An Ethnographic Study of High School Teachers in the Culture of a Summer Writing Program Bonnie S

University of New Hampshire University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository Doctoral Dissertations Student Scholarship Fall 1991 Summer revisions: An ethnographic study of high school teachers in the culture of a summer writing program Bonnie S. Sunstein University of New Hampshire, Durham Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation Recommended Citation Sunstein, Bonnie S., "Summer revisions: An ethnographic study of high school teachers in the culture of a summer writing program" (1991). Doctoral Dissertations. 1662. https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation/1662 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 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UMI 300 N. ZeebRd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. SUMMER REVISIONS: AN ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY OF HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS IN THE CULTURE OF A SUMMER WRITING PROGRAM BY BONNIE S. SUNSTEIN B.S., Boston University, Boston, MA, 1968 M. Ed., Boston University, Boston, MA, 1975 DISSERTATION Submitted to the University of New Hampshire in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Reading and Writing Instruction September, 1991 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. This dissertation has been examined and approved. A ) Dissertation director, Dr. Thomas R. Newkirk, Professor of English Dr. Donald H. Graves, Professor of Education ____________ Dr. Jane A^Hansen, Associate Professor of Education Dr. Burt H. Feintuch, Professor of English 'h'ltl-tC I/h_- C L S idLi __________ Dr. Patricia A. Sullivan, Assistant Professor of English /Z. 199/ Date Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ©1991 Bonnie S. Sunstein Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. To my mother, Janet Schloss Stone who taught me to love people and the art of their language. She is an art teacher, a portrait painter, and a reader of biographies-written and spoken, published and unpublished. For me, my brothers, our children, her friends and her students-she enables us to become ourselves. She knows how to sweeten the struggle that comes with growth. In this dissertation, I paint word portraits about teachers who enable, create, and learn as they share the struggles of growth. She planted the seeds for this work. iv Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation describes teachers coming to knowledge together in an intense three week community; a collaboration between themselves and those in their temporary world, crafted through relationships and conversations. These acknowledgements reflect another community, one in which I have lived and learned intensively for three years and whose written scholarship had already influenced the first half of my professional lifetime. This project involved a committee of six remarkable people who gave me their company as scholars, teachers, colleagues and friends. They asked tough questions and demanded clear research, thought and method, but their confidence in my abilities left the creation of the work to me. They taught me to teach myself, offering guidance and wisdom while they watched and listened. There is a piece of each of them in these pages. Their exemplary teaching will influence the second half of my professional lifetime. Tom Newkirk, my mentor and dissertation advisor, taught me to look for dissonances, reminding me that tensions are sites of growth and centers for effective writing. With humor and insight, he accommodated the awkward ethics of guiding my research while I studied his program. Tom’s help matured my writing and clarified my thinking. He pushes me to my edges, and then encourages me to go further; with a single word or phrase, he can capture and direct a long line of thinking. Don Graves, master of the perfect metaphor, always helps me focus my plans with his wisdom and experience. Early on, he observed that I was "catching a bullet in flight," and that conversation governed three frantic weeks which resulted in a rich collection of data. Jane Hansen's guidance is quiet, strong, and ever present. Her memory for details is astounding; she is perhaps the most responsive listener I know. Despite her tight schedule, she is v Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. somehow always available to listen and think with me when I need her. Burt Feintuch has mentored me over three years in the rich treasury of two academic disciplines: anthropology and folklore. He's been patient and flexible, mapping a new territory with the routes I choose, always offering one more reference, one more reading. He has guided my methodological perspectives and helped me to develop my own techniques of ethnographic writing. My work with him has been liberating, allowing me to jump out of my own discipline in order to see it better. Pat Sullivan and Elizabeth Chiseri-Strater welcomed me to Durham and placed themselves in complex multiple positions in my life, as nurturing personal friends, devoted teachers, and the very closest of colleagues. In formal and informal settings, both Pat and Elizabeth are models of professional scholarship, incisive response, love and sisterhood. Pat's close and honest readings and her strong shots of confidence have kept me cleaner as a writer, stronger as a woman, and more sure as a scholar. Elizabeth, more than anyone else, has helped me see the nuggets of truth and flecks of light inside a dark massive muck of data, watching as I sort out the parts that hold value, reassuring me many times over. I am lucky to enjoy support and collegiality in a large community of scholars. Don Murray's friendship wisdom, support, sympathy, and humor has influenced my reading, writing, and teaching for over twenty years, but especially during my time here. Over many lunches and during my visits to their home, both Don and Minnie Mae Murray listened and helped with thousands of thoughts and details. Professors Tom Camicelli, Grant Cioffi, Bob Connors, Bud Khleif and Pearl Rosenberg have been true teachers as well, interested in my work far beyond the boundaries of my studenthood and their courses. Betty Graves and Beth Newkirk have encouraged me as well with their interest, empathy, friendship, and hospitality. My siblings in the UNH English department and the Education department's vi Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reading and Writing Ph.D. program have been a bottomless source of intellectual and emotional support, especially Dan-Ling Fu, Dan Seger, and Peg Murray, whose brains, logic, love, and three years of weekly study sessions made me feel firsthand how knowledge happens. Tom Romano offered live fellowship for a year, and then kept it growing through the U.S. mail with his detailed responses and rallying postcards. His passionate belief in this project made it more important to me. My other colleagues were

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