"Painless" publishing? Perish the thought

I need an attitude check about publishing in academe. My heart is just not in it.

My background and experience as a high school Language Arts teacher have something to do with it. Writing instruction has changed considerably over the last several decades. I am deeply indebted to the reader/writer workshop model and practitioner-scholars such as Lucy Calkins, Linda Rief, and Nancy Atwell, who have influenced my personal approach to writing as well as how I frame instruction for young writers.

So, for example, with an ulterior motive informed by the fact that my son insists he "hates" reading, I announced recently over dinner one night that he was going to write books this summer. His immediate response was, "Can we publish them?" Now, that makes my heart swell!

Publishing redefined
Where I come from, "publishing" simply means sharing your writing with an audience of at least one (and not just your teacher). My son is only seven years old, and he already grasps this notion, reinforced not only by me but his Kindergarten and first-grade teachers, too.

This is a monumental K-12 instructional reform. Just ask your parents or grandparents to recall their own memories of learning to write. They will likely regale you with horror stories of weekly themes written strictly for the English teacher, who heavily inscribed each page of the students' composition notebooks in red pen, possibly encoding her feedback using one of the cryptic, numerical hierarchies of English grammar errors, such as Warriner's or UT's own Hodges Harbrace handbook. (And you thought journal reviewers were mean!)

Those of us of a certain age can probably recall being told by well-intentioned English teachers never to use the first-person and never to write in this-or-that color of ink.  I suppose it's all part of being socialized into academic Discourse, which serves a purpose, but by virtue of its sheer dominancy in K-12 education and beyond, has all but eclipsed other legitimate ways of being, communicating, and publishing.

For example, some in academia look askance upon digital and web-based publishing. As a matter of professional survival, graduate students and untenured faculty avoid publication in open-access, online journals for fear it will be discounted in decisions about hiring, promotion, and tenure. As Rich (2012) warns: "Remember that not all peer-reviewed journals are equal nor will these likely be evaluated equally on the job market" (p. 378).

Still. I am intrigued by online journals such as New Horizons For Learning, supported by Johns Hopkins University.  It has an established history of open-access online publishing for manuscripts pertaining to all aspects of education. Part of the New Horizons mission is to create a lab of ideas through a virtual roundtable of expert professionals.  The journal puts forth a call for open submissions for publication, and participants vet the content through a "generative process" on the website. It's a complete revisioning of peer-reviewed publication.

So, I bristle a bit upon receiving well-intentioned advice about having "a competitive publishing record" (Rich, 2012, p. 376). I guess I am just having myself a sort of "Norm Denzin" moment. But, then, I consider Tracy's (2010) argument for developing universal standards of quality for rigor and trustworthiness in qualitative research, and I can appreciate the usefulness of criteria for evaluation. As Tracy says, "...[G]uidelines and best practices regularly serve as helpful pedagogical launching pads across a variety of interpretive arts" (p. 838).

I am reminded of the old adage: you must learn the rules before you can break the rules.

Why should the writing process, including the publication stage, be any less rigorous? From a sociocultural perspective (my preferred lens), it makes sense. The writing process is a continual learning process, in which the learner, or in this case, writer, must use and internalize the external tools of the trade (i.e. "rules" and conventions of language use and representation) before she can expertly innovate and break new literary ground with them.

SOAPP
One of my favorite "pedagogical launching pads" in the classroom was a mnemonic to scaffold students' thinking as they approached new writing tasks and performance “prompts.”  The mnemonic was “SOAP,” which stood for “subject, occasion, audience, and purpose,” as in, “What is the subject?  What is the occasion for writing?” and so on.  Later I modified SOAP, which I came to view as not appropriately acknowledging students’ social and cultural contexts. I added a second "P" to stand for "perspective" or "position." Using the rule of SOAPP, I encouraged students to ask themselves, “What is my position?” and “What is my perspective?”  It was a small step toward leaving the safe but predictable (and oftentimes inauthentic) confines of classroom discourse.

As I read Rich's publishing guide for graduate students, I thought (for the first time in a long time) about my trusty SOAPP heuristic. In my field, literacy scholars often critique academic-based discourses as limiting students’ literacy development and falling short of helping students attend to their own perspectives and identities vis-à-vis writing topics and intended audiences.

