2011 Conference

Proposal Deadline
October 15, 2010
Email to Luke Niiler

Proposal Form

Call for Presenters

Theme
Turning the Tide

Location
The University of Alabama
Tuscaloosa, AL

Date
February 17-19, 2011

Keynote Speaker
Elisabeth Piedmont-Marton
Southwestern University, Georgetown, TX

Chair
Luke Niiler, Director of the University Writing Center
The University of Alabama

Conference Center
All sessions, a Thursday reception, and breakfasts and lunches will be held at the Bryant Conference Center on the University of Alabama campus. Parking is available on-site.

Accommodations
Accommodations are available at The Hotel Capstone on the University of Alabama campus at the special reduced conference rate of $109/night. The Hotel Capstone is a safe, convenient property located right next door to the Bryant Conference Center. It will take you no more than a minute or two to walk to your sessions. Free parking is available. Phone 205-752-3200 or 1-800-477-2262, and ask for the “SWCA conference rate” of $109 per night for either a Double room (Non-Smoking) or King room (Non-Smoking).   One to four occupants per room. This low rate is not available on the hotel website and will expire on January 18, 2011, so make your reservations now!



After four decades of the “modern” Writing Center, we are awash in tides of tired thinking, ways of seeing and being that we need to move beyond so that we can move forward. For example, we often claim to understand Writing Center work as “local”; we privilege “the writer, not the writing”; we view outreach as vital; we see connections between tutoring and teaching; we struggle with how to teach sentence-level topics. While these ideas do contain some valuable truths, they are also shopworn. SWCA 2011, then, is an opportunity to turn this tide, an invitation to think anew about what we do. The conference program will feature select, high-quality presentations that interrogate current conceptions of Writing Center work and extend our theory and practice in fresh, provocative, and compelling ways.

We invite proposals for 15-20 minute individual presentations, 45-minute panels or roundtables (3-4 people), 90-minute workshops (3-4people), and poster presentations. All proposals will be reviewed for relevance and quality; submission will not guarantee acceptance. If a submission is rejected, we will work with potential presenters to revise for resubmission.

Sample topics follow:

Let’s consider how work from diverse fields such Education, Educational Psychology, Art, Architecture, Business, Sports Management, Coaching, and Engineering--as well as fiction, film, creative nonfiction, and pop culture studies--can augment our practice.

Let’s recognize the notion of 'attributed value' in WC practice. How do we account for it, and how can we move past it? That is, many of our constituencies and funding agencies assume that we are valuable without ever asking us to clearly establish our value through rigorous assessment methods. How do we respond?

Let’s talk frankly and productively about race, gender, and sexuality in the Writing Center. How can our person-centered work enrich the fields of queer theory and feminism? How can our work begin to address what Victor Villanueva has termed ‘the rhetoric and precedents of racism’?

Let’s dismiss the notion that rigorous, empirical, quantitative analyses are anathema, and discuss how such methodologies might help us better understand our work, and represent that work to external audiences.

Let’s welcome and celebrate assessment—of tutors, clients, and centers—as a valuable tool for ongoing reflection and growth. Let’s think through the implications of robust assessment protocols in terms of internal and external constituencies: chairs, deans, provosts, accrediting bodies, the general public.

Let’s consider, for a moment, that there is some truth to the notion that specialist tutors do, in fact, work better than generalists in some instances. Let’s review the literature and work out how this dynamic might play out in our Writing Centers.

Let’s do some post-process theorizing.

Let’s do some real, live, on-the-spot and in-the-moment tutoring, and critique each other’s practice in a workshop setting.

Let’s break down some binaries: between HOC and LOC, between ‘directive’ and ‘nondirective’ tutoring, between verbal and nonverbal communication, between speech and silence.

Let’s take on a Writing Center culture that often self-defines and self-promotes in terms of the 'no', in terms of what it doesn't do (ie, proofread, edit, work with clients on the day a paper's due, etc)? What are the implications and consequences of doing this?

Let’s name some NEW scholarship that can be used to train our tutors. With apologies to Stephen North, no work prior to 2000, please.

Let’s talk about power: Why, after 40 years of the 'modern' writing center, do so many Writing Centers not have a place at the big table? That is, at a time during which every leading indicator points to the importance (and lack) of strong writing skills, are so many Writing Centers unfunded and understaffed? Is 'admin' solely to blame, or is, perhaps, our lack of rhetorical and business savvy also at issue?

Finally, let’s have some frank discussions about the stuff we don’t usually talk about when we talk about Writing Centers: love and death, pleasure and pain, food and drink, time and eternity.

Join us as we push the field forward: Join us as we turn the tide!



SWCA

SWCA - 2010
Call for Presenters
Southeastern Writing Center Association
est. 1981