GLENVILLE, WV – Glenville State College Associate Professor of English Dr. Marjorie Stewart has been featured in a free, open-source textbook for composition courses that has been nearly ten years in the making.
Volume III of Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing focuses on providing multiple perspectives on a variety of topics in writing. In each chapter, authors are given an opportunity to present their unique insights and strategies to readers. Volume three focuses on exigencies, contexts, and practices for writers, as well as topics in visual rhetoric and multimedia composing.
Stewart’s chapter, titled, “Weaving Personal Experience into Academic Writing,” was inspired by a weaver she worked with while completing her master’s program. “She had a shop in Pittsburgh that sold wearable art and she made hand-woven clothing,” Stewart recalled. “The way she set up the yarn on the loom and in the shuttle serve as a metaphor for weaving personal stories into academic writing.”
Within the chapter, Stewart focuses on allowing personal or narrative writing in academic papers. “The chapter talks about when it is appropriate and why it can be helpful to make the essay accessible and meaningful. Of course, I tell students not to do it if their professors don’t allow or like it.”
“I have used chapters from Writing Spaces Volumes I and II in my classroom. They’re better than the writing advice most print textbooks offer and they’re free. I’m glad to be included in this series and in this movement to make textbooks free or affordable to all students,” she said. “I believe that, after pharmaceuticals, the textbook industry is one of the most predatory businesses we have. Open Source texts give us the power to fight back for the good of our students.”
“There is currently a call for submissions to Volume IV. I’m thinking about it,” she added.
All volumes in the series are published under a Creative Commons license and available for download at the Writing Spaces website, www.writingspaces.org. Printed copies can also be purchased by visitingwww.parlorpress.com/pages/writing-spaces or https://wac.colostate.edu/books/writingspaces.
