Peter Elbow
Encyclopedia
Peter Elbow is currently a Professor of English Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts
at Amherst
where he also directed the Writing Program from 1996 until 2000. He is best known for his work in writing theory, practice, and pedagogy
, and has authored several books, including Writing Without Teachers (Oxford UP 1973), Writing With Power: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process (Oxford UP 1981), Embracing Contraries: Explorations in Learning and Teaching (Oxford UP
, 1986), Everyone Can Write (Oxford UP
, 2000), and his most recent, Being A Writer (McGraw-Hill
, 2002). With his colleague, Pat Belanoff, he wrote two versions of a textbook widely used: A Community of Writers and Being A Writer, and his most recent, Being A Writer ( McGraw-Hill , 2002). He has a new book that Oxford will put out on January 1, 2012: Vernacular Eloquence: What Speech Can Bring To Writing.
He is also the author of numerous articles, largely dealing with writing. His practices and theories on freewriting, editing and revising, and peer response are now widely taught in English classes.
and Williams College
(1953-1957), he was a diligent and successful student, but when he attended the University of Oxford
on a scholarship from Williams, there were many weeks when he could not write the essays assigned by his tutor. Elbow made it through with mediocre exam results, but when he began his PhD in English at Harvard University
, his writing difficulties persisted and he had to quit after a semester and a half.
Elbow began teaching, first as an instructor at M.I.T from 1960–1963, and then as one of nine founding members of Franconia College
from 1963-1965. It was at Franconia where Elbow discovered he could write more easily if he knew he was writing to colleagues or to students than to his own teachers.
In 1965 he returned to graduate school, this time at Brandeis University
. Here he developed a self-analytical process of writing, mostly out of fear that he would not be able to write for teachers again. Elbow has said that the process of freewriting really came about during this time in his life. He would sit down with his typewriter and type out all his thoughts, making writing a sort of therapy. This helped him to get through the graduate level writing and when it came time for him to write his dissertation, he had many ideas, but ultimately settled on Chaucer. He would eventually make his dissertation book-length and publish it in 1975 under the title Oppositions in Chaucer.
After receiving his PhD, Elbow accepted a position at M.I.T in 1968, turning down an offer from Berkeley
to remain in the Boston
area for personal reasons. While sitting in his office one day in 1970, a representative from Oxford University Press
came to show him some books that he might like to use in his classes. Then the representative asked Elbow if he was writing anything, Elbow replied that he had thought about trying to write something to do with teacher-less writing groups, a concept he had become interested in. Soon after, he had an advance to begin a book called Writing Without Tears, which would later become Writing Without Teachers. In the nearly 40 years since then, Elbow has penned more than 10 books, as well as numerous articles regarding writing technique and theory.
While criterion-based feedback may seem obvious, it is the inclusion of reader-based feedback that makes this overall method fresh for teachers. Reader-based feedback lets the writer see what thoughts and feelings occur in a reader's mind as he or she is reading the text. Elbow calls this type of feedback "movies of the reader's mind." This is how her or his writing makes her or his reader feel - a kind of feedback not generally provided by teachers. The list of detailed questions Elbow provides for reader-based feedback follow from the following essential questions:
This method of Elbow’s is useful in classrooms to get students to provide each other with helpful and meaningful feedback, but works just as well for an individual writer seeking feedback from a friend or colleague (Elbow Writing).
Also notable in Writing Without Teachers is Elbow’s proposition of the teacher-less writing class, which is the root of today’s writing groups. In these teacher-less writing classes, which meet at least once a week, all group members actively participate by contributing a piece of writing and reading each others’ work. They discuss it with the goal of getting the writer to see not necessarily what is wrong or right with the piece, but instead what effect the writing has on the readers in the group, as opposed to one teacher’s opinion. This is also very similar to Writing Workshop
s, which are also currently popular pedagogical practices.
