Jung, Julie. Revisionary Rhetoric, Feminist Pedagogy, and Multigenre Texts. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2005. 196 pp.

by Cheryl Radeloff

In Revisionary Rhetoric, Feminist Pedagogy, and Multigenre Texts, Julie Jung challenges traditional approaches to text revision and proposes alternative views and practices. Her hope is that exploring the very way writing and revision are taught will "help us create an expansive revisionary space, one where we can both disrupt disciplinary expectations and not be rejected for doing so” (xii). Although there is a considerable body of scholarship devoted to feminist pedagogy, Jung's text reminds feminist teachers that the process of writing is often neglected as a site for challenging traditional power structures. Jung believes feminism intersects with revising practices through attention to silence and listening, margins and borders, and reading and responsibility. For example, Jung challenges readers to question creative silences needed for text production along with the silences imposed by patriarchal publishing and academic standards. By discussing the complex, intersecting, and often contradictory elements inherent in fusing feminism and composition, Jung succeeds in illustrating being both a "troublemaker” and conformist. Jung's text encourages feminist pedagogues to push our students and ourselves to see writing as a site of contention and disruption as well as a source of enlightenment and self-awareness.