Dyson (2004), for instance, speaks of a paradox in her essay “Writing and the Sea of Voices.” During the last part of the 20th century, teachers, riding a wave of socioculturally fueled research, tried hard – too hard it seems – to bridge sociocultural contexts by incorporating more talk and discussion in the classroom. But, the pendulum swung too far, and researchers began to focus new attention on the negative impact of teacher-centered talk on student writing processes. Dyson argues that some teacher-initiated talk may create classroom cultures that are no more culturally relevant than the cognitive and Behaviorist environments that preceded them.

Although her work is dedicated to the social and cultural aspects of K-12 teaching and learning, Dyson's critique of the “dyadic” apprenticeship model inspired me to re-examine Rich's (2013) article. How does his "Quick and (Hopefully) Painless Guide to Establishing Yourself as a Scholar" function as one such "dyadic encounter"? In dispensing his writing advice, how well does Rich address the components of SOAPP, particularly the last "P" ?

Rich immediately launches into the writing "occasion," which refers to both immediate situations and contexts that generate a piece as well as broader contexts that motivate its development. Rich addresses all of these, including the universal "publish or perish" mantra that prods much academic writing. He makes a good point that as soon as one starts graduate school, occasions to conduct research and to write are everywhere. These ideas should be noted or logged for future reference.

What follows is an intertwined discussion of "subject" and "purpose" for writing. Rich encourages readers to choose topics about which they are passionate and for which they have an interest, but the viability of a topic primarily resides in whether or not the author can achieve some meaningful purpose or "contribution" with it. This aligns with advice from other scholars (Kilbourn, Piantanida & Garman), and I respect Rich's avoidance of the clichéd literature "gap." Identifying one's purpose is "the most important question to address" (Rich, p. 376), but to answer the question, one must consider the "complex interplay" between subject and purpose (to use Kilbourn's expression). From a qualitative standpoint, Rich hints at the value of highly subjective, unique interpretive perspectives, when he suggests that "challenging the conventional wisdom has more appeal than reaffirming what is already accepted" (p. 376).

As this article focuses on publishing, the "audience" component figures prominently, from advice on formatting (avoid jargon in subheads) to leveraging peer feedback as a gauge of broader audience appeal. Some of Rich's advice is helpful, but some tips come across as superficial flourishes, at best, to downright pandering, at worst. He instructs ambitious graduate students to scan a desired journal and, "If a journal has recently published something similar on your topic in the past few years, attempt to cite this work; many journals ask the recently published authors to review articles" (p. 377).

And then this: "After you choose a journal for submission, tailor the paper based on the journal's particular theoretical, methodological, or interdisciplinary focus to encourage positive reviews or at least minimize negative remarks" (p. 377). Something about that does not settle well with me, and it has something to do with that other "P."

Save for one comment about developing a "clear and concise style" (p. 378), Rich provides little to no guidance in his "Painless Guide" on developing and maintaining one's personal voice and positionality -- dare I say "integrity"? -- during the tumultuous publishing process.

Writing for an audience is a skill. Not too long ago, being a published author was an accomplishment enjoyed by an elite few. That is still true in academia, but other genres of writing and writing communities are expanding and reaching new audiences. Authors once shut out from the publishing process are finding a voice.

It's an exciting time, but with opportunity comes responsibility. The publishing process sensitizes the writer to the needs of her audience. Ideally, through the process, the writer also develops and refines her style, voice, and perspective. It should be a mutually reinforcing dynamic, but, in academic publishing, it seems difficult to maintain a balance between the two.

References
Dyson, A. H. (2004). Writing and the sea of voices: Oral language in, around, and about writing. In R.B. Ruddell & N.J. Unrau (Eds.), Theoretical Models and Processes of Reading (5th ed., pp. 146-162). Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

Kilbourn, B. (2006). The qualitative doctoral dissertation proposal. The Teachers College Record, 108(4), 529–576.

Rich, T. S. (2013). Publishing as a graduate student: A quick and (hopefully) painless guide to establishing yourself as a scholar. PS: Political Science & Politics, 46(02), 376–379.

Tracy, S. J. (2010). Qualitative quality: Eight “big-tent” criteria for excellent qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 16(10), 837–851.

"Painless" publishing? Perish the thought