A non-reader focused passage in a section on poststructuralist theory

A 1985 essay  by John Clifford  and John Schilb,  "Composition  Theory and  Literary Theory," reviewed  the  work  of literary theorists  who  made it possible to imagine the teaching of literature  and composition,  reading and writing, as inter-connected disciplines. Clifford  and  Schilb  assessed  the  influence  of reader-response poststructuralist theories  and rhetoric and  examined  the  work of  those compositionists  and literary critics who,  they  argued, offered ways of thinking about reading and writing that  would  elide programmatic and disciplinary separations  (to name  a  few:  Susan Miller,  Richard Lanham,  Ross  Winterowd,  Wayne  Booth, Nancy  Comley and  Robert Scholes, and Terry  Eagleton). Though remarkably different from one another, these theorists share a concern with acts rather than facts of reading (Ray).

Salvatori, Mariolina, “Conversations with Texts: Reading in the Teaching of Composition.” College English, Vol. 58, No. 4 (Apr., 1996), p. 443

I chose this passage to discuss in my “Difficulty Blog” because I had to read it over several times before I could absorb it.  The most obvious difficulty I had with this passage was with some of the vocabulary: “poststructuralist,” “…would elide programmatic and disciplinary separations..”

First, I am not familiar with the term “poststructuralist,” so I went to Wikipedia to get that meaning.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-structuralism

That was helpful, and is something I will remember, as it seems to be a common term for theories of reading that is more reader focused rather than author focused.

Second, I had trouble with “…would elide programmatic and disciplinary separations..” I had to dig deep in my memory to remember the meaning of “elide” and had to think for a few minutes to determine how “programmatic” and “disciplinary” might be different and how those differences would affect the idea.

I think this vocabulary “problem” shows a gap between the general repertoire of the text and my own general repertoire.  They are pretty minor as far as problems go.  Just a quick google and a few minutes of thought and I was able to bridge the gap.  I did notice that it took some effort for me to incorporate the meanings of the new words into my understanding of the text.  The first time I read the passage, I understood very little, even of the phrases that I would normally understand fine—the gap caused such a disturbance that it impeded my understanding of the text.  The next few times I read it, it took a little effort to keep all the new meanings in my mind as I created the textual meaning.  It got easier the third and fourth readings.  But perhaps this analysis is too “cognitive” for a McCormick analysis?  Maybe not: I’m just describing how I was able to mesh my repertoire with that of the text.

Another difficulty I had was with all of the citations.  The way that the author rattles off a list of theorists, with no reference to titles, dates, or publications is a little off-putting for me, as if the author assumes that I know all of the writers that she mentions.  This is rather ironic, as the author is makes these citations in a way that is decidedly reader-unfriendly.  I have to admit, though, that I am probably not Salvatori’s intended audience.  She was clearly speaking to other theorists (I don’t identify myself as a theorist, at least not yet).

I think this was caused by a clash between the literary repertoire of the passage and my own literary repertoire.  I expect authors to give just a little more information when citing others, and the fact that Salvatori did not do that made me feel a little bit like an outsider—because everyone who knows anything will know this list of authors.  I’m pretty sure this was not Salvatori’s intent, but it was part of my interpretation.