I've thought about this question a good deal, too, Cathy, starting
back when as secretary of the association of chairs of English
departments I did a survey of writing instruction -- this would have
been maybe in the early '70s. I'd be _very_ happy to hear other
people's views on it.
My own first take is that a "FY Comp" industry parallel to the US
one never developed in Canadian universities (I'm not quite sure why,
but I have a suspicion it has to do with the dominance in Canada of a
English model of university, with its assumption that only the elite
come, and with a tighter dominance of traditional English English
literature in the middle of the century), and so writing has tended
to find its way in the existing disciplines (mainly English) or as
non-disciplinary "writing centres" rather than as a separate
discipline. So we got to WID before there was a WID? (Henry's views
on this would be very interesting to me.)
I think inkshedding, on this view, is a peculiarly Canadian
phenomenon. Writing learning as a byproduct of something else.
Very pragmatic, too.
This isn't to say we've done that particularly well, across the
board: one big difference I see is that there's simply _less_
writing instruction in Canadian universities. But from my
abolitionist perspective (if we could do it without costing so many
of my friends their jobs, I'd say let's get rid of standalone writing
classes altogether), we're not doing so badly.
-- Russ
__|~_
Russell A. Hunt __|~_)_ __)_|~_ Aquinas Chair
St. Thomas University )_ __)_|_)__ __) PHONE: (506) 452-0424
Fredericton, New Brunswick | )____) | FAX: (506) 450-9615
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