4. Mapping Texts: The Reading/Writing Connection

The strategies students observe in reading can become part of their own repertoire for writing.
—Stuart Greene, “Exploring the Relationship Between Authorship and Reading” (36)

BEING ABLE TO READ effectively and efficiently is necessary for writing a thesis/dissertation and for any kind of scholarship. However, when graduate students read scholarly texts for a class or a research project, they sometimes feel as if they are entering a strange country, a foreign landscape, with unmarked paths and roads that are bewilderingly difficult to navigate. As they struggle to find their way, they may wish for a set of directions or a “map” of the terrain that will enable them to traverse its roads more effectively.

This chapter discusses strategies for “mapping” the texts you will need for writing your thesis or dissertation, based on insights derived from reading theory. You will note that it uses metaphors associated with travel—words such as navigation, direction, terrain, signposts, and maps. Viewing reading in terms of travel can yield mapping strategies that help you derive more from your reading and adapt strategies you perceive in published works to your own writing—that is, you will learn to read like a writer..

The Challenge of “Navigating” Unfamiliar and Densely Populated Texts

Most graduate students have been successful undergraduates and consider themselves capable of completing reading and writing tasks without too much difficulty. However, as you have probably discovered, the reading expectations in graduate school tend to be considerably higher than they are in undergraduate classes. The material is likely to be quite challenging, and some of it may presume a background that you do not have yet. You may find a lot of it quite difficult to understand—and there is so much of it! Faced with these difficult and bewildering texts, you may suspect that no matter how much you have read before coming to graduate school, you haven’t read nearly enough—certainly not nearly as much as the other students in your department, who somehow seem smarter, better educated, and more articulate than you. You may also fear that no matter how much you read, you will never catch up. How can you manage to read effectively and efficiently when you are trying to complete a thesis or dissertation?

Effective Reading Is Not Necessarily Quick Reading

Ours is a culture that values efficiency, and in the context of graduate school, the implication is that “good” readers are “fast” readers. Advertisements for speed-reading classes abound, and you may feel frustrated if you don’t understand an academic article or book right away. Pressured for time, you may attempt to “skim” material needed for a class or for a research project. But when you finish “reading,” you may discover that you didn’t understand it very well—possibly you didn’t understand it at all.

An important idea to keep in mind is that some reading will take a great deal of time and that you may have to read some texts more than once to engage with them and incorporate them into your own writing. Some material, of course, you will want to skim, to get a quick overview of its potential usefulness. But some of it you will have to read slowly, struggling with ideas and leaving some to be understood later. Here, then, is an important concept to remember when you read a scholarly text:

You don’t have to understand every single idea in a text the first time you read it.

Many articles and books presume a familiarity with concepts that, for you, may be completely unfamiliar. Casual references may be made to studies, theories, or issues that you have not yet encountered. Moreover, many scholarly texts are not written for easy comprehension. Although it would be desirable if scholars wrote articles and books with the goal of making their ideas clearly understood, many do not (I sometimes suspect that some are deliberately written to be difficult). You may then have to slog through dense jungles of text, leaving some of it unexplored or only partially cleared. Sometimes later sections will clarify early confusions in the same text. But you may have to renavigate a text—that is, read it several times to understand it fully.

Constructing a Map of a Text

Inexperienced readers often begin the process of academic reading as follows: They glance at the title of a text or ignore it altogether. Then they simply begin reading from the beginning, proceeding step by step, hacking their way through each word and sentence, attempting to understand each idea as it is presented to them on the page.

In contrast, experienced readers attempt to obtain significant information about a text before they begin to read—in essence, to construct a map of the text that will enable them to navigate it more effectively. Here are 10 strategies for constructing such a map:

1 Get an Overview of Its Topography

Before you begin reading carefully with the goal of comprehending the ideas in a text, consider whether it is worth exploring. Examine the title, head notes, introductory material, table of contents, and organizational structure. Do these features enable you to view the text in terms of structure and main ideas? Can you perceive its peaks and valleys or the roads that will enable you to navigate? Are there digressions that lead away from the central direction?

