An Interdisciplinary Textbook Project: Charting the Paths Taken

Advanced-level literacy textbooks, written for students who are transitioning from ‘general’ academic English to the English of their academic disciplines, are not often discipline-specific, nor are they written by teams of authors who bring in both language and disciplinary expertise. In this chapter, we showcase an interdisciplinary textbook development project that brought together professionals from two disparate fields: applied linguistics and chemistry: Specifically, we explain the complex and iterative process that led to the publication of Write like a Chemist, a textbook that assists university-level chemistry students (native and nonnative speakers of English) develop discipline-specific reading and writing skills. To explain why the textbook looks the way it does, we chart the various paths taken during the writing process. After providing background on the project and identifying the textbook’s defining characteristics, we highlight numerous (and intertwined) steps that led to its development and final publication. We comment on these steps sequentially, even though most occurred in a non-linear fashion, influencing and informing one another throughout the multi-year project. We depict the following steps in the textbook-development process: (i) articulating priorities and principles; (ii) scaffolding the instructional approach; (in) selecting target genres, compiling corpora with full-length text exemplars, and analyzing them using tools from corpus linguistics and discourse, genre, and move analyses; (iv) converting analytical findings into instructional materials; (v) piloting and assessing materials; and (vi) using feedback to improve materials. To describe the textbook publication process, we focus on steps taken to (i) find a publisher; (ii) secure copyright permissions; (in) select a title; (iv) acknowledge contributors; and (v) finalize copy. We conclude with suggestions for language professionals who wish to pursue interdisciplinary textbook endeavors in other content areas or with different skill emphases.