DEFINING OUR TERMS

DEFINING OUR
COMMITMENTS:

CATALOGING THE USES

OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

Kaitlin
Clinnin
Ohio State
October 17,
2015

So when in the past few years, a

number of teachers and theorists of
writing began to talk about the idea of
community as somehow central to our
work, I was drawn to what was said.
-- Joseph Harris
The Idea of Community in the Study of Writing
College Composition and Communication 1989
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COMMUNITY IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Community in writing studies
Scholarship
Pedagogy
Service

Community in higher education institutions

Institutional mission
Purpose of a degree
Student experience
Institutional investments and commitments
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RESEARCH QUESTIONS
What does community mean in writing
studies and higher educational contexts?
Historically tracking disciplinary usage of
community trends
What assumptions and values compose a
disciplinary understanding of community?
How does the disciplinary understanding of
community impact our roles as teachers,
scholars, and administrators?

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CATALOGING BY DESIGN
Search for community in CCC resulted in:

1, 791
articles in
CCC

871 articles
met study
criteria

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4,792 code
occurrences

467 codes
for
community

OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

(1950-2013)
Higher Education
Context
Rapid enrollment
growth (2.3 to 20.6
million students)
Increased campus
diversity
Fluctuations in
funding, construction,
regulation, admission
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Writing Studies
Context
Transition from
service course to
research discipline
Paradigm shifts
(current traditional
rhetoric,
expressivism, social
epistemic theories)

OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

(1950-2013)
Most Frequent Codes from 1950 2013 in CCC
#1

Non-specified Community (1060)

#2

Community College (490)

#3

Discourse Community (264)

#4

Academic/Scholarly Community (184)

#5

Racial Community [Nonacademic] (130)

#6

Geographic/Local Community (97)

#7

Community Figure/Member (92)

#8

College Campus/University Community

(86)

#9

Community Space/Location (78)

#10

Community Group (73)

TOTA
4,792 occurrences in 871
@kclinnin
L
articles
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OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

(1950-2013)
Non-specified
Community
Non-specified
Community

Academic
Community

Non-Academic
Community

Community
College
Academic/Scholarl
y Community
College
Campus/Universit
y Community

Discourse
Community
Racial Community
[Non-academic]
Geographic/Local
Community
Community
Figure/Member
Community
Space/Location
Community Group

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OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

(1950-1959)
Most Frequent Codes from 1950 1959 in CCC
#1

Non-specified Community (42)

#2

Community College (13)

#3

Academic/Scholarly Community (5)

#4

College Campus/University Community

(4)
Community Resources (4)
Geographic/Local Community (4)

#7

Community as Object of Academic

Research (3)
Community Service (3)

#9

College Serves Community (2)

Community Language Customs (2)

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Community Space/Location (2)

OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

(1990-1999)
Most Frequent Codes from 1990 1999 in CCC
#1

Non-specified Community (359)

#2

Community College (172)

#3

Discourse Community (132)

#4

Academic/Scholarly Community (53)

#5

Idea of Community (47)

#6

Community Literacy (37)

#7

Community Space/Location (35)

#8

Community as a Term (30)

#9

Community as a Feeling/Sense (22)

Community Figure/Member (22)

TOTA
1,447 occurrences in 208
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L
articles
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OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY IN CCC

(2010-2013)
Most Frequent Codes from 2010 2013 in CCC
#1

Community College (89)

#2

Non-specified Community (86)

#3

Native/Indigenous/Tribal Community
(29)

#4

Discourse Community (24)

#5

Academic/Scholarly Community (23)

#6

Geographic/Local Community (22)

#7

Racial Community [Non-academic] (19)

#8

Community Figure/Member (16)

#9

Professional Community (13)

#10

Community Group (12)

TOTA
623 occurrences in 97 articles
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L
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IMPLICATIONS FOR MOVING

FORWARD
Community usage is rooted in a shifting
particular historical, social, and cultural
context
There is not a singular disciplinary
understanding of community but at least
467 diff erent understandings

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FOCUS ON NON-SPECIFIED
COMMUNITY
Coded when contextual reading could not determine
the use of community
Standard English is that usage which is recognized and
accepted as customary in any particular community
(Hartung 60, 1957)
she contributes to her schools Web site and designs
visual PowerPoint texts like Honduras 2001, about a
social action project she undertook with members of her
community (Hawisher et al 661, 2004)

Non-specifi ed community is not inherently negative

Allows for general community experience or characteristic
General community reference allows subject to defi ne
own community

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IMPLICATIONS FOR MOVING

FORWARD
Determining presence and absence in the
catalog for CCC
What uses of community are represented in
scholarship and what uses are missing or
underrepresented?
How does CCC compare to other large journals
like Teaching English in the Two-Year College,
Computers and Composition, College English?

Need to refl ect on disciplinary and

institutional commitments to community in
teaching, administrative, and service
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capacities
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