I think Natasha raises a good point; however, I would simply say that in
a
course where the substance is writing (as in technical writing) the
appropriate discipline expert is a writing expert. That person should,
indeed, have some technical knowledge, or at the very least, be an adept
learner. The lower the level of student being taught, the less
discipline
specific knowledge is required (ie. a first year engineering student
knows
little about engineering, so the instructor of such a student needs to
learn more than the student knows-- and be willing to continue learning
along with or ahead of the student).
As for the move the other way, one of the difficulties for the
disciplinary
expert coming to writing is that they think they know about writing --
after
all, they're academics and have been writing their entire lives etc. It
is
the unfortunate fact of working in "language" that many don't realize
that
our approach to it is constructed rather than natural. Some disciplinary
specialists -- usually the really great writers -- appreciate the need
to
understand writing as a construction of knowledge. They would certainly
be
suitable, but as Natasha noted, so many of them just say "this is the
way I
do it", or "this is what my first boss taught me".
Katherine Gottschalk and Keith Hjortshoj have worked up the program at
Cornell, so you might want to e-mail them regarding their summer
training
course for faculty and its costs, pitfalls etc. The website -- with
staff
e-mails somewhere there -- is at
http://www.arts.cornell.edu/knight_institute/
Rob
--
**************************************
Dr. Robert Irish, Director
Language Across the Curriculum
Applied Science and Engineering
University of Toronto SF B670
416.978.6708
http://www.ecf.utoronto.ca/~writing
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