Is Post-Process theory a floating signifier, too?

I'm enjoying Lisa Ede's wide-ranging reading of the post-process movement.I think her read of the professionalization of composition studies is an important chapter in understanding process theories of composing. In fact, I find this to be the strongest segment of Part II and, in some ways, of the whole book. I like the way she unfolds a discussion of the "crisis rhetoric" that spurred universities to hire composition faculty, the need for employment that literature Ph.D.s felt, the use of social science oriented research as a way to prove that the field had a "method" and "strategies" for solving the literacy crisis. One thing I wondered about as I read along for a second time was what role open admissions played in all of this. She does mention Shaughnessy, but the democratization of higher education and affirmative action was a major factor here, and I wondered why we didn't hear more about that.

I think Ede makes a very strong point about post-process theory but is she also making the same kind of move with post-process theory that she says post-process folks are making with process theories, what she calls the writing process movement (63)? She has pointed to a range of texts that identify our historical and epistemological "turn" to post-process theory (Reither, Cooper, Kent, Dobrin, Crowley, Faigley, Harris, etc). But we don't get detailed readings of these texts. She points out that these texts tend to see process theories in limited "floating signifier" ways. I worry that post-process theory is also becoming a floating signifier in Ede's text. That doesn't mean that I don't see her text doing important work--it is. But what about the differences across these texts? She does treat those differences in small detail, but I guess I want to see a fuller reading across those texts. Has someone done that already? I want to understand how the post-process theory conversation evolved in more detail and why it evolved for specific material reasons beyond the professionalization argument. What about postmodernism, poststructuralism, revisions of liberal feminisms, critical race theory, and globalization?

While Ede is focused on process and post-process, other scholars have articulated the debate as one of expressivism vs. social constructionism.

A few years ago when I taught Thomas Kent's edited collection on post-process theory in CCR 601, I invited my colleague Jim Zebroski to come and talk about his views on post-process theory and on the ways that the process movement has been discussed and addressed in our composition histories. He gave a great talk, and some of the ideas he shared with us are in his essay entitled "The Expressivist Menace" in the edited collection by Rosner et al _History, Reflection, and Narrative: The Professionalization of Composition, 1963-1983_ (Ablex, 1999) This is an important collection, and Jim does a good job of unpacking the reaction against the "spectre" of expressivism. He looks at empirical evidence for how expressivism has emerged in the field, examining writing practices, teaching practices, curricular practices, disciplinary practices, professional practices, and theorizing practices. Part of the problem with composition histories that make claims about expressivism is that they examine only a narrow range of evidence. Jim's study expands the conversation, and he articulates a useful social formation reading of why we are in the moment of reaction against expressivism. I'll bring in his article to class, and we can talk about his reading of the social formation of particular arguments about expressivism.

Also, I really like Laurie's use of Britton et al to unpack a reading of the "Mind the Gap" assignment in Writing 105. Read her entry if you haven't already at her blog: thoughtjam@wordpress.com.

I have to go read a few more 105 papers before tomorrow morning!