Shows relationships between the different aspects of the writing process at the same time that it teaches students to create and develop an idea first, and then create and develop a style to match their idea, reinforcing the integral relationship between content and form.

Presents a writing process that is predicated on how to ask meaningful questions.

• Teaches students specific ways of composing questions that will help them -- and their readers -- focus on their ideas.
• Students then work on answering their questions in different types of writing projects.
• As they write and revise, they explore key factors that influence the strength of their ideas: voice, diction, context, style, and audience.

Connects thinking and writing directly to reading -- as it guides students through various segments of the writing process.

• Combines specific readings with particular aspects of the writing process to reinforce not only how and why to write, but the variety possible on the outcome of particular writing "rules."

Features a unique and eclectic collection of multicultural readings from around the world. The readings:

• Range from shorter to longer fiction and non-fiction as the text progresses.
• Deals with multiculturalism on a number of different contextual levels -- racial, ethnic, religious, geographic, literary, gender, political