"The Study of Error"

In reading “The Study of Error” by David Bartholomae I found that I gained a more informed judgment of how to deal with the shortcomings of basic writing. Bartholomae tries to examine the basis of basic writing, how we critique it, and whether it is really a shortfall on the writer’s part or just a misunderstanding of the task at hand.

I understand, from the article, that the correct way to approach basic writing is to not come at it as a lesson that we can teach students, but rather it should be looked at as an opportunity to examine the errors made by the writer when he is faced with tasks that are beyond his current ability. We as consultants need to approach papers with eyes that can recognize errors the writer has made and try to evaluate those mistakes based on where they originated. As Bartholomae states basic writers do make choices and struggle to find strategy as they deal with “the varied demands of a task, a language, and a rhetoric” (257). Basic writing is not uninformed or unintellectual, rather its confused and misguided so we must be sensitive to that as we give advice to our writers. I believe the value in this is that once we recognize the errors the writer has made we can begin the consultation by acknowledging the things the writer has done, giving him some confidence in his ability, and then come at it with a critical eye helping the writer to see what mistakes he made.

One lesson within the article that I found to be important, on our part, is the assertion that we must be proficient readers. When we look at the papers with careful eyes we can at times overlook the miscues within the writing and see the bigger picture of the writers argument. Bartholomae argues that good readers are able to see the “sense” of the passage and can make better corrections within the essay if they overlook the small errors and try to see the core of the argument. We saw this when we were editing the “Is Chance Wise” paper, as we skillfully read the paper we were able to catch a glimpse of what the writer truly meant and could give better feedback.

            This is no easy feat, and I believe that this requires a lot to be accomplished in the one-hour meeting we have with our writers. Yet, what I believe to be a valuable lesson is that in our understanding of Bartholomae’s argument we can act as better, more careful consultants because we understand the ways in which student’s shortcomings can appear within their writing. 

Emily Chadwick