The appendix to Writing Without Teachers has a section called "The Doubting and Believing Game: An Analysis of the Intellectual Enterprise.” Elbow started out simply trying to justify his “no arguing” rule for teacher less classes, but it developed into what really is the central theoretical foundation underlying all of his work. Elbow argues that Western conceptions of good thinking are based on the doubting game or critical thinking: A methodology that seeks to use a methodology of skeptical doubting to find flaws in thinking that might look good. Elbow argues that really good thinking also calls on a complementary methodology: conditionally trying to believe all ideas in order to find virtues in thinking that looks wrong.(He is NOT arguing against the doubting game or critical thinking; just asking for an additional methodology) Elbow has developed the believing game in a series of essays written throughout his career. His essay, “In Defense of Binary Thinking,” is also crucial in this theoretical work.
Writing With Power is revolutionary because while it has a handbook
feel to it, it also breaks the idea of the current-traditionalist handbook. Elbow’s ideas are fresh and creative and lend themselves well to English classes, where teachers still practice his techniques.
regarding the role of the writer, as well as that of an academic in undergraduate writing. Bartholomae posits that Elbow “comes down on the side of credulity as the governing idea in the undergraduate writing course” whereas he, himself, expresses more skepticism. The debate
continued with these differing views: Elbow believes that writing belongs to the writer from the beginning; Bartholomae counters that he is more dismissive, not necessarily granting the writer her own presence. He believes that Elbow is too accepting while he, himself, thinks that the writer should prove himself first.
In his response, Elbow agrees with Bartholomae that training for academic writing
should be a crucial part of an undergraduate’s career; however, Elbow says that this training can’t be completed in just one semester. Elbow says that perhaps one of their greatest differences is that Bartholomae believes the classroom to be a “‘real space, not an idealized utopian space’” (88). This implies to Elbow that Bartholomae believes that “a classroom cannot be utopian, and that utopian spaces are not real spaces” (88).
Yet another major aspect of the debate comes from the idea of writing without teachers, a concept that Bartholomae states doesn’t exist. Elbow cites diaries
, letters, stories, poems, and so forth as ways that students write for themselves with no teachers involved. Elbow acknowledges that unequal power, however, is ubiquitous, and not just in writing, but believes that there is still plenty of writing being done for the students’ own enjoyment.
The debate has, over the years, helped to shape the understanding and teaching of composition theory, especially in regards to how much power is granted the writer. It has also caused writers to consider audience in ways they may not have before.In the end, the two have essentially agreed to disagree, with Bartholomae saying that the writer should have the role of authorship to work towards, and Elbow maintaining that writers be accepted as writers from the beginning.
The main point of this article is the importance of free writing and then revising with the audience in mind. He also stresses the importance of teaching non-academic discourse in addition to academic discourse in Freshmen writing classes.
This work focuses on assessment and writing for students as well as literary scholars like himself.This essay creates a necessary distinction between "Being a Writer vs. Being an academic." Elbow addresses the juxtaposition between writing as a role or as a profession. Elbow makes an interesting correlation between goals and how we go about achieving them. Elbow furthers his discussion by exploring 8 specific points of conflict in the realm of designing and teaching a first year college writing course. Three of these elements are presented in his other work called,"The War Between Reading and Writing and How to End It."
In this article, Elbow critiques the different forms of administering grades to students by presenting the disadvantages and benefits related to each method. Ranking and evaluating are the main focus of this article with the addition of liking as a method to complement evaluation. Elbow’s aim is to persuade his audience about the effectiveness of his suggested method of evaluating by the results he has experienced with his own students.
In this article, Elbow focuses on writer-based prose. He makes two claims: "ignoring audience can lead to worse drafts but better revisions" and "ignoring audience can lead to better writing immediately." This article provides a possibility for growth to both students and teachers. Students can learn to put the audience behind a locked door while they write their first draft and then open this door for the revisions. Teachers can learn how to teach students to free-write by providing them with the opportunity to do so and perhaps by not just focusing on what the student has done wrong.
In this article, Elbow presents us with argument of whether speech or writing is more permanent, and his own opinion of them being similar. He emphasizes that we should be using both of these medias to figure out and better structure what we really want to say.
