May 2, 2008

Mixing It Up Over Formulas

To the Editor:

In their April 4 essay, "In Teaching Composition, 'Formulaic' Is Not a 4-Letter Word" (The Chronicle), Gerald Graff and Cathy Birkenstein quote what I wrote in English Journal in 2000. They claim that I argue "that formulas 'force premature closure on complicated issues and stifle ongoing exploration.'"

That is not quite accurate. I actually wrote that formulaic writing leads to these consequences — and formulaic writing of a particular kind, at that. I