Documenting an era of dramatic change and growth in the sophistication of scholarship in rhetoric and composition studies, this book includes essays which find in contemporary theory the language to ask new questions, to reframe existing problems, and to move beyond current impasses in thought and action. The different perspectives offer a stand against current backlash theory, as seen in the reassertion of expressivism and creative writing as the antidote to the difficulties wrought by too much theorizing. All the essays included are winners of the James L. Kinneavy Award and celebrate the award's tenth anniversary as well as its founder, one of the discipline's most learned and beloved scholars.

Contributors include David Bleich, Richard M. Coe, William A. Covino, Reed Way Dasenbrock, Sidney I. Dobrin, Lester Faigley, Pamela K. Gilbert, Susan C. Jarratt, Bruce McComiskey, Michael Murphy, Richard E. Miller, Jasper Neel, Gary A. Olson, Joseph Petraglia, George L. Pullman, Joy S. Ritchie, Phillip Sipiora, David W. Smit, Patricia A. Sullivan, John Trimbur, Nancy Welch, and Lynn Worsham.