What can be transferred from general composition to other domains, I believe, is the idea that writing in all fields is shaped by an interactive relationship between the way an intellectual community constructs knowledge in writing and the genres it uses to configure that knowledge. In brief, here is how this dynamic works: Writers create texts to "do business" in certain communities of readers and writers. Within those communities, there are specific ideas, often tacit, about what constitutes acceptable subject matters to write about. About each of these acceptable subject matters, there are, within communities of readers and writers, certain status quo ideas, attitudes, and propositions, discursive entitlements Chaim Perelman calls the "starting points for argumentation." Within these communities there are, in addition, specific kinds of rhetorical "moves" or "transactions" that a writer is expected to make in order to lead readers to perceive a central idea or adhere to a thesis. Aristotle, for example, in teaching the art of rhetoric for fourth century Athenian orators, calls these "moves" enthymemes. Within these communities there are also definite ideas, again often tacit, about what functions written texts should serve--that is, the degree to which they should "shift the scene" from the written text at hand to some other arena of action.
All these aspects of "knowledge work"--acceptable subjects, starting points, transactions, and functions of texts--are constrained by the kinds of genres within which the community has chosen to conduct its business. Indeed, as I argue, the genres of different communities actually emerge from the knowledge-work its members must perform. In other words, whether a person writes about a specific subject matter, chooses to detail specifically what she believes her readers presently know and think about the subject, engages in certain kinds of rhetorical moves (for example, definition or comparison and causal reasoning), and urges some specific action depends on the genre she is expected to produce. The choice of genre also dictates, to a finer degree than other prescriptive rules, how the writer must construct paragraphs, sentences, and words.
This knowledge work-genre dynamic is what students can learn in general composition that can be transferred to the writing they must do in other courses. It is this dynamic that I believe ought to constitute the "content" of college writing instruction. (188-189)
Joliffe, David. "The Myth of Transcendence." Pedagogy in the Age of Politics: Writing and Reading (in) the Academy. Eds. Patricia A. Sullivan, Donna J. Qualley. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1994. 183-194.
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