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02/22/2006 Entry: "Practice"

Theory and Practice

From the Lectures of the Cliché: Theory and Practice

Forgive poor transcriptions. Neighbors won't turn their radio down.

(CREAAAAAAAAAK. Door opens. In walks the good Dr.)

Class,
What are we talking about? We're talking about practice? Practice?
Compositionists fret over practice. "We must practice!" Practice?

(inaudible mumbling in class; sound of someone leaving the room, maybe more than one)

The (still) emerging field of computers and writing/writing with technology/composition and technology, however you all may scribble it into your term papers, still wonders about practice. How do you put "that idea" into practice? We no longer have lore; we have practice! Our field is becoming a series of Time/Life books: How to manuals. Hackerism. The will to practice. "In this article I will show how I practice multimodal/multiliteracy/multimulti writing in my class. . ."
The Compile search engine for composition scholarship brings up almost 10,000 hits for "practice" and less than 3,000 for "theory." Practice! Practice has won the search engine war!

(barely audible question from students)
"But Dr. Don't you tell us not to draw binaries?"

Indeed. You ask a good question. I will give you a "C." It is neither A nor F. So it, too, is not a binary.

Quintilian told us to practice the places of argument, not just know them! Jay David Bolter asks us to practice our theories, not just explicate them! Who among us really works with applied grammatology? But what are we talking about?

Student: "Uh, practice?"

Correct! In his CCCC chair address, Donald Stewart asked: "How can historical knowledge liberate composition teachers from theory and practice which are dated and ineffective?" I give you your notes. Why do you people not read your notes from this course! A history which lasts only one or two weeks, and you forget! You over there! You're not even taking notes! What the hell are you doing?

But I digress.

What were we talking about?

Posted by Jessica @ 02/24/2006 11:26 AM EST

Overheard in the hallway outside of my office this past week: "Sure it works in practice, but does it work in theory?"

Posted by Scot @ 02/23/2006 11:15 AM EST