2 Examine the Text for Its Central “Moves”

In his book Genre Analysis, the genre theorist John Swales discusses the importance of “moves” in academic texts as a way of understanding how a text achieves its rhetorical goal of impacting an intended audience. A “move,” in Swales’s system, can be understood as a “direction” in which the text proceeds to make its point, and when you look at the moves in the texts you read, you will be able construct a map that will help you navigate. The process of tracing the moves or thought patterns in a text can enable you to understand that text more clearly. Also when you focus on how that text works to develop its ideas—to read rhetorically—you will gain familiarity with typical text patterns that you can adapt for your own purposes. Reading rhetorically means that you read a text not only to understand what it says, but also to discern how it works—that is, how the writer structures the text and uses language to communicate ideas and influence readers.

Some of Swales’s research focused on moves that are characteristic of introductions in a research article. After he studied many such introductions, he constructed a three-move scheme that he designated the Create a Research Space (CARS) model. This is a diagram of that model:

Move 1 Establishing a territory

Move 2 Establishing a niche

Move 3 Occupying the niche

Other genre theorists have similarly examined texts from the perspective of “moves” and the way in which they construct a pattern within a text. Building on Swales’s work, Dudley-Evans analyzed introductions characteristic of Ph.D. dissertations, constructing a model that consists of six moves. His model is diagrammed here:

Move 1 Introducing the field

Move 2 Introducing the general topic within the field

Move 3 Introducing the particular topic (within the general topic)

Move 4 Defining the scope of the particular topic

Move 5 Preparing for present research

Move 6 Introducing present research

(Discussed in Bhatia, Vijay K. Analysing Genre: Language Use in Professional Settings. London: Longman, 1993–97.)

Examining the moves in a text will help you understand how the text functions and enhance your grasp of its content. You can then approach reading with a dual focus: to understand what a text is saying and to analyze how it says it. This dual focus is crucial for working with complex texts, both as a reader and as a writer.

3 Consider the Text in a Rhetorical Context

The concept of “moves” is based on the idea that nearly all texts have a rhetorical goal—that is, they are written by someone (the writer or author) to have an impact on an intended audience. Try to determine, then, who that “someone” may be. What sort of persona is communicated in the text? Does this person seem trustworthy? What may be the author’s motive for writing this particular text? What central arguments are made? Can you see where the author is “going” as he or she proceeds along the paths of the text?

Because authors write articles and books to join a scholarly conversation, consider the nature of that conversation. Does the title give a clue as to the author’s purpose? Does the author want to change readers’ view about an idea or belief? Does the author want to clarify an uncertainty or problematize what is usually regarded as a certainty?

4 Situate the Text Within Your Discipline

Disciplines are filled with disagreements, controversies, and uncertainties, and a text often provides the site for an ongoing debate. Can you determine the controversy (or conversation) that a particular text is addressing? In the context of the “mapping” metaphor, can you characterize the “site” of this text in reference to other texts that address a similar topic? Is it left, right, or center? How do you know?

5 Locate the “Sea of Former Texts”—Areas of “Intertextuality”

In “Intertextuality: How Texts Rely on Other Texts,” Charles Bazerman observes that “we create our texts out of the sea of former texts that surround us, the sea of language we live in. And we understand the texts of others within that same sea”(83). Scholarly texts are thus characterized by “intertextuality,” which can be defined as the “explicit and implicit relations that a text has to prior, contemporary or future texts” (Bazerman 84).

As you navigate your articles and books, then, note the location of this “sea” of intertextuality. What sources does the text build upon? Which ones does it oppose? What insights into the terrain of the text can you gain by noting the works it incorporates? Note instances of direct or indirect quotation and the use of particular phrases or terms.

6 Compare This Text to Other Texts You Have Read

As you read, consider whether this text resembles other texts you have previously “visited.” Is it structured similarly, or does it adhere to patterns associated with a particular genre? Or does it flaunt your expectations? As you traverse its roads, does it seem familiar, or are there unexpected bumps along the road, places that require you to leap across a chasm? Comparing a text to other texts in your discipline and, in particular, to those that pertain to your topic, can aid your reading comprehension and is also essential to writing the literature review.

