Developing Global Rhetorical Arts: Networked Collaboration in the Write4Change Online Writing Community

• In Event: Literacies in Circulation: Exploring a Transliteracies Framework for Understanding Diverse Learning Pathways

Abstract

Purpose: This paper explores the emergent dimensions of collaborative writing in online contexts. It reports on the Write4Change (W4C) Project, a global network of adolescent writers and teachers dedicated to writing for social action, and examines how cross-cultural conversations about the intersections between ‘freedom’ and ‘place’ emerged and resonated across the online writing community.

Framework: Rooted in a transliteracies framework, this study examines the complexity of meaning making in a world characterized by global, networked flows and emerging technologies. At the core of W4C is the belief that writing is a fundamentally participatory practice (Jenkins et al., 2006) and the central means by which young people participate in the contemporary world. We understand writing to involve the composing, (re)mixing, and assembling of texts and other symbolic artifacts across multiple modes, media, and languages (Bezemer & Kress, 2008; Canagarajah, 2012; Lankshear & Knobel, 2011).

Methods: In order to support systematic inquiry into the ways teachers and students engage in writing as a form of social action on a global scale, we drew on Design-Based Implementation Research (DBIR) to “pose new kinds of questions” and frame research and practice as mutually transformative (Fishman et al., 2013, p. 138). Rather than focus solely on ‘what works,’ this study concentrates on “what works where, when, and for whom” by engaging in iterative, collaborative research with multiple stakeholders, most centrally adolescents and teachers (Penuel et al., 2011, p. 335).

Data: Drawing on pilot data of four teachers and 60 youth (aged 13-19) from the US, Canada, and India from the first six months of Write4Change, the study includes the following data: field notes, video and audio, photographs, youth artifacts, surveys, interviews, and network analytics. Data analysis included recursive process, thematic, and design coding as well as the creation of various forms of maps and matrices (Miles, Huberman, & Saldaña, 2014).

Findings: We investigated the emergence of influential ideas that swept through and took root in the online community, often linked through the use of #hashtags that trended across different kinds of postings (e.g., poetry, selfies, links, etc.). In the paper we explore three primary dimensions of networked collaboration that emerged as youth explored cross-cultural dimensions of ‘freedom’ - one the most popular themes that resonated across the network. The three dimensions we discuss are: 1) vulnerability management; 2) “crowded talk” (Soep, 2006); and 3) responsive authorial positioning.

Significance: This paper highlights the affordances of networked collaboration, an area of critical development as more people become connected via digital tools and practices across ideological, geographical, and cultural differences. This study develops knowledge about what we call ‘global rhetorical arts’ - the capacity to represent oneself and one’s ideas across multiple languages and modalities in ethically alert, aesthetically nimble, and rhetorically effective ways in collaboration with others. Just as instructional practices have moved from strictly focusing on products to purposefully including the processes of writing, scholarly work on networked writing activity also must take a turn toward processes as emerging, evolving, and ultimately shaped by networks.

Authors

• Amy Stornaiuolo, University of Pennsylvania

• Matthew Hall, The College of New Jersey