Response to Narrative Discourse and the Basic Writer - Norbert Elliot

Mina Shaunghnessy is pretty much a god to City College in part because of her fierce championship of basic writing pedagogy. Therefore, to read about the supposed controversy brought on by Min-zhan Lu's attempt to fracture the work of Mina Shaunghnessy saying "she feared conflict" in a time during the 70's where conflict was rampant appears disingenous. What this argument is about really is the place of narrative in academic discourse. Although in academia papers are written to be quote filled, source cited, with a position taken for or against a concept or idea, narrative writing provides a different set of systems that can be used to produce writing that is thoughtful and insightful and offers a new perspective on topics that have been toiled about for years. Because basic writers are usually the marginalized students, students of color, different ethinicities and cultural backgrounds, their voices may be squelched in the academic setting. Narrative writing allows those voices to bloom and offer various perspectives of arguments academia may not want to acknowledge or perhaps have held so close as to believe their perspective is right.
It is my opinion that narrative writing can be the jump start to directing our students to the type of writing that will be required of them in the higher level courses. However, It is my experience that narrative writing helps in thinking and reformulating ideas and allows the student to take ownership of what he has read in order to write what is authentic for them. Narrative writing is freeing in a way that expository writing is not but it is not easy as some seem to think. Narrative writing requires choices (topic, setting, idea), editing, re-thinking, and sometimes an overhaul of a particular set of beliefs. This is the type of mental exercise we can give our students when we assign papers. Narratives can teach them to see from their point of view and from society's and come up with a conclusion that may or may not be a core belief. When we get students to write their narratives, we allow them to open up in a way that academic writing does not.