Computers & Writing @ UC Davis
Over ten years ago, UC Davis hosted Computers & Writing 2009 with a theme that highlighted the cross-contextual and technology-mediated nature of modern composing (@school, @home, @play). We are delighted that C&W is returning to Davis and we look forward to examining questions about hybrid practices that span boundaries and combine modalities with the Computers & Writing community. For us, these questions about hybridity also must explicitly consider questions about “To what end?” What are our ultimate goals as a field, and how do those goals shape our pedagogies, our designs, our research questions, and our methods of inquiry? These questions resonate in our teaching, our research, and our work as writing program administrators. Computers & Writing 2023 draws on the vibrant communities of teachers, writers, and scholars associated with the University Writing Program and the Writing, Rhetoric, and Composition Studies PhD Emphasis.
About the 2023 Conference
We hope to build on the wonderful work and conversations that took place at East Carolina University during Computers & Writing 2022. Like all of you in the Computers and Writing community, we recognize how changed our lives and our students' lives are because of the pandemic. As we navigate this strange new endemic phase of existence, we felt that our theme of "hybrid practices" was particularly resonant. While we had crafted the initial conference theme in 2019, the need for blended, hyflex, remote, and other forms of interaction and learning has only become more pressing in the past three years.
We recognize that a conference with the theme of "Hybrid Practices for Engagement and Equity" needs to embrace multiple ways for participants to connect and interact. We plan to host a conference that will allow attendees to have conversations and to connect with each other from a distance as well as in person. We plan to welcome friends old and recent and yet to be to our campus and to our new Teaching and Learning Complex (TLC). We also plan for an online component of the conference for those who are unable to travel to Davis, CA, but who still want to participate in this important conference.
When submitting your proposal, we ask that you indicate not only your session type but also your preferred delivery format: (1) In Person, (2) Virtual/Remote Synchronous, or (3) Virtual/Remote Asynchronous Session. Virtual/Remote presentations that are accepted as synchronous sessions occur ahead of or during the conference. Presenters should not their scheduling preference when submitting. Proposed asynchronous sessions will be submitted ahead of the conference dates and be available on demand to all conference attendees; presenters should describe the delivery platform they plan to use for asynchronous delivery. We are happy to have conversations with potential presenters about asynchronous options, and we encourage those with questions to submit queries by October 14, 2022 to CandWconference@gmail.com. In-person presentations that are accepted will be organized into concurrent sessions and take place during the on-site conference.
Our goal is to embrace the hybrid and work to make remote participation and attendance as engaging as--if still different from--on-site attendance. We too are learning not only about best practices when teaching becomes hybrid, hyflex, blended, and/or remote but also when the way we meet and share our research embraces hybrid, hyflex, blended, and/or remote options.
You’ll have the option to participate in the conference virtually or in-person. Those who participate virtually will be able to attend live-broadcast in-person presentations that take place at the conference as well as keynote and plenary panels. All attendees will have access to the virtual synchronous and asynchronous presentations.
Registration costs will be differentiated based on in-person or remote conference participation.
No doubt, you will have questions over the next year. We will create an FAQ and post as questions as they emerge and as we work through solutions. We welcome your feedback and suggestions, and we would encourage you to submit those through the conference email address. While we may see questions posted to Twitter, Facebook, or other social media platforms — and we will do our best to respond to them — we might just as easily miss them in the rapid flow of information there. We are much more likely to see questions that arrive by email. We can then add them to the FAQ and share that information out on social media.
We welcome feedback and questions through CandWconference@gmail.com.