7 Consider Why You Are Reading This Text

As you navigate the text, ask yourself the following questions that explorers probably ask themselves:

• What am I doing here?

• Why should I continue on this journey?

• What do I expect to learn from this text?

• How can I use this text in my research?

8 Create Signposts That Will Enable You to See the Path More Clearly

If it is possible, mark the text as you proceed. Highlight important sections or interact with the text by writing comments in the margin. Take notes that summarize important ideas (see Chapter 6, “Writing the Literature Review”). Signposts can be a helpful guide if you decide to incorporate this particular text into your own writing.

9 Keep Track of Your Own Location as You Proceed

As you move through the text, pause periodically to ask yourself, “Am I learning anything from this text? Has it altered my perspective in some way about my topic?” Pause from time to time to consider the impact of this text on you as a student engaged in writing a thesis or dissertation.

10 Evaluate Your Presence Within This Text

As you read, consider the value of the text you are navigating. Is this a text that you will want to revisit? Does it warrant additional attention? Do you think another trip would be worthwhile?

Reviewing the Process of Mapping a Text

The strategies for navigating or “mapping” a text can be summarized as follows:

1. Get an overview of its topography.
2. Examine the text for its central “moves.”
3. Consider the text in a rhetorical context.
4. Situate the text within your discipline.
5. Keep track of your own location as you proceed.
6. Evaluate your presence within this text.
7. Locate the “sea of former texts”—areas of “intertextuality.”
8. Consider why you are reading this text.
9. Compare this text to other texts you have read.
10. Evaluate your presence within this text.

Mapping a Text: “The Prickly Politics of School Starting Time,” by Kyla L. Wahlstrom

Read the article by Kyla L. Wahlstrom. Then note how this text can be “mapped” using the 10 previous suggestions.

The Prickly Politics of School Starting Time

By Kyla L. Wahlstrom

There are many questions yet to be answered about the consequences of a change in school starting time. But one thing is certain: As the transition is being planned and implemented, all the stakeholders who will be affected need to be consulted and kept informed.

Some school districts have responded to recent research findings on adolescent sleep patterns and needs by significantly changing high school starting times. Other districts are considering such a move. But tinkering with the school-day schedule is not without its risks.

Aware of those risks, in the fall of 1996, several superintendents of suburban Minnesota school districts asked the Center for Applied Research and Educational Improvement (CAREI) at the University of Minnesota to assess the attitudes of stakeholders toward such a venture. Seventeen school districts agreed to participate in the study, which soon focused not only on high schools but also on elementary and middle/junior high schools, since the schedules of all buildings in a district are inextricably linked.¹

Of the 17 districts, only 1 of them—Edina—had already made the decision to start the high school day 70 minutes later in 1996–97 than the previous school year. At the start of the study, then, only the stakeholders in Edina were actually experiencing the change. A year later, the Minneapolis School District pushed back the starting time of its seven comprehensive high schools by an hour and 25 minutes, from 7:15 to 8:40 a.m., enabling CAREI to study the actual impact of a later starting time in that district as well.²

The CAREI researchers discovered that changing a school’s starting time provokes the same kind of emotional reaction from stakeholders as closing a school or changing a school’s attendance area. A school’s starting time sets the rhythm of the day for teachers, parents, students, and members of the community at large. The impact of changing that starting time is felt individually, and the individuals who are affected need to have their views heard and legitimized so that the discussion can move forward in search of common ground. Another striking finding from the first year of the CAREI study had to do with the role that assumptions play in discussions of changing school starting times. Informal conversations on the topic seemed invariably to include a comment such as “The transportation department rules the district, and this change cannot take place because of bus problems” or “The coaches will never go along with this idea—there’s no use in even approaching them.”

