Composition: History & Theory: 1940 - 1949
The Rise of Expository Writing
Description
Robert J. Connors in “The Rise and Fall of the Modes of Discourse” (1981) claims that the modes were no longer a controlling force in the classroom by 1950 due to several developments in the 1940s, including the increasing popularity of Exposition textbooks in “modal” freshman composition courses. The popularity of exposition was in part due to the mode’s practicality which lent itself to a business-oriented culture. Connors also attributes the fall of the modes of discourse to the advent of the General Education and Semantics movements of the 1940s. The General Education movement focused on “reading, writing, speaking, and listening” while the General Semantics movement viewed “language as a symbol liable to abuse” (452).
Date of Upload
3/13/09