Bruce Leland
Western Illinois University
Computers and Writing Conference, 1996
My handout provides some of the background for my paper. Here's some more: I've used email lists with all my classes for three years now, always with the purposes of allowing discussion (and therefore learning) to extend beyond the limits of our 50-minute classes, and of trying to foster a strong sense of community in the class. I've given a number of presentations about the community aspect--I've found that with email lists I am able to develop with every class the community feeling that I used to get only with my very best classes. The students get to know one another, bond together, and teach one another in a community of fellow-learners. Now I can't imagine trying to teach a class without email.
I had planned to talk again today about community building, cooperative learning, and the social construction of meaning, using my list from my spring semester class--an English Education class in writing pedagogy. Then a couple comments I heard at CCCC got me thinking about the roles of individuals in email communities. Or rather about the ways that selves (or subject positions) are created in (or created by) these communities.
So I changed my paper. My hypothesis today is that selves are developed, created, constructed on the lists--and that these creations are determined, in large part, by the needs of the lists. Self and community become intertwined.
My best example is Fred. Fred's role was developed and defined over the first half of the semester--in part by him and in part for him. He tried out a couple roles in the first few weeks. First he tried to just blend safely in, posting messages like those he had seen others post. Then he emerged as a whiner--complaining about attendance policies and other infringements. This post from early on suggests that he wasn't entirely comfortable with that position.
Then he tried adding a goofy comment to one of his posts --another complaint--and this is what the class responded to. He got some immediate feedback, so he tried it again. And he hit his stride. Pretty soon there was an outpouring of messages claiming that Fred's were always the first messages read when the others logged on.
So Fred became the clown (Exhibit four). That's not to say that he didn't also make serious contributions, but his primary identity on the list was as the clown--a role with which he got the highest level of approval and response from the community.
That this was a role constructed for the list became clear to me as Fred began submitting increasingly sophisticated and well-written papers. He was understanding and processing the course material better than most of his peers, showing me an entirely different self than he showed the class on the list. Different, too, was his face-to-face demeanor. In class he was quiet--silent actually--never participating in class discussions and, in fact, only talking to the two people who sat next to him. When we took the Meyers-Briggs inventory (actually the Kiersey-Bates version available on the net), he showed up as a strong "I"--hardly the gregarious social creature he appeared to be on-line.
The idea of construction is further supported by the fact that almost every class list I've been on has had someone adopt this role. Whether it provides relaxation, comic relief, a counterpoint, an alternative voice--this role seems to be an important part of the functioning of a successful email community.
Example two: Dale was one of the people Fred talked to. He, too, was a strong (and silent) introvert--and the most prolific contributor to the on-line discussion. This in itself isn't unusual. Over and over I've seen that introverts, who feel uncomfortable engaging in spontaneous class discussion find voices in email, where they get to participate in class discussions for the first time.
Dale didn't just contribute frequently--he wrote long, detailed provocative posts. (Exhibit five) Early on others commented on this length--even teasing him with the nickname Blabby. Dale acknowledged the teasing, admitted that he was aware he wrote a lot, and continued to do so.
As I was assigning names to the positions the students were creating, I came to think of Dale's as a "teacher" role--another role which has occurred on every class list I've run. The "teacher" introduces serious issues, reflects on them, and provokes thinking and response from others. In this spring's list Dale was the customary introducer of new topics: teaching classic literature, homework, motivating students, among others.
There were other "teachers" on the list as well--obviously it's an essential role in the kind of learning community I try to foster on class lists. But Dale was the strongest example in this spring's class. Here's a sample. Dale presented a scenerio for the class to respond to, which they did. So did I, in fact, and we carried the topic of homework into the next class meeting.
(Note that I'm defining "teacher" here not as "authority," or "provider of answers," but as "catalyst"--the one who provokes thinking and response. In fact, "catalyst" may be the better term to define this role.)
Perhaps the most interesting thing about Dale's role was the way it was constructed by the class. To be sure they responded to his invitations to think and reflect on important issues. However, a great many thought they were responding to a woman. Since Dale was silent in class, many only knew him as a member of the list. With his gender-neutral name and his inviting, non-authoritarian, exploratory writing, he was interpreted by the list as female.
I'm going to take time for just one more example, another construction that has occurred on almost all my class lists. Here's Marie (exhibit seven). Jodi had described an embarrassing moment with the junior high class she did her pre-student teaching work with; Marie was there to offer some words of support. And here she is consoling a classmate. The gendered term here would be "mother." As students share ideas on the list, they also begin to share a variety of concerns and problems. And others respond to those concerns by sharing their own experience and by offering words of encouragement and support. This, of course, is a socially constructed role in the larger society--women (typically) as comforters and caregivers.
And supporters. Though this behavior isn't limited to the "mother" figures, with Marie it seemed to be part of her mothering. Here she is to Robin: "I really like what you said." She even extended her pat-on-the-back support to me. What in another student might have been obvious brown-nosing, for Marie was a part of her constructed role.
I wanted to include this particular role since it allows me to continue with the theme of gender-switching. In this spring's class it was a woman playing the mother role--but the student who mothered us all through two classes last year was a male. He offered condolences whenever anyone was sick, and encouragement when anyone was discouraged; he was always there, agreeing, supporting, helping. Either gender can take up this role but like the other two roles/positions I've looked at, this one has appeared on all my class lists.
As I started pulling this paper together last week, I began to realize that I've only scratched the surface. There are more roles to analyze--a couple of the more interesting ones might be the resistor--the student who chooses not to participate, in spite of the course requirement, or the loner--the one who submits free-standing posts, apparently without reading the work of the others.
And looking at these community roles is just part of the analysis of subject positions. Obviously gender is an important consideration, along with class and race. And age, and power position, and educational experience, and personality type, and language experience, and membership in other communities, and on and on. Only after we've begun to sort out all these influences and constraints can we begin to see how email communities provide new or different influences and constraints.