To assess the accuracy of these and similar assumptions, we conducted individual interviews during the first year of the study with each participating district’s transportation director, with 51 coaches and co-curricular faculty advisors, with all 17 district directors of community education, with several food service directors, with several district personnel directors, with all elementary and secondary curriculum directors, and with local employers who provide after-school jobs for students. Surprisingly, none of the interviewees suggested that a change in school starting time—especially at the high school level—would be out of the question. Indeed, though coaches and transportation directors did voice some concerns, most respondents in all categories were willing to discuss at length ways of implementing such a change, since it would be beneficial for students and their learning. To allow untested assumptions to forestall debate on the issue is to close the door prematurely (and possibly wrongly) to later starting times for high school students.

The CAREI study showed, too, that advocates for later school starting times tended to use in their lobbying efforts both hard data (e.g., the findings of sleep research on adolescents) and testimonials (e.g., positive outcomes from districts that had already made such a change). In both Edina and Minneapolis, a small number of advocates had a positive impact on the decision-making process.

It’s important to remember, however, that strident advocacy can squelch debate. And without thorough discussion of the issues surrounding a proposed change in school starting time, any decision will be shallow and may have to be revisited.

In both Edina and Minneapolis, shifts in high school starting times affected the starting times of elementary and middle schools as well. Had the school board members in either of those districts focused solely on the logistics of the change, it is very unlikely that a later high school starting time would have been implemented. But the school boards in both districts first considered the research data on adolescent sleep needs. To their credit, they posed the question, Are the data of sufficient quality and relevance to merit consideration? With that question answered affirmatively, the next questions became: What do we hope to gain by shifting our high school starting time? And what may we lose in the process? The answers to these two questions had to be based on fact, not on emotion or on potential logistical problems.

Eventually, however, both school boards arrived at the point where concerns about logistics appropriately entered the debate. Then the question became, What will it take to bring our school schedules into line with what the research tells us about adolescent sleep needs? The boards formed several subcommittees to investigate logistical problems and to come up with possible scenarios. Throughout the decision-making process, though, factual evidence took precedence, and students’ best interests held sway. As a result, the discussions involved much less wrangling than has been seen in other districts embroiled in the same debate. From a school board’s perspective, keeping a potentially divisive debate focused on student needs is good politics.

If altering high school starting times is risky for school boards, it is equally risky for superintendents. In an open forum, the 17 superintendents whose districts took part in the CAREI study discussed the dissension that community debate on the topic had caused in some locales. Three superintendents, in whose districts the topic had not surfaced, said they did not plan to bring it up. Two of the three noted that their contracts were up for renewal, and they did not want their boards split over this potentially divisive issue (on which they would be forced to take a stand). They elected instead to remain publicly silent and privately neutral on the topic.

In Minneapolis, the decision to move to a later starting time for the high schools was made under an interim superintendent. When the new superintendent took over, she “inherited” that decision, and any perceived negatives related to its implementation were not associated with her.

If altering school starting times is risky for school boards and superintendents, it is no less so for high school principals. In Edina and Minneapolis, the high school principals served on the committees that made the decision to push back high school starting times. Like other committee members, these principals had access to the sleep research data and to information on outcomes from districts that had already taken such action. Armed with the facts, the principals were able to refute unsubstantiated claims and to respond to the concerns of students, parents, and teachers. Participation in the committees’ debates also helped the high school principals identify potential sources of resistance to the change and learn to deal with them before opposition escalated.

It was equally important to have the elementary and middle/junior high school principals involved in the discussions, since changing the high school starting time inevitably affects other buildings as well. In large districts, however, it is impractical to have as many principals take part in the deliberations as may be optimal. Minneapolis compensated by providing regular briefings on the committees’ discussions to all principals in the district.

Clearly, schools at all levels whose own schedules will be affected by a change in the high school starting time must be given sufficient advance notice. In Minneapolis, schools that were told in the spring that their starting times would be changed in the fall encountered much less resistance from parents and staff members than did schools that learned about the change shortly before the fall term began. Staff members and parents need time to adjust their personal and family schedules, and providing such time is one key to a smooth transition.

All the findings of the CAREI study that I have mentioned so far apply to both urban and suburban schools and school districts. But a few factors emerged that seem more pertinent to one setting than to the other.

