Description
The apparatus of Roles for Writers and Readers speaks to students in their dual capacities as both readers and writers. The introductory chapter has three purposes: to define the four read- er's and six writer's roles, to provide general guidelines for responsive reading within rhetorical contexts, and to encourage a writing process that is exploratory, experimental, and complete from invention through revision. The introductions to Chapters 1-7 offer detailed strategies for reading and writing each role, carrying students from the beginning to the end of each process. The headnotes before an individual selection not only introduce an author, but also give the context of the writing and something about its creation or the writer's habits. The aim here is to bring students into the company of the writers they read, creating an atmosphere and attitude conducive to their own writ- ing. The "Notations" immediately preceding each selection pose prereading questions to help students uncover the personal con- text in which they will read and to encourage them to read like writers.These "Notations" prepare for the "Responses" questions immediately following each selection. Here students are asked to respond to a selection, state its meaning as they see it, and make connections between their interpretation and their ways of living, feeling, thinking, and seeing that have authorized that interpretation. The questions under "Strategies and Tactics" ask students to respond like writers, look beneath the polished surface of a piece of finished writing to its play of ideas and language, and see how writers play their roles and help readers read. The "Writing Projects" provide both subjects and contexts for writing, urging students to explore the rhetorical possibilities discovered in their reading.
The glossary supplements the chapter introductions with detailed explanations of such subjects as methods of development, persona, coherence, and other features of effective writing- important matters that fall outside the discussions of individual roles and the processes of reading and writing. These can be assigned to meet the needs of individual students and classes. Cross references at the end of each entry show where these subjects are relevant to the preceding chapters.
ISBN: 9780023307201
