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Gary Tate Contributions

The Contributions of Gary Tate

simply, directly. -Dr. Gary Tate

scholarly field begins to develop. Professor Tate (semi-retired) is a teacher, influential author, editor of multiple texts on composition studies, and lecturer. For forty years he taught and served as the director of the writing programs at the University of Tulsa, Northern Arizona University, and Texas Christian University (also Director of Graduate Studies in English). in the English departments. He has been Chair of the National Counsel of Teachers Commission on Composition (NCTE), served two three-year terms on the College Composition and Communication Conference Committee, and been a member of the College Composition and Communication Journal’s executive board. As a freshman composition educator at Texas Christian University, Dr. Tate noticed an urgent need for formal organization of college composition studies because he did not believe in “composition studies as a service discipline” just to enable students “to succeed in the Academy”. He was one of the first professionals to stress the value of documenting classroom teachers’ anecdotal information on student writing in the classroom. Professor Tate has published groundbreaking essays from well known scholars in the field including, Edward Corbett, James Moffett, Maxine Hairston, Ken Macrorie, Jane Emig, Erika Lindemann, and Victor Villanueva . In 1967, he published the first collection of essays for graduate students focusing on rhetoric and composition, Teaching Freshman Composition (ed. Tate and Corbett 1967). This became the template for the rest of the composition studies field. Thus, a plethora of valuable information via an accessible route was initiated to promote and validate a vanishing field. His editorial projects have resulted in multiple editions of well known text starting with the revolutionary text, Teaching Composition: 10 Bibliographical Essays (1976), the first book-length bibliography in composition studies. Thereafter, another edition followed with twelve essays, and a reference text, The Writing Teacher’s Sourcebook (co-ed. Corbett, 1981 & 1988 and Myers, 1994 & 2000) now in its fourth printing. In 1998, Professor Tate published a significant text based on the effects of social class from the teacher’s perspective, Coming to Class: Pedagogy and the Social Class of Teachers (co-ed. Shepard & McMillan 1998). *(Check the publications list for a complete record of his work).

University. This journal is the oldest independent periodical in its field paving the path for the myriad of other writing journals that are currently in existence. Dr. Tate’s main goal was one of transformation: focus less on teacher authority and more on practicality- teaching freshmen how to write and aid freshman composition professors. The first issue included articles about the training of teacher assistants, the use of writing labs, establishing standards in writing. From the lens of an outsider, Professor Tate has consistently promulgated that “true education” is more than just training students within the Academy’s various disciplines. Advocating that student prose is as valuable as teacher feedback, he espouses that rhetoric and composition are essential components to writing, they should not be separated. Dr. Tate emphasizes using “conversations” within the classroom to facilitate student awareness and personal growth in preparation for the world.

was the general editor of the SMU Studies in Composition and Rhetoric. He explains that budget cuts and staff reductions forced the series to be dropped which has resulted in a loss of recognition on the text. *(complete list available)

the Academy,particular composition studies. His contributions to the establishment of rhetoric and composition as a distinct discipline is profoundly immense, and the Academic community should never forget his forthright commitment. Dr. Tate has illustrated over the years that goals must be set and text carefully chosen. Tate is critical of the professionalization of undergraduate education. He is a proponent of connecting students’ personal lives as it relates to the real world, not the theoretical academic discourse within the Academy. In a poignant essay, Halfway Back Home (Coming To Class, 1998) Dr. Tate reflects on his lower working class upbringing and feelings of embarrassment and denial throughout his life until his epiphany that “social class” was at the root of his discomfort. This connection to self-identity and purpose signifies the value of literature and composition as interrelated and interdependent. The growth of composition and rhetoric as a discipline has definitely benefited from Professor Tate’s ceaseless efforts to bring dignity, scholarship, and a strong writing pedagogy to class.

Dr. Gary Tate:

English in the early 60s, I volunteered to direct the writing program and to try to keep track of the TA’s and maybe educate them a bit. This why, when Ed. Corbett came as a guest speaker at my NDEA Institute the summer of 1965, I ask if he would interested in joining me in putting together a collection of articles that might be used in courses for TA’s. He agreed that there was a need an off we went.

has grown. I now regularly teach a junior/senior course in working-class literature.