Joining the Conversation: Readings About Academic Writing

Writing is a skill that develops through the practice of reading carefully, thinking critically, arguing honestly, and returning to your drafts with curiosity and the willingness to be changed by what you find.This textbook is an invitation to that practice. Drawing on the scholarship of Writing Studies and organized around Kenneth Burke's enduring parlor metaphor, it guides first-year college students through the conventions of academic writing, the foundations of rhetoric and argument, the recursive stages of the writing process, and the research skills that scholarly participation requires. Along the way, it asks students to see themselves not as passive recipients of knowledge but as active participants in conversations that matter: in their courses, in their communities, and in the world beyond college.The parlor is already in session. This book will help you find your voice within it.