Product Description: In Dialectical Rhetoric, Bruce McComiskey argues that the historical conflict between rhetoric and dialectic can be overcome in ways useful to both composition theory and the composition classroom. Historically, dialectic has taken two forms in relation to rhetoric...read more

Product Description: This volume provides a systematic historical survey of the methods and purposes of writing instruction in Western culture. The book traces the development of writing curricula from the earliest stages in ancient Greece to the standardization processes of the Roman period which dominated Western schools up to the 18th century...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: One of the major figures in this book, the Roman educator Quintilian, points out that writing -- unlike speaking -- must always be learned from a teacher since it cannot be learned by natural imitation as oral language is. He uses the example of a two-year-old who can understand and speak even though the child is years away from being able to be taught even the rudiments of the written alphabet...read more