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(Presented at “Teaching Writing in a Post-Truth Era,” University of Notre Dame, August 20, 2019)
I come to the issue of teaching writing in the post-truth era from a somewhat different perspective than our previous speakers. I’m a librarian who has long been interested in the ways students get ideas, interact with other’s ideas, and how their experiences as writers in college shape their identity as people with agency and a grasp of how knowledge is made and negotiated by people – people like them. I’m taken with the parallels between writing instruction and what librarians do. Your writing program has as a goal ethical and moral use of words and evidence.
Making an argument is an ethical activity, one that helps students develop intellectual and moral virtues.
