I can imagine that, for a WPA (which I am not nor have I ever been), “labor” means “work”:
- The intellectual work of articulating policies, goals, mission statements, objectives, the theoretical identity of a writing program, etc.
- The administrative work of staffing, scheduling, placing, paying, training, assessing/evaluating, promoting, firing, etc.
- The scholarly work of researching, reporting, conversing, developing ideas about Writing Studies, Literacy, and Higher Education.
- The ethical work of building and maintaining healthy, constructive, humane places to work and learn for students, faculty, instructors, and staff.
- The emotional work of effectively representing–to Administration, other institutional departments of Higher Ed, other Writing Programs, and larger society–Writing Studies, the Institution (employing the WPA), the “laborers” within a WPA’s management purview.
- The physical work of being available for informed problem solving, negotiating, inventing, experimenting, designing, funding, etc.
I think, too, that “labor” refers to the contributions people devote to the understanding of what writing is, what it does to and for people. From the perspective of a WPA these contributions might manifest as:
- Ideas
- Theories
- Pedagogies
- Suggestions
- Critiques
- Designs
- Program structures
- Journal/scholarship vessels
- Research plans
- Web sites
- Syllabi
- Implementations
- Research
- Teaching
- Conference papers
- Web sites
- Published writings
- Relationship cultivation
- With… and Between…
- Admin
- Folks from other disciplines (Technology, Education, etc…)
- Other WPAs
- Off-campus community members
- Instructors
- Scholars in the field
- Students
- With… and Between…
What am I missing????
(Shout out to Kristen Ruccio who gave a killer presentation yesterday!)
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