Communication Across the Curriculum and in the Disciplines: A Call for Scholarly Cross-curricular Advocacy

Abstract

Communication-across-the-curriculum (CXC) programs provide assistance to other disciplines on the teaching and learning of communication*meeting an increasingly important need for students not only to be content specialists, but also coherent communicators. Research emerging from this initiative details programmatic challenges and emphases, but also provides insight into the unique interdisciplinary issues involved with teaching communication in other disciplinary cultures. Through a systematic thematic analysis, this review provides a synopsis of CXC scholarship over the past 25 years*highlighting three distinct eras of CXC scholarship that illustrate differing approaches to negotiating the mission of interdisciplinary change: cross-curricular proactiveness, cross-curricular skepticism, and cross-curricular curiosity. Over this time period researchers in this scholarly discussion have engaged in work that has produced detailed program descriptions and assessment, transferable instructional resources, and increasingly more discipline-specific empirical results and theoretical contributions. To increase CXC's impact, though, future scholarship could respond to pressing challenges by adopting a stance of cross-curricular advocacy that is proactive in ways characteristic of early research but with a more focused commitment to empirical rigor, theoretical sophistication, and reflective scholarly partnerships.

Engaging Students in Integrated Ethics Education: A Communication in the Disciplines Study of Pedagogy and Students' Roles in Society

“…She also noted an obvious need for more specialized integration of communication in other disciplinary classrooms (i.e., CID). In addition, CXC is often criticized for its lack of theoretical sophistication and rigor (Dannels, 2001;Dannels & Gaffney, 2009;Darling, 2005). In response, Dannels (2001) created the CID model that has a discipline-specific agenda.…”

“…The earliest efforts to focus on communication in different disciplines were described in the communication-across-the-curriculum (CXC) framework, which is used to provide noncommunication majors with foundational communication instruction (Dannels & Gaffney, 2009). The framework is derived from the idea that students need to not only specialize in their content area, but also be effective and efficient communicators (Darling, 2005).…”

The Basic Communication Course at Two- and Four-Year U.S. Colleges and Universities: Study VIII—The 40th Anniversary

“…This cost-cutting device, combined with the increased inclusion of the basic course in general education may suggest a need to explore instructional delivery options such as a communication across the curriculum program. Some researchers make a case for this instructional method and consider it a form of scholarly crosscurricular advocacy (Dannels & Gaffney, 2009). When contemplating such a program, these sorts of questions arise.…”

Communication in the Disciplines: Interpersonal Communication in Dietetics

“…Dannels and Housley Gaffney (2009) observed that even when oral communication assignments in academics were intended to prepare students for the workplace, academic standards and expectations were reinforced (See, e.g., Dannels, 2003;Dannels, Anson, Bullard, & Peretti, 2003;Dannels & Norris Martin, 2008;Smith, 2005). CXC research during the third era is grounded in the CID theoretical framework, making it pertinent to the current study of dietetics.…”

“…Additionally, from this study issues of relevance to CXC may emerge, signaling directions for future exploration and also suggest areas for the cultivation of interdisciplinary partnerships with other discipline practitioners and perhaps external entities (Dannels & Housley Gaffney, 2009). …”