ABSTRACT
The trend to decenter authority in the composition classroom affects teachers of writing at every level, and the questioning of teacher authority has touched nearly every aspect of our scholarship, changing the way we theorize about, research, and practice the teaching of writing. Although teacher authority has been at the center of our discussions in teacher training, workshops, conventions, and publications, little attention has been paid to the different social and cultural positions of men and women. As a community, we have taken for granted a stable and single definition of teacher authority that does not account for gender, racial, cultural, or other differences. I am certainly not arguing here that these various movements to alter our conceptions of teacher authority are invalid, but I do think we have missed a crucial aspect of this conversation. Particularly in a field where the majority of practitioners are women, we should be taking these differences into account when we discuss issues of teacher authority.
