Thinking brainstorming as otherwise in collaborative writing: A rhizoanalysis

Abstract

Process writing is one of the most popular writing methods in education, but the early stages of the writing process have received little attention in previous writing research. This article adds to a so-called post-process movement in writing research by asking: What becomes possible when thinking of brainstorming in a collaborative writing assemblage as becoming and rhizomatic? A rhizoanalysis of three events was conducted using data from upper-secondary school students’ collaborative brainstorming sessions to write a musical script. The analysis showcases that brainstorming in collaborative writing is messy and crowded, and that a rhizomatic understanding of brainstorming in collaborative writing is allowing, explorative, and unexpected. Nevertheless, the concept of brainstorming can be misleading in response to what the doings in brainstorming can be(come). Therefore, this article proposes a re-thinking of brainstorming as otherwise, asking whether the notions of idea-ing and becoming ideas might be more generative.