Sitting in the broad room with the buttery afternoon sunlight alighting upon the bookshelves, a soft voice behind me asks me to think aloud as I work with a writing scenario. I was supposed to be interviewing her, but she has turned the tables on me to think on my feet to see how I would begin the very article I am writing now. She poses questions like: Where will I start? What is the purpose of the article? Who is my audience?
Linda Flower, professor at Carnegie Mellon, is too modest to state she is a famed expert as a social cognitive rhetorician. She stands directly behind me, so I cannot see her as she speaks to me. I am supposed to feel like I am alone sitting at the table working on this very article, but all my mind can think is that …show more content…
The course is offered to students both inside and outside of the English department, making for an eclectic class with students who have varying perspectives on writing. When asked about the course, Flower states students will learn about how readers process text, but, more importantly, they will learn about themselves as writers. “Writing does not exist in a vacuum,” she states, and so it shows how we as writers, just as I am doing now, have expectations for ourselves based on assignments. We even have influences that we do not often think about when we are writing. Where did we come up with our style? What are the genre constraints we have to contend with?
Flower first began teaching courses to MBA students at Carnegie Mellon University, but wanted to study further the interaction between social forces and rhetorical discourse. These two for her are married perfectly in the intersection of social cognitive theory. As a social cognitive theorist, Flower has studied the writing process for decades, and her theory of understanding writing as an active process, rather than a talent or inspiration, has stimulated new ways of thinking through rhetorical situations, communicating information to other people through conversation or
Linda Flower, professor at Carnegie Mellon, is too modest to state she is a famed expert as a social cognitive rhetorician. She stands directly behind me, so I cannot see her as she speaks to me. I am supposed to feel like I am alone sitting at the table working on this very article, but all my mind can think is that …show more content…
The course is offered to students both inside and outside of the English department, making for an eclectic class with students who have varying perspectives on writing. When asked about the course, Flower states students will learn about how readers process text, but, more importantly, they will learn about themselves as writers. “Writing does not exist in a vacuum,” she states, and so it shows how we as writers, just as I am doing now, have expectations for ourselves based on assignments. We even have influences that we do not often think about when we are writing. Where did we come up with our style? What are the genre constraints we have to contend with?
Flower first began teaching courses to MBA students at Carnegie Mellon University, but wanted to study further the interaction between social forces and rhetorical discourse. These two for her are married perfectly in the intersection of social cognitive theory. As a social cognitive theorist, Flower has studied the writing process for decades, and her theory of understanding writing as an active process, rather than a talent or inspiration, has stimulated new ways of thinking through rhetorical situations, communicating information to other people through conversation or