University of Massachusetts
This article relates to the statewide university system. For the flagship campus often referred to as "UMass", see University of Massachusetts Amherst...
at Amherst
Amherst, Massachusetts
Amherst is a town in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States in the Connecticut River valley. As of the 2010 census, the population was 37,819, making it the largest community in Hampshire County . The town is home to Amherst College, Hampshire College, and the University of Massachusetts...
where he also directed the Writing Program from 1996 until 2000. He is best known for his work in writing theory, practice, and pedagogy
Pedagogy
Pedagogy is the study of being a teacher or the process of teaching. The term generally refers to strategies of instruction, or a style of instruction....
, and has authored several books, including Writing Without Teachers (Oxford UP 1973), Writing With Power: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process (Oxford UP 1981), Embracing Contraries: Explorations in Learning and Teaching (Oxford UP
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
, 1986), Everyone Can Write (Oxford UP
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
, 2000), and his most recent, Being A Writer (McGraw-Hill
McGraw-Hill
The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., is a publicly traded corporation headquartered in Rockefeller Center in New York City. Its primary areas of business are financial, education, publishing, broadcasting, and business services...
, 2002). With his colleague, Pat Belanoff, he wrote two versions of a textbook widely used: A Community of Writers and Being A Writer, and his most recent, Being A Writer ( McGraw-Hill , 2002). He has a new book that Oxford will put out on January 1, 2012: Vernacular Eloquence: What Speech Can Bring To Writing.
He is also the author of numerous articles, largely dealing with writing. His practices and theories on freewriting, editing and revising, and peer response are now widely taught in English classes.
Biography
In the introduction to the second edition of Writing Without Teachers, Elbow says that his interest in writing practices came from his own perceived inability to write. While attending Proctor AcademyProctor Academy
Proctor Academy is a coeducational, independent preparatory boarding school for grades 9-12 located on in Andover, New Hampshire.-Origin:Andover Academy was established in 1848 by the Town of Andover. The idea of the school spawned from a sewing group conversation between the wives of the area's...
and Williams College
Williams College
Williams College is a private liberal arts college located in Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States. It was established in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim Williams. Originally a men's college, Williams became co-educational in 1970. Fraternities were also phased out during this...
(1953-1957), he was a diligent and successful student, but when he attended the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
on a scholarship from Williams, there were many weeks when he could not write the essays assigned by his tutor. Elbow made it through with mediocre exam results, but when he began his PhD in English at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, his writing difficulties persisted and he had to quit after a semester and a half.
Elbow began teaching, first as an instructor at M.I.T from 1960–1963, and then as one of nine founding members of Franconia College
Franconia College
Franconia College was a small experimental liberal arts college in Franconia, New Hampshire, United States. It opened in 1963 on the site of The Forest Hills Hotel on Agassiz Road, and closed in 1978, after years of declining enrollment and increasing financial difficulties.A small, eclectic...
from 1963-1965. It was at Franconia where Elbow discovered he could write more easily if he knew he was writing to colleagues or to students than to his own teachers.
In 1965 he returned to graduate school, this time at Brandeis University
Brandeis University
Brandeis University is an American private research university with a liberal arts focus. It is located in the southwestern corner of Waltham, Massachusetts, nine miles west of Boston. The University has an enrollment of approximately 3,200 undergraduate and 2,100 graduate students. In 2011, it...
. Here he developed a self-analytical process of writing, mostly out of fear that he would not be able to write for teachers again. Elbow has said that the process of freewriting really came about during this time in his life. He would sit down with his typewriter and type out all his thoughts, making writing a sort of therapy. This helped him to get through the graduate level writing and when it came time for him to write his dissertation, he had many ideas, but ultimately settled on Chaucer. He would eventually make his dissertation book-length and publish it in 1975 under the title Oppositions in Chaucer.
After receiving his PhD, Elbow accepted a position at M.I.T in 1968, turning down an offer from Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
to remain in the Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
area for personal reasons. While sitting in his office one day in 1970, a representative from Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
came to show him some books that he might like to use in his classes. Then the representative asked Elbow if he was writing anything, Elbow replied that he had thought about trying to write something to do with teacher-less writing groups, a concept he had become interested in. Soon after, he had an advance to begin a book called Writing Without Tears, which would later become Writing Without Teachers. In the nearly 40 years since then, Elbow has penned more than 10 books, as well as numerous articles regarding writing technique and theory.
