbright Scholar

Kyla Patterson, a 2017 graduate of the BA in Writing, Rhetoric, & Discourse program, recently received the prestigious Fulbright Scholarship! WRD was able to catch up with Kyla and learn about where she will be going and what kind of work she will be doing as a Fulbright Scholar. Beginning this autumn, Kyla will be traveling to Czechia (also known as the Czech Republic in the recent past) to participate in an English Teaching Assistant Program. As the name of the program suggests, Kyla’s main responsibility will be teaching English to elementary-aged children in Czechia for at least twenty hours

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