Composition at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century by Richard Fulkerson

I thought it was interesting how Fulkerson opens up his article by revealing that he is not trained in the field, but felt it was necessary to address the current theories that according to him have changed composition. “Frustration drives me to try to make personal sense of composition studies, a discipline for which I was not trained into which I have been inexorably drawn.”  Throughout the article I felt like his tone was a bit discouraged and it even seemed like he was calling nonsense to all the current changes in writing. He emphasized that in CCS the courses are not aimed at improving writing and are not necessarily needed in an English department. Fulkerson also asserted that CCS courses seemed “inappropriate because reading, analyzing, and discussing the texts upon which the course rests are unlikely to leave room for any actual teaching and writing.” Overall, I think Fulkerson seems to present the idea that the current theories and practices are not much useful to composition studies and that the current instructors put in place to teach composition may not be qualified to do so because they are not improving writing.

At the end of the article I was a bit  surprised because instead of providing a solution liked I had hope he would he instead gave a dooming prognosis and that is “the field composition studies is on verge of what undoubtedly will come to be known as the “the new theory wars.”