Tim Peeples, Paula Rosinski, and Michael Strickland’s article, “Chronos and Kairos, Strategies and Tactics: The Case of Constructing Elon University’s Professional Writing and Rhetoric Concentration,” is one of a few articles chosen for a special edition in Composition Studies focusing on premier undergraduate majors in writing and rhetoric.
Editors for the special edition accepted only a handful of article-length pieces, one of which was the piece by Peeples, Rosinski, and Strickland that focuses on the building of Elon’s English major concentration in Professional Writing and Rhetoric (see program info at www.elon.edu/pwr). The special edition also includes a number of short two- to three-page writing major summaries, which together give readers of the journal a broad picture of the state of undergraduate writing and rhetoric programs across the nation.
“Chronos and Kairos, Strategies and Tactics” is a theory-building piece that brings value to readers – including those outside writing and rhetoric studies – by constructing a framework that helps understand how programs develop. The article draws on classical studies in rhetoric, as well as contemporary cultural theory, to theorize program development in two kinds of time – chronos and kairos – requiring two kinds of planning and action – strategic and tactical.