Subject Guide
Recommended Databases for Finding Scholarly Articles
- ERIC - ProQuest This link opens in a new windowIncludes some research on composition as it pertains to education. Provides citations and abstracts for journals and Eric documents. (1966-present)
- Communication and Mass Media Complete This link opens in a new windowCommunication and Mass Media Complete covers communication, mass media, and other closely-related fields of study to create a research and reference resource encompassing the breadth of the communication discipline.
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new windowThis electronic version of the MLA International Index comprehensively covers modern languages and literature. (1963 -). Though primarily focused on language and literature, since 2000 the bibliography has included items related to composition studies.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowA valuable historical database with full-text coverage often extending back to a journal’s origin date, though there may be a delay or “moving wall” for indexing of more recent issues. Coverage includes College Composition and Communication, College English, Rhetoric and Public Affairs, Rhetoric Review, Rhetoric Society Quarterly, and Rhetorica.
Selected Online Scholarly and Practitioner Journals
You can select a particular journal to search for a topic, or review its table of contents. Some of the journals listed are not available online through the WSU libraries. Use Interlibrary Loan to request the articles for free. You will receive a PDF by email; this service usually takes 1-2 business days.
This video may help you with navigating the Interlibrary Loan request form. Or you can select green chat button in the lower left on this page to talk to a librarian for assistance in requesting an article.
- Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies
Articles up to 18 months ago are available online through the Communication & Mass Media Complete database. Order current articles through Interlibrary Loan (free library service/takes 1-2 business days. - Composition Studies
Back issues, five years prior to the present, are freely accessible on the publication website. WSU does not subscribe to this journal. Order current articles through Interlibrary Loan (free library service/takes 1-2 business days. - Journal for the History of Rhetoric
Former title was "Advances in the History of Rhetoric". Some articles are open access. WSU does not subscribe to this journal. Order current articles through Interlibrary Loan (free library service/takes 1-2 business days. - Journal of Business & Technical Communication (JBTC)
Full text available through WSU - Journal of Technical Writing & Communication
Full text available through WSU - KB Journal (Kenneth Burke Society)
Full text available through WSU - Philosophy & Rhetoric
Full text available through WSU - The Quarterly Journal of Speech
Full text available through WSU - Rhetoric & Public Affairs
Full text available through WSU - Rhetorica
Full text available through WSU - Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Articles prior to 2015 are available online through JSTOR and ProQuest. WSU does not subscribe to this journal. Order current articles through Interlibrary Loan (free library service/takes 1-2 business days. - Written Communication
Full text available through WSU
Selected Journals
Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies
Full text available through WSU.
Encyclopedia of Rhetoric by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9780195125955Publication Date: 2001A comprehensive survey of the latest research. Featuring 150 articles by leading scholars from many different fields of study.
Sage Handbook of Rhetorical Studies by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781412982795Publication Date: 2008Addresses and explores fundamental issues and pivotal questions about the role of rhetoric in history and in today's society.
Handbook of Research on Writing by Call Number: Purdy/Kresge Library P 211 .H35 2008ISBN: 9780805848700Publication Date: 2008Sums up inquiry over the last few decades on what we know about writing and the many ways we know it.
Handbook of Writing Research by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781593856953Publication Date: 2008Synthesizes current knowledge on writing development in children and adolescents and the processes underlying successful learning and teaching. The book includes a special section on cultural diversity, gender, special education, and bilingual learners.
Circulation, Writing, and Rhetoric by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781607326748Publication Date: 2018In an effort to give circulation its rhetorical due, this book introduces a wide range of studies that explore the connections between circulation and public rhetorics, urban studies, feminist rhetorics, digital communication, new materialism, and digital research.
Economies of Writing by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781607325239Publication Date: 2017Explores complex forces shaping the production and valuation of literacies, languages, identities, and institutions and consider their implications for composition scholarship, teaching, administration, and public rhetorics.
Reinventing (with) Theory in Rhetoric and Writing Studies by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781607328933Publication Date: 2019Collects original scholarship that takes up and extends the practices of inventive theorizing that characterize Sharon Crowley's body of work.
Renewing Rhetoric's Relation to Composition by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9780805863956Publication Date: 2009Uses the writings of Theresa Jarnagin Enos as points of departure for studies of broader trends.
Rhetoric and Writing Studies in the New Century by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9780809335688Publication Date: 2017This collection of essays investigates the historiography of rhetoric, global perspectives on rhetoric, and the teaching of writing and rhetoric.
Talking Back: Senior Scholars and Their Colleagues Deliberate the Past, Present, and Future of Writing Studies by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781607329763Publication Date: 2020A history of writing studies in autobiographical form.
- Studies in Writing & RhetoricThe CCCC Studies in Writing and Rhetoric Series, established in 1984, supports research that explores how writing and rhetoric are currently and have been historically taught, practiced, and circulated within communities, whether in colleges, workplaces, or neighborhoods, local, national, digital, or international contexts.
- Reference Guides to Rhetoric & CompositionThe Series provides compact, comprehensive and convenient surveys of what has been learned through research and practice as composition has emerged as an academic discipline over the last half century. Each volume is devoted to a single topic that has been of interest in rhetoric and composition in recent years, to synthesize and make available the sum and parts of what has been learned on that topic.
The History and Theory of Rhetoric by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781003000198Publication Date: 2020A conceptual framework for evaluating and practicing persuasive writing and speaking, presented by tracing the traditional progression of rhetoric from the Greek Sophists to a in a wide range of settings and in both written and visual media.
A New History of Classical Rhetoric by Call Number: ebookISBN: 9781400821471Publication Date: 2009Provides a comprehensive history of classical rhetoric
Rhetoric in the Middle Ages: a History of Rhetorical Theory from Saint Augustine to the Renaissance by Call Number: Purdy-Kresge Library PN 173 .M8 2001ISBN: 0866982698Publication Date: 2001Follows the threads of ancient rhetorical theory into the Middle Ages and examines the distinctly Medieval rhetorical genres of perceptive grammar, letter-writing, and preaching.
MLA Style Guides
- Excelsior OWL: MLA Formatting and Style GuideThis resource offers examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page.
- The Writer's Handbook: MLA Documentation GuideThe University of Wisconsin - Madison provides a quick resource for citing references in papers using the style outlined by the 2009 MLA Handbook.
- Citing Primary Sources: MLALibrary of Congress instructions for and examples of citations of primary source materials: Web Sites, Cartoons, Maps, Photographs, Films, and more.
Rhetoric and Writing Studies: Web Resources
- ComPileAn inventory of publications in post-secondary composition, rhetoric, technical writing, ESL, and discourse studies, 1939-
- H-Net DigiRhetThe H-DigiRhet network will provide an online discussion space for teachers, researchers, and scholars who are working at the intersections of writing, rhetoric, communication, and digital technologies, focusing on issues of digital composition, computer-mediated communication (CMC), digital literacy, information and communication technologies (ICTs), human-computer interaction (HCI) and digital rhetoric.
- Humanities Commons: Rhetoric and CompositionA discussion forum for those interested in the history, theory, and pedagogy of rhetoric and composition.
- SILVA RHETORICAE:Online lexicon of rhetorical terms.
- The WAC ClearinghouseSupporting scholarly exchange about communication across the curriculum