The 54th annual MMLA (Midwest Modern Language Association) is seeking paper proposals for the 2012 convention to be held November 8-11 in Cincinnati, Ohio.  Of specific interest to graduate students and faculty in Written Communication is the following call for the "Teaching Writing in College" section:

Topic: (Re) Defining First-Year Composition

In their recent essay (http://goo.gl/xRXcr) on “working” the relationship between rhetoric and composition, Horner and Lu argue that we might further the work of teaching writing by “imagin(ing) alternative approaches to first-year composition.” Such approaches “engage students themselves in the kind of resisting reading and writing, at once respectful and questioning, of the canonical texts and principles of rhetoric” (my emphasis). Using this essay as a point of departure, this section invites presentations that “(re) define” first-year composition in some way. Possible topics include but are not limited to:

• Rhetorical tradition and contemporary composing
• Re-imagining audience
• Extra-curricular writing in curricular spaces
• First-year composition and digital humanities (a hot topic from this year’s MLA http://goo.gl/OTMjY)
• Genre theory in classroom practice
• Incorporating multilingual and/or translingual goals (http://goo.gl/GEgjD)

This list is far from complete. Please add your voice to the discussion.
Please send 250-word abstracts by June 1 to to Andre Buchenot, IUPUI, buchenot@iupui.edu.
Chair: Andre Buchenot, IUPUI, buchenot@iupui.edu