The reactions of high school teachers to a later starting time differed by setting, for example. A clear majority of the suburban teachers said that they liked the change, for reasons that ranged from “more time to incorporate the news of the day into my lessons” and “more students are awake and fully participating in my first- and second-hour classes” to “more time to talk with fellow teachers about sharing materials and team teaching.” The suburban teachers were still arriving at an early hour—but, because of the later dismissal time, they were working a longer day.

Urban high school teachers, by contrast, were evenly split between liking (45.2%) and not liking (45.7%) the later starting time. Those who responded positively to the change cited many of the same reasons listed by their suburban counterparts. But two-thirds of the urban teachers who did not like the change mentioned the negative impact that a later dismissal time had on their personal lives. Their comments ranged from “I feel I have no ‘down time’ before I go home” and “I have lost at least an hour that I would otherwise spend at my second job” to “I now have to face rush-hour traffic.” Only one-third of the teachers who disliked the change mentioned the needs of students in their listings of negative concerns.

These sharp differences in teachers’ attitudes deserve further study. Perhaps urban teachers are simply reflecting the stresses of teaching under less than ideal conditions. The personal toll of having to make accommodations for a later starting time may be the final straw that makes this change feel overwhelming.

The preferred dismissal time for elementary and middle/junior high schools is another factor that differs by locale. Parents in both suburban and urban areas worry about young children walking along roads or waiting for a bus at a road’s edge in winter darkness. But urban parents worry too that “there’s a different kind of predator out there in the late afternoon.” Thus urban parents prefer an earlier school dismissal time to a later one.

A third issue that differs by locale is “zero hour” classes—those that meet an hour before the regular school day begins. Such classes are usually limited in enrollment, since they serve accelerated students or youngsters in work/study programs. The CAREI study reveals that more suburban students than urban ones take zero hour classes because transportation to school is less of a problem in suburban areas. This equity issue merits further study.

Moreover, zero hour classes negate for participants the beneficial effects of a later school starting time. Districts may wish to consider the wisdom of offering such options.

Obviously, changing a high school’s starting time produces a complex array of benefits and tensions. Just as clearly, districts must challenge the assumptions before a genuine dialogue can take place on the topic.

Meanwhile, we still do not know the effect of a later high school starting time on student achievement. In an effort to provide that information, CAREI is now looking at longitudinal achievement data from districts that implemented a later starting time several years ago.

CAREI will also seek to answer the question of whether a later high school starting time reduces the incidence of juvenile misbehavior by keeping youngsters in school until later in the afternoon. To date, there is no evidence to suggest that crime rates have dropped as a result of pushing back school starting times.

CAREI has studied most extensively the two Minnesota districts that have pushed back their high school starting times by an hour or more. Other districts in the state have implemented a 30- to 40-minute delay in the start of school. Still other districts have accepted the value of a later starting time but are struggling in committees over how to deal with the logistical problems. Meanwhile, CAREI researchers are looking for an answer to the question, How late is late enough to help address the sleep needs of adolescents without changing school schedules more than is necessary?

High school starting time is a seemingly simple issue with prickly political dimensions, and there is no single solution that will fit all districts. Only through open discussion of their concerns can stakeholders develop a shared understanding of the facts that will lead to a reasonable—but purely local—decision. And that’s as it should be, since those stakeholders are the ones who will have to live with the consequences.

1. Kyla Wahlstrom and Carol Freeman, “Executive Summary of Findings from School Start Time Study,” 1997, available from http://carei.coled.umn.edu.
2. Kyla Wahlstrom, Gordon Wrobel, and Patricia Kubow, “Executive Summary of Findings from Minneapolis School District School Start Time Study,” 1998, available from http://carei.coled.umn.edu.

File Name and Bibliographic Information

Kyla L. Wahlstrom, “The Prickly Politics of School Starting Times,” Phi Delta Kappan 80, 05, January 1999, 344–347.

Copyright Notice

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Please fax permission requests to the attention of KAPPAN Permissions Editor at 812-339-0018 or e-mail permission requests to [email protected].

