1. Developing Discourse Roles and Positionings - an Ecological Theory of Writing Development
Writing Development: Multiple Perspectives,
Institute of Education, University of London
Jon Smidt,
Sør-Trøndelag University College, Trondheim, Norway July 3, 2009

2. An ecological theory of writing development
SPEECH GENRES
Individual utterances
Mikhail Bakhtin (1986)

3. The Metaphor of Ecology
Gregory Bateson (1972): Steps to an Ecology of Mind
David Barton (1994): Literacy. An introduction to the ecology of written language:
Originating in biology, ecology is the study of the interrelationship of an organism and its environment. When applied to humans, it is the interrelationship of an area of human activity and its environment. It is concerned with how the activity – literacy in this case – is part of the environment and at the same time influences and is influenced by the environment. An ecological approach takes as its starting-point this interaction between individuals and their environments. (Barton, 1994 : 29)

4. An ecological theory of writing development
values and beliefs in society
culture specific norms and expectations
discourses in the classroom
texts
individual writers
writers’ sense of who they are or want to be in their writing

5. Individual utterances
SPEECH GENRES
Individual utterances
Discourse roles
Positionings
Bakhtin 1986
Ongstad 1999,
Smidt 2002
Mead  Goffman 1959
Ivanic 1998

6. Writing Development Example1: Challenging Norms and Values
Anne Haas Dyson:
Writing superheroes. Contemporary childhood, popular culture, and classroom literacy (1997)

7. Dyson 1993:
the link between composing a text and composing a place for oneself in the social world (p.229)

8. Dyson 1997:
Thus, our texts are formed at the intersection of a social relationship between ourselves as composers and our addressees and an ideological one between our own psyches (or inner meanings) and the words, cultural signs, available to us.
(p.4)

9. Writing Development Example 2: Reciprocal positionings
Jon Smidt:
‘Double histories in multivocal classrooms: Notes toward an ecological account of writing’
Written Communication Vol 19 No 3, July 2002

10. Writing development is multidimensional
norms of school writing
Interactional dimension
teacher
students
sociocultural or ideological dimension
Time dimension

11. Writing Development Example 3: Struggling to Create a Discoursal Self
Roz Ivanic:
Writing and identity : The discoursal construction of identity in academic writing.
(1998)

12. Ivanic 1998 sees
/../ every act of academic writing as, among other things, the writer’s struggle to create a discoursal self which removes the tension between their autobiographical self and the possibilities for self-hood available in the academic community. (p. 336)

13. Used about writing development, the metaphor of ‘ecology’ turns our attention to the influence of all participants in the writing classroom, student writers, classmates and teachers, as well as the represented cultures and norms.

14. norms of school writing
Social interactionists
teacher
students
Social constructionists

15. Individual utterances
SPEECH GENRES
Reference
Individual utterances
expressivity
addressivity
Mikhail Bakhtin (1986)  Ongstad 1999

16. Examples taken from:
Dyson, Anne Haas (1997) Writing superheroes. Contemporary childhood, popular culture, and classroom literacy. New York: Teachers College, Columbia Univ.
Ivanic, Roz (1998) Writing and identity : The discoursal construction of identity in academic writing. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins
Smidt, Jon (2002) ‘Double histories in multivocal classrooms: Notes toward an ecological account of writing’ Written Communication Vol 19 No 3, July 2002:

17. Other references:
Bakhtin, M. M. (1981) The dialogic imagination. Four essays (M. Holquist, Ed. and Trans.), Austin, TX: University of Texas Press
Bakhtin, M. M.(1986) Speech genres and other late essays (C. Emerson and M. Holquist, Eds., V. W. McGee, Trans.). Austin, TX: University of Texas Press
Barton, D. (1994) Literacy. An introduction to the ecology of written language. Oxford: Blackwell
Bateson, G. (1972) Steps to an ecology of mind. New York: Ballantine Books
Cherry, R. (1988) ‘Ethos versus Persona: Self-representation in written discourse’. Written Communication, 5,
Cope, B. and Kalantzis, M.(eds) (1993) The Powers of Literacy: A Genre Approach to Teaching Writing. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press
Dyson, A. H. (1993) The social worlds of children learning to write in an urban primary school. New York: Teachers College Press
Evensen, L.S. (2002) ‘Convention from below: negotiating interaction and culture in argumentative writing’. Written Communication Vol 19, No. 3p
Fairclough, N Discourse and social change. Cambridge UK: Polity Press
Goffman, E. (1990) The presentation of self in everyday life. London: Penguin Books (Original work published 1959)
Halliday, M.A.K. (1994) An introduction to functional grammar, Second edition. London & New York: Edward Arnold
Halliday, M.A.K. and Martin, J.R. (1993) Writing science: literacy and discursive power. London & Pittsburgh: Univ. of Pittsburgh Press
Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991) Situated learning. Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Mead, G. H. (1967) Mind, self, and society from the standpoint of a social behaviorist. Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, Phoenix Books. (Original work published 1934)
Nystrand, M. (1986) The structure of written communication. Studies in reciprocity between writers and readers. Orlando: Academic Press
Nystrand, M. (1989) ‘A social-interactive model of writing.’ Written Communication, 6, 66-85
Nystrand, M. (1990) ‘Sharing words: The effects of readers on developing writers.’ Written Communication, 7, 3-24
Nystrand, M., Gamoran, A., & Carbonaro, W. (1998) Towards an ecology of learning: the case of classroom discourse and its effects on writing in high school English and social studies. Albany NY/Madison WI: National Research Center on English Learning and Achievement/Wisconsin Center for Education Research Report Series 2.34
Ongstad, S. (1999). Self-positioning(s) and students’ task reflexivity—a semiotic macro concept exemplified. Journal of Structural Learning and Intelligent Systems 14(2), 1-28
Rommetveit, R. (1974). On message structure: A framework for the study of language and communication. London: Wiley
Sperling, M. (1994): ‘Constructing the perspective of teacher-as-reader: A framework for studying response to student writing’. Research in the Teaching of English, 28,
Sperling, M. (1995) Revealing the teacher-as-reader: A framework for discussion and learning (Center for the Study of Writing Occasional Paper No. 40). Berkeley: National Writing Project
Swales, J. (1990) Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge, New York, Port Chester, Melbourne, Sydney: Cambridge University Press