Date: Sep 08, 2008

The Hofstra Cultural Center Presents "Who Owns Writing?" Revisited

A National Conference, October 16, 17 and 18, 2008

Hofstra University’s first national conference on writing, “Who Owns Writing, Revisited,” explores the new institutional and public spaces that the teaching of writing will occupy in the 21st century. It asks what is the place – institutionally, publicly, privately – of writing and the teaching of writing in the new century?  Is writing the province of English departments, or is it the concern of the university and community as a whole?  

Nationally renowned panelists will convene for this conference to consider this pressing issue. The keynote speaker will be Doug Hesse, founding director of the Marisco Writing Program at the University of Denver and professor of English. He is past chair of the Conference on College Composition and Communication, a former president of the Council of Writing Program Administrators and editor of WPA: Writing Program Administration. The plenary session “Student Writing in the 21st century” will feature Sondra Perl, David Bleich and Frank Cioppi.  Sondra Perl is a professor of English at Lehman College and the Graduate Center of CUNY, and cofounder of the New York City Writing Project with Richard Sterling in 1978. She is the coauthor of Writing True and author of On Austrian Soil: Teaching Those I Was Taught to Hate about her experiences in the classroom working with adult Austrian students, some of whom were the descendants of Nazis. David Bleich is professor of English at the University of Rochester, whose research specialties include literature, literacy, teaching, language use, feminist philosophy, science studies and Jewish studies. His work examines the way literature lives in communities and societies, the problems of language and truth-telling in interpersonal and social contexts, and the challenge of making schools into more successful institutions. Frank Cioffi is the author of The Imaginative Argument: A Practical Manifesto for Writers and is professor of English at Scripps College.  

Panels will include such pressing topics as Rethinking Writing Center Pedagogy”; “Values and Science/Technology: Writing Science Across the Curriculum”;“What Do You Mean Copying from the Internet Is Cheating? How Students Perceive Intellectual Property”;“Writing Program Administration: Models of Success”;“Why Can’t They Write? The Myth of College-Level Writing”; “Cyberwriting: Owning the Web in the College Classroom” and “Writing and Teaching Writing in an Ownership Society.”

Conference fees are $75 for the three days (student and senior citizen discounts are available). A banquet on Friday, October 17, is priced separately at $35. All conference events, with the exception of meals, are free to members of the Hofstra community upon presentation of a current HofstraCard. To register, or for more information, call the Hofstra Cultural Center at (516) 463-5669 or visit www.hofstra.edu/culture.

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October 16 and 17: The Write Stuff

As part of the conference, Hofstra Entertainment presents the show The Write Stuff, conceived and directed by Bob Spiotto, director of community and arts program and executive producer of Hofstra Entertainment. This imaginative and highly entertaining evening of “plays on words” includes several short comedies by David Ives, selections from the Book of Sequels, Politically Correct Bedtime Stories, Fractured Jewish Fairy Tales, ShrinkLits and some other “stuff” from the pens of Abbott and Costello, George Carlin, the Marx Brothers, Woody Allen and Allan Sherman among others.

Show time is Thursday, October 16, at 8 p.m. and Friday, October 17, at 8 p.m. at Monroe Lecture Center Theater, California Avenue, South Campus

Tickets are $16, $13 senior citizen (over 65) and $10 matriculated non-Hofstra student with ID. Members of the Hofstra community receive one free ticket upon presentation of a current HofstraCard (two ticket maximum). For more information call the Playhouse Box Office at (516) 463-6644, M-F, 11 a.m.-3:45 p.m. or order online at www.hofstra.edu/HofstraEntertainment.