Freewriting
Free writing, a term commonly used by Elbow, coined by Ken Macrorie, is to write without stopping, without editing, without sharing, without worrying about grammar, without thinking, without rushing. Elbow wants his students (and others) to write whatever they want, however they want but just write daily-10 to 15 minutes for one freewrite. Normal freewriting can be adapted to focused freewriting and public freewriting. Focused freewriting is trying to stay on a topic, which is particularly useful when a student has a specific assignment to do. Public freewriting is geared toward being shared, which makes it seem a little more risky but it is very useful in groups, especially where there is trust, and growth can occur. The goal of this exercise is to bring about a more natural language, while making the writing process easier and more comfortable to the student.Criterion- and reader-based feedback
Feedback techniques are also among Elbow’s practices. These techniques, presented in Writing With Power, are divided into two types: criterion-based and reader-based feedback. Criterion-based feedback judges the writing against standard criteria, such as content, usage, organization, and general effectiveness. This is the kind of feedback that most people are used to giving and receiving. What Elbow says is quite useful about criterion-based feedback is that it allows the writer to reflect on her or his own writing as he goes along. It also allows her or him to recognize common troubles he has in writing so that he can avoid them in the future. In Writing With Power, Elbow gives a catalogue of criterion-based questions. These questions all stem from the following essential questions:-
-
-
-
- What is the quality of the content of the writing: the ideas, the perceptions, the point of view?
- How well is the writing organized?
- How effective is the language?
- Are there mistakes or inappropriate choices of usage?.
-
-
-
While criterion-based feedback may seem obvious, it is the inclusion of reader-based feedback that makes this overall method fresh for teachers. Reader-based feedback lets the writer see what thoughts and feelings occur in a reader's mind as he or she is reading the text. Elbow calls this type of feedback "movies of the reader's mind." This is how her or his writing makes her or his reader feel - a kind of feedback not generally provided by teachers. The list of detailed questions Elbow provides for reader-based feedback follow from the following essential questions:
-
-
-
-
- What was happening to you, moment by moment, as you were reading the piece of writing?
- Summarize the writing: give your understanding of what it says or what happened in it.
- Make up some images for the writing and the transaction it creates with you.
-
-
-
This method of Elbow’s is useful in classrooms to get students to provide each other with helpful and meaningful feedback, but works just as well for an individual writer seeking feedback from a friend or colleague (Elbow Writing).
Influential texts
While Peter Elbow is the author of over 10 books, as well as numerous articles which largely deal with writing theory and practice, few of his works have been as critical to his career as Writing Without Teachers (Oxford UP 1973) and Writing With Power: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process (Oxford UP 1981).Writing Without Teachers
Writing Without Teachers was Elbow’s first book about writing, and the one that has made his freewriting technique so popular as a pedagogical practice. In this book, Elbow uses two main metaphors. These are metaphors that reflect Elbow’s interest in letting one’s ideas develop and change throughout the writing process. The first is to see writing as growing. It must move through stages. The first stage is to generate words before a writer can continue to “grow” a piece of writing and move through the subsequent stages. In this section Elbow stresses that it is crucial to write as much as possible because the more a writer writes, not only does he have more to work with, but he also has more to throw away, allowing him to keep moving through the growing stages of writing. The second metaphor is to see writing as cooking, letting ideas simmer and bubble until they are ready to be used. In this metaphor, Elbow emphasizes interaction, particularly between writing and reiteration. According to Elbow, growing is transformation at the macro level, cooking is transformation at the micro level. Essentially, the writing lets his ideas simmer until he can use them to interact with his writing. Elbow suggests that writers spend sufficient time writing as well as stopping completely and reflecting on what the larger picture is meant to present.Also notable in Writing Without Teachers is Elbow’s proposition of the teacher-less writing class, which is the root of today’s writing groups. In these teacher-less writing classes, which meet at least once a week, all group members actively participate by contributing a piece of writing and reading each others’ work. They discuss it with the goal of getting the writer to see not necessarily what is wrong or right with the piece, but instead what effect the writing has on the readers in the group, as opposed to one teacher’s opinion. This is also very similar to Writing Workshop
Writing Workshop
Writing Workshop is a method of writing instruction developed by Lucy Calkins and educators involved in the Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University in New York City, New York. . This method of instruction focuses on the goal of fostering lifelong writers...
s, which are also currently popular pedagogical practices.