Here is a way that this text can be “mapped” using the strategies discussed above:

1. Get an overview of the topography.

   The note at the beginning of the article refers to questions concerning the “consequences of a change in school starting” and the word stakeholders. These phrases suggest that the article is concerned with opinions by stakeholders about a proposed change in school starting time. The note at the beginning of the article indicates that the author was associate director of the Center for Applied Research and Educational Improvement, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, indicating that this is a research report that presents findings about this topic. Note that the introduction to the article also provides an overview of what the study was about: the questioning of 17 school districts in Minnesota about attitudes concerning a later starting time for high schools.

2. Examine the text for its central moves.

   This text has no headings or subheadings, so to get a sense of the central moves, one needs to skim the text. The introduction provides an overview of what the study involved and the people who were interviewed. The central section of the article discusses who was interviewed and differing reactions from school boards and suburban and urban parents and teachers. The concluding section raises questions for additional investigation.

3. Consider the text in a rhetorical context—figure out the nature of the conversation.

   This report attempts to find out various stakeholders’ attitudes about a proposed change in high school starting time. There is obviously an assumption that attitudes will vary, and the article attempts to present a preliminary report on these attitudes and suggest areas for further research. The author presents a balanced perspective; her textual “self” is that of a researcher who is interested in pursuing questions related to the topic.

4. Situate the text within the discipline.

   This text was written by a legitimate academic organization whose purpose is to present information as objectively as possible. If you were working in an area related to this topic, you may want to use this article as a springboard to justify your research.

5. Identify areas of intertextuality.

   The article refers to previous studies of this topic, both of which are accessible online. You may wish to read these studies as well. However, because both of them were written by the same person, you may want to find other studies on this topic.

6. Compare this text to other texts you have read.

   You may compare this text with research that suggests that adolescents tend to sleep later in the day and perform better when they have had sufficient sleep.

7. Ask why you are reading this text.

   You may be reading it to justify further research on this topic; there are a number of suggestions at the end.

8. Create signposts in the text.

   Keywords of interest in this article refer to the different groups or stakeholders involved in this controversy, and you may flag these within the text. If you were looking for a thesis/dissertation topic, you may highlight these terms and circle the issues at the end that point to additional research questions.

9. Keep track of your own location.

   As you read, you may consider how the study described in this report furthers your own progress. Did it point you in a direction worth pursuing? Does it build on previous work?

10. Evaluate your presence in the text.

    This is a short article and probably does not require rereading. But perhaps you may make a note of the groups that were studied, with the idea that you may revisit this section.

Applying Strategies for Mapping a Text

Following are some suggestions for further applying the strategies discussed in this chapter:

1. Find a seminal article in your discipline, perhaps one you have been assigned for class, and apply as many of the strategies discussed previously as you think are worthwhile. Can you situate that article in terms of the writer’s goal or motive? Does the writer address a controversy or problem in the discipline? Is there a conversation that he or she is joining? Can you point to a statement in the text that enables the author to enter the scholarly conversation?
2. Find an article in your field, perhaps one you have been assigned for class, and analyze the “moves” it uses to introduce the topic to the reader. Consider the extent to which you can use these “moves” in your own writing.
3. In an article published in Composition Forum, Carra Leah Hood addresses an issue in the field of rhetoric and composition. Read the excerpt from that article here and construct a “map” of that text, noting, in particular, the “sea of intertextuality.” Using a topic that is related to your thesis or dissertation, analyze and imitate the “moves” in this text.

   Lying in Writing or the Vicissitudes of Testimony

   By Carra Leah Hood

   In “Requiring Students to Write About Their Personal Lives,” which appeared in the 17 February 1993 issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education, Susan Swartzlander, Diana Pace, and Virginia Lee Stamler note the contradiction between the “shockingly unprofessional” practice of asking students to write about their personal traumas in writing courses and the common occurrence of such assignments (B1). They argue that this practice remains common because the debates about whether or not “personal writing helps students to develop the necessary academic skills” ignore the ethical concerns of requiring students’ self-disclosures in writing for school (B1). Most importantly, the authors point to ethical concerns with grading, retraumatization, and gender. It is their contention that attention to these concerns will convince a professor inclined to ask students to write about their personal traumas not to do so. For instance, any professor who may argue that “having students write on what they care about most and know best is the only way to get them to write well” would reconsider an assignment that could potentially retraumatize the student writer (B1). A male professor may change his assignment after being apprised of the gender concerns such disclosures present to female students, the authors predict.

