(Late Post) Constructing Author Voice

Don't comment on this post, unless you really want to I guess. It is late and I'm am doing it mostly for posterity (see what I did there) and to make sure I still reach my blog number goal regardless of grade!

THIS POST IS REGARDING The Construction of Author Voice by Editorial Board Members BY Christine M. Tardy AND Paul Kei Matsuda!

Many reviewers who responded in the study suggested that the construction of the author voice when reading is "natural and unavoidable" (38). The results of the study mostly support this line of thinking. With a majority of respondents either speculating upon or passively sensing the author voice, it would seem that this act is in fact bound to happen when reading.

If we take this premise as given, how does this relate to the writing classroom? How does constructing the author voice benefit or hinder the student? To answer this, it is important to understand the ways by which the author voice might be constructed by the reader. What factors into a reader's construction of author voice? There are 19 things that the study looked for:

- Breadth/Depth of Knowledge
- Choice of Topic
- Author Representation of Field
- Research Setting Description
- Signs of Author Language Background
- Particular Sentence Structure Use
- Theoretical Framework Choice
- Author Representation of Other Researchers in Field
- Particular Term Use
- Particular Writing Convention Use
- Signs of Careful Editing (or lack thereof)
- Consistencies/Inconsistencies in Writing Style
- Research Method Choice
- Patterns of Source Citation
- Patterns in References List
- Manuscript Formatting
- Particular Genre Convention Use
- Choice of Journal to Submit Manuscript
- Citation Style use

That is a lot to consider, but I'm mostly concerned with what will apply in the writing classroom. As such, the choices in red (above) are not likely to factor into assessment in the writing classroom for various reasons (writing classroom students aren't likely submitting to journals for publication, for example). The pattern I have tried to suggest in my choices above are that I am assuming less emphasis on higher level concerns in writing classroom assessment. In other words, I care less about field wide student concerns and journal submission concerns than I do about whether or not they are citing sources correctly or demonstrating grammatical and syntactic competency.

In reflecting on the previous paragraph regarding MY concerns, am I showing a construction of author voice already though? Am I assuming students in the writing classroom are not WORTHY of higher level concerns? In general, I suppose that I am...but students are also to be taken on a case by case basis. I would also argue that teaching what a majority of students will benefit from (and providing individual assistance where necessary) is simply more practical than trying to cater every moment to every student. A teacher can't possibly attune every class and every lesson to every student without sacrificing an amount of content, breadth, or sanity.

But, let us return to my original questions. How DOES the construction of author voice relate to the classroom? As I may have already demonstrated, expectation from students will influence what a teacher looks for. To go further (read, more individual) a teacher's expectations of a particular student may influence what the teacher looks for in the work of that particular student. A good student who makes a unique choice may be seen as "exploring new terrain" whereas a bad student making the same choice may be seen as "lacking knowledge of conventions" (good and bad are also potentially problematic designations for students, but that is another blog).

Are there benefits to constructing the author voice? Maybe. It is possible that knowing WHAT mistakes to look for will help a student who is trying to improve that particular error. A student's self-awareness of their weaknesses (which come up from, say, journals and self-evaluation), as well as a teacher's knowledge of that student's self-awareness, may allow teacher and student to work together to locate, discuss, and improve those areas. Are the hindrances to constructing author voice? Absolutely. A good student who wrote a bad paper or a bad student who wrote a good paper suddenly have imbalanced expectations of future performance (and lopsided assessments of students is problematic in itself).