Developing Discourse Roles and
Positionings - an Ecological Theory of
Writing Development
Writing Development: Multiple Perspectives,
Institute of Education, University of London
Jon Smidt,
Sør-Trøndelag University College, Trondheim, Norway
July 3, 2009
An ecological theory of writing
development
SPEECH GENRES
Individual utterances
Mikhail Bakhtin (1986)
The Metaphor of Ecology
• Gregory Bateson (1972): Steps to an Ecology of Mind
• David Barton (1994): Literacy. An introduction to the
ecology of written language:
• Originating in biology, ecology is the study of the
interrelationship of an organism and its environment.
When applied to humans, it is the interrelationship of an
area of human activity and its environment. It is
concerned with how the activity – literacy in this case – is
part of the environment and at the same time influences
and is influenced by the environment. An ecological
approach takes as its starting-point this interaction
between individuals and their environments. (Barton,
1994 : 29)
An ecological theory of writing development
values and beliefs in society
culture specific norms and expectations
discourses in the classroom
texts
individual
writers
writers’ sense of who
they are or want to be
in their writing
SPEECH GENRES
Discourse roles
Individual utterances
Mead  Goffman 1959
Ivanic 1998
Bakhtin 1986
Ongstad 1999,
Smidt 2002
Writing Development Example1:
Challenging Norms and Values
Anne Haas Dyson:
Writing superheroes.
Contemporary childhood, popular
culture, and classroom literacy
(1997)
Dyson 1993:
the link between composing a text and
composing a place for oneself in the social
world (p.229)
Dyson 1997:
Thus, our texts are formed at the
intersection of a social relationship
between ourselves as composers and our
addressees and an ideological one
between our own psyches (or inner
meanings) and the words, cultural signs,
available to us.
(p.4)
Writing Development Example 2:
Reciprocal positionings
Jon Smidt:
‘Double histories in multivocal
classrooms: Notes toward an
ecological account of writing’
Written Communication Vol 19 No 3, July
2002
Writing development is
multidimensional
norms of
school writing
Interactional dimension
Time
dimension
teacher
students
sociocultural
or ideological
dimension
Writing Development Example 3: Struggling
to Create a Discoursal Self
Roz Ivanic:
Writing and identity : The discoursal
construction of identity in academic
writing.
(1998)
Ivanic 1998 sees
/../ every act of academic writing as, among
other things, the writer’s struggle to create
a discoursal self which removes the
tension between their autobiographical self
and the possibilities for self-hood available
in the academic community. (p. 336)
• Used about writing development, the
metaphor of ‘ecology’ turns our attention to
the influence of all participants in the
writing classroom, student writers,
classmates and teachers, as well as the
represented cultures and norms.
norms of
school writing
Social interactionists
teacher
students
Social
constructionists
SPEECH GENRES
Reference
Individual utterances
expressivity
addressivity
Mikhail Bakhtin (1986)
Ongstad 1999

Examples taken from:
– Dyson, Anne Haas (1997) Writing superheroes.
Contemporary childhood, popular culture, and
classroom literacy. New York: Teachers College,
Columbia Univ.
– Ivanic, Roz (1998) Writing and identity : The
discoursal construction of identity in academic writing.
Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins
– Smidt, Jon (2002) ‘Double histories in multivocal
classrooms: Notes toward an ecological account of
writing’ Written Communication Vol 19 No 3, July
2002: 414-443
Other references:
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Bakhtin, M. M.(1986) Speech genres and other late essays (C. Emerson and M. Holquist, Eds., V. W. McGee, Trans.). Austin, TX:
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Barton, D. (1994) Literacy. An introduction to the ecology of written language. Oxford: Blackwell
Bateson, G. (1972) Steps to an ecology of mind. New York: Ballantine Books
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