Last Friday, Staff Writer Elisha Dura attended Dr. Natalie Adler’s lecture on Harry Denny, a prominent figure in writing studies. The lecture is part of the Undergraduate Writing Program and GSAS Writing Studio’s “Names You Should Know in Writing Studies” lecture series. 

On Friday morning, the Columbia Undergraduate Writing Program and GSAS Writing Studio hosted another installment of their lecture series “Names You Should Know in Writing Studies,” intended to provide the audience with introductions to major thinkers in writing studies. This week, Dr. Natalie Adler presented to a group of Columbia Writing Center workers, University Writing teachers, and undergraduates on Harry Denny.

If you’ve ever used the Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) while scrambling to finish a paper, then you’ve likely interacted with a piece of Harry Denny’s work. Denny is currently an associate professor of English and the Director of the Writing Lab at Purdue, which includes the Purdue OWL. As a writing center director, Denny is interested in writing center theory and practice in his research, but his work also extends into LGBTQ+ studies.

Launching into the lecture, Dr. Adler introduced some of Denny’s key texts, which range from articles on writing center theory to a book on sociocultural dynamics in the writing center. While he frequently interacts with other scholars in writing studies, his theory is also influenced by activist groups such as ACT UP and Queer Nation as well as various philosophers involved in the politics of power.

Dr. Adler discussed a few key words in Denny’s scholarship. Among these terms was “face”, crucial to his first book Facing the Center: Toward an Identity Politics of One-To-One Mentoring. The concept of face, Dr. Adler explained, relates to how we communicate and present identity and how that changes with context. 

In relation to writing centers, face connects to one of Denny’s central research questions about what it means to claim an identity as a writer—in Denny’s words, “When a writer-identity is nurtured, what other forms of identity get eclipsed?” Engaging with her audience, Dr. Adler asked listeners to write their thoughts on what parts of their own identity may be hidden by claiming their writer identity.

Listeners also wrote down their answers to Dr. Adler’s opening question, “What does it mean to queer something?” While Denny defines queering writing center sessions as the act of “seeking strategic occasions to subvert conventional dynamics” of writing, one listener added that queering something involves bringing about fluidity, community, and resistance. Queering a text, they noted, can be a method for disrupting conventions. 

Moreover, Dr. Adler noted that writing center practices were already being queered. By encouraging the use of different languages and Englishes, inviting all identities, and motivating writers to take ownership of their work, writing centers already subvert writing conventions that have been instilled in writers by various institutions. 

In relation to Denny’s research on writing center administration, Dr. Adler discussed Denny’s fascination with the concept of  “coming out as a writing center person.” In the broader academic field of English and even in the narrower field of writing studies, research on writing centers “can be taken as less intellectually rigorous,” Dr. Adler stated. Speaking to a room full of writing center staff and users, Dr. Adler’s commentary seemed to resonate well with listeners who nodded in agreement.

Dr. Adler closed the lecture by mentioning Harry Denny’s “open source ideology,” the belief that writing center research and information should be public. His current work reflects this ideology, too. Under Denny’s direction, the Purdue OWL remains committed to conducting the Writing Centers Research Project which collects information on writing center operations, administration, and usage at Purdue and other colleges and universities primarily in the US to be published for open access viewing. 

Denny’s work as a writing center administrator has received backlash, Dr. Adler added. Most notably, Fox News criticized the Purdue OWL’s writing guide on gender-biased language. For Dr. Adler, this backlash against Denny only underscores the fact that the work done in writing centers can be political. Despite being often overlooked, writing center studies has the potential to influence discussion outside of the university setting, which only increases the urgency to further recognize writing center research’s importance in academia.

Writing via Bwarchives