The Believing Game
“The Believing Game” is an appendix essay, where Elbow acknowledges the game of believing as a method that he applies to all his work. The essay defines the believing game in comparison to the doubting game - which is also more familiarly known as critical thinking. Elbow feels doubting and believing are two methods needed in order to examine and accept an idea as true.The appendix to Writing Without Teachers has a section called "The Doubting and Believing Game: An Analysis of the Intellectual Enterprise.” Elbow started out simply trying to justify his “no arguing” rule for teacher less classes, but it developed into what really is the central theoretical foundation underlying all of his work. Elbow argues that Western conceptions of good thinking are based on the doubting game or critical thinking: A methodology that seeks to use a methodology of skeptical doubting to find flaws in thinking that might look good. Elbow argues that really good thinking also calls on a complementary methodology: conditionally trying to believe all ideas in order to find virtues in thinking that looks wrong.(He is NOT arguing against the doubting game or critical thinking; just asking for an additional methodology) Elbow has developed the believing game in a series of essays written throughout his career. His essay, “In Defense of Binary Thinking,” is also crucial in this theoretical work.
Writing With Power
Writing With Power was originally published in 1981 during an era where writing teachers were really starting to try to get a sense for what it meant to be a writer teaching writing. During this time, current-traditionalism was quite popular in handbooks for writers (Strunk & White’s Elements of Style, for example). This method presented writers with a very cut and dry sense of how to write. With the publication of Writing With Power, Peter Elbow broke the current-traditionalist mold. This book proffers various techniques for writers to try, finding one that best suits them. This book takes writers through the whole writing process from generating ideas (where freewriting once more makes an appearance) to revising and editing both alone and with others. Elbow goes on to address issues when writing to different kinds of audiences and also how to seek adequate feedback. It seems to be Elbow’s goal to show writers that there is more than just one “correct” way to involve oneself in the writing process. If writers learn to interact with their writing in these ways, they have learned to write with power.Writing With Power is revolutionary because while it has a handbook
Handbook
A handbook is a type of reference work, or other collection of instructions, that is intended to provide ready reference .A handbook is sometimes referred to as a vade mecum or pocket reference that is intended to be carried at all times.Handbooks may deal with any topic, and are generally...
feel to it, it also breaks the idea of the current-traditionalist handbook. Elbow’s ideas are fresh and creative and lend themselves well to English classes, where teachers still practice his techniques.
The Elbow and Bartholomae Debate
In the 1990s, Peter Elbow engaged in a public debate with David BartholomaeDavid Bartholomae
David J. Bartholomae is an American scholar in composition studies. He is Professor of English and a former Chair of the English Department at the University of Pittsburgh....
regarding the role of the writer, as well as that of an academic in undergraduate writing. Bartholomae posits that Elbow “comes down on the side of credulity as the governing idea in the undergraduate writing course” whereas he, himself, expresses more skepticism. The debate
Debate
Debate or debating is a method of interactive and representational argument. Debate is a broader form of argument than logical argument, which only examines consistency from axiom, and factual argument, which only examines what is or isn't the case or rhetoric which is a technique of persuasion...
continued with these differing views: Elbow believes that writing belongs to the writer from the beginning; Bartholomae counters that he is more dismissive, not necessarily granting the writer her own presence. He believes that Elbow is too accepting while he, himself, thinks that the writer should prove himself first.
In his response, Elbow agrees with Bartholomae that training for academic writing
Academic writing
In academia, writing and publishing is conducted in several sets of forms and genres. This is a list of genres of academic writing. It is a short summary of the full spectrum of critical & academic writing. It does not cover the variety of critical approaches that can be applied when writing about...
should be a crucial part of an undergraduate’s career; however, Elbow says that this training can’t be completed in just one semester. Elbow says that perhaps one of their greatest differences is that Bartholomae believes the classroom to be a “‘real space, not an idealized utopian space’” (88). This implies to Elbow that Bartholomae believes that “a classroom cannot be utopian, and that utopian spaces are not real spaces” (88).
