Persistence, resistance, and change: Toward a critical praxis for student researched writing

This project re-situates and re-defines researched writing, examines the persistence of the current-traditional model in college curriculums, investigates why resistance to the current-traditional model has often failed, and offers a solution which realigns researched writing with current rhetoric and composition research, theory, and pedagogical paradigms. The dissertation investigates the following research questions: What is the traditional research paper? How does it manifest in classrooms? How do teachers think and talk about this persistent genre? I critique the theoretical, ideological, and historical assumptions that exist in terms of the purposes of researched writing, and claim that a more critical aim for this pedagogy is needed. Using data from historical scholarship, contemporary textbooks, and teacher interviews, I argue that researched writing should be taught using a post-process theoretical frame. This frame includes emphasis on a variety of types of sources including students\u27 own experiences and perspectives as evidence, and a greater attention to real-life rhetorical situations that ask students to think outside of (in addition to) their immediate (classroom based) context. A post-process theoretical and pedagogical frame is necessary for revising, rethinking, and renewing our practices in teaching researched writing. This dissertation builds toward a model for researched writing that understands research as an activity, not a genre, so that students come to see research as one of many rhetorical tools