Writing centers professionalize: Visions and versions of legitimacy

Abstract

This dissertation explores the ambiguities of professionalization for writing centers and presents an alternative way to approach what I believe is an inevitable process. Toward that end, my project is to examine how the discourse surrounding the professionalization of writing centers constructs scholars, tutors, teachers, and writing. In particular, the focus of my project is to compare how tutors' self-definitions of professionalism reflect/deflect how professionalism is defined in the scholarly literature and in arenas outside of academia. The conclusions I draw are based on my research of two local writing centers in two southwest universities as well as a survey of the intertwined histories of literature, composition studies, and writing centers, and my experience co-directing a writing center for two years. My final argument is that writing center workers ought to look outside of academia for organizational models more closely aligned to political activism such the civil rights movement and women's movement, and to capitalize on the interdisciplinary nature of writing center work to create a "participatory democracy," in which participants theorize from their experience and value the process over gaining expertise.