Yet another major aspect of the debate comes from the idea of writing without teachers, a concept that Bartholomae states doesn’t exist. Elbow cites diaries
Diaries
As a proper noun, Diaries, the plural of diary, can refer to:*Diaries: 1971-1976, an 1981 documentary by Ed Pincus*Diaries 1969–1979: The Python Years, a 2006 book by Michael Palin...
, letters, stories, poems, and so forth as ways that students write for themselves with no teachers involved. Elbow acknowledges that unequal power, however, is ubiquitous, and not just in writing, but believes that there is still plenty of writing being done for the students’ own enjoyment.
The debate has, over the years, helped to shape the understanding and teaching of composition theory, especially in regards to how much power is granted the writer. It has also caused writers to consider audience in ways they may not have before.In the end, the two have essentially agreed to disagree, with Bartholomae saying that the writer should have the role of authorship to work towards, and Elbow maintaining that writers be accepted as writers from the beginning.
Reflections on Academic Discourse: How it Relates to Freshmen and Colleagues
The main point of this article is the importance of free writing and then revising with the audience in mind. He also stresses the importance of teaching non-academic discourse in addition to academic discourse in Freshmen writing classes.
Being a Writer vs. Being an Academic: A Conflict In Goals
This work focuses on assessment and writing for students as well as literary scholars like himself.This essay creates a necessary distinction between "Being a Writer vs. Being an academic." Elbow addresses the juxtaposition between writing as a role or as a profession. Elbow makes an interesting correlation between goals and how we go about achieving them. Elbow furthers his discussion by exploring 8 specific points of conflict in the realm of designing and teaching a first year college writing course. Three of these elements are presented in his other work called,"The War Between Reading and Writing and How to End It."
Ranking, Evaluating, and Liking: Sorting Out Three Forms of Judgment
In this article, Elbow critiques the different forms of administering grades to students by presenting the disadvantages and benefits related to each method. Ranking and evaluating are the main focus of this article with the addition of liking as a method to complement evaluation. Elbow’s aim is to persuade his audience about the effectiveness of his suggested method of evaluating by the results he has experienced with his own students.
Closing My Eyes as I Speak: An Argument for Ignoring Audience
In this article, Elbow focuses on writer-based prose. He makes two claims: "ignoring audience can lead to worse drafts but better revisions" and "ignoring audience can lead to better writing immediately." This article provides a possibility for growth to both students and teachers. Students can learn to put the audience behind a locked door while they write their first draft and then open this door for the revisions. Teachers can learn how to teach students to free-write by providing them with the opportunity to do so and perhaps by not just focusing on what the student has done wrong.
The Shifting Relationships Between Speech and Writing
In this article, Elbow presents us with argument of whether speech or writing is more permanent, and his own opinion of them being similar. He emphasizes that we should be using both of these medias to figure out and better structure what we really want to say.
Selective Bibliography
- Bartholomae, David. “Writing with Teachers: A Conversation with Peter Elbow.” College Composition and Communication 46:1 (1995): 62-71.
- Bartholomae, David and Peter Elbow. “Responses to Bartholomae and Elbow.” College Composition and Communication 46:1 (1995): 84-92.
- Elbow, Peter. “Being a Writer vs. Being an Academic: A Conflict in Goals.” College Composition and Communication 46:1 (1995): 72-83.
- Elbow, Peter. Selected Works of Peter Elbow. Mar. 31, 2009.
- Elbow, Peter. Writing Without Teachers. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 1973,1998.
- Elbow, Peter. Writing With Power: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford UP, 1981, 1998.
Further reading
- Elbow, Peter and Pat Belanoff. A Community of Writers: A Workshop Course in Writing. McGraw-Hill, 1989.
- Elbow, Peter and Pat Belanoff. Sharing and Responding. 3rd ed. McGraw Hill, 1999.
- Elbow, Peter. Everyone Can Write. New York: Oxford UP, 2000.
- Schneider, Pat. Writing Alone and With Others. New York: Oxford UP, 2003.