   In 2001, Jeffrey Berman published Risky Writing: Self-Disclosure and Self-Transformation in the Classroom, his contribution to the debate about the value of students’ self-disclosure in their writing courses. In this study, Berman argues that student writing about trauma leads to educational, aesthetic, and therapeutic achievements. His position highlights, first of all, at least one instance of a writing teacher dismissing the ethical concerns raised by Swartzlander, Pace, and Stamler. Secondly, Berman’s analysis demonstrates superficial understanding of the relationship between writing, trauma, and recovery, a superficiality that is all too common in the debates about the appropriateness or inappropriateness of requiring students’ self-disclosures in their writing courses.

   In an effort to restate the ethical issues embedded in essay assignments that ask students to explore traumas in their life, this essay conceptualizes the place of writing, and language use more generally, in recovery as much more complicated, much less controlled, much more diffuse, and much less significantly associated with particular writing assignments in school than Berman and even Swartzlander, Pace, and Stamler assume.

   Hood, Carah Leah. “Lying in Writing or the Vicissitudes of Testimony.” Composition Forum Issue 14.2, Fall 2005. Reprinted with permission.

4. Read the three paragraphs reprinted here from an article by Edward G. Goetz, “Desegregation Lawsuits and Public Housing Dispersal.” This article examines the effects of one desegregation lawsuit, “Hollman v. Cisneros in Minneapolis.” Which mapping strategies can you use to understand and evaluate this text?

   Desegregation Lawsuits and Public Housing Dispersal

   By Edward G. Goetz. Journal of the American Planning Association 70, 3, Summer 2004.

   In the past two decades, the U.S. department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has settled a series of lawsuits across the country related to the segregation and spatial concentration of public housing units. These lawsuits were typically filed as housing discrimination cases in which it is alleged that the local housing authority and HUD willfully and negligently segregated subsidized housing projects in a predominantly minority neighborhoods. Since the late 1980s, HUD has entered into consent decrees in more than a dozen of these cases nationwide. Although the settlements differ in detail from case to case, there are several common themes that run through them all. Typically, the settlements call for the demolition of public housing, the construction of replacement housing on scattered sites, and the development of a “housing mobility” program to facilitate desegregative moves by low-income public housing families (Popkin, Galster, et al., 200a). In addition, several of the settlements call for the merging of Section 8 and public housing waiting lists, along with community development in areas surrounding the public housing sites.

   The combination of public housing demolition, redevelopment, and housing mobility programs makes these legal settlements hybrids of two federal programs, HOPE VI Public Housing Redevelopment (HOPE VI) and Moving To Opportunity (MTO). The settlements deal with older public housing much as the HOPE VI program does—by emphasizing demolition and redevelopment of the sites into lower density, mixed-use developments. Many of the consent decree sites have, in fact, made use of HOPE VI program funds to accomplish those objectives. In addition, however, the lawsuits incorporate the MTO model of geographically restricted housing vouchers and mobility counseling to facilitate the deconcentration of poor households.

   In this article, I summarize the implementation of the consent decree in one of these lawsuits, Hollman v. Cisneros in Minneapolis, and investigate the degree to which the decree has resulted in the dispersal and deconcentration of subsidized families. The Hollman settlement is an appropriate exemplar for these lawsuits because it incorporates virtually all of the elements that are included in any one of them.

   Reprinted with permission.

Works Cited

Bazerman, Charles. “Intertextuality: How Texts Rely on Other Texts.” What Writing Does and How It Does It. Charles Bazerman and Paul Prior, Eds. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2004. 83–96.

Bhatia, Vijay K. Analysing Genre: Language Use in Professional Settings. London: Longman, 1993–97.

Greene, Stuart. “Exploring the Relationship Between Authorship and Reading.” Hearing Ourselves Think: Cognitive Research in the College Classroom. New York: Oxford UP, 1993. 33–51.

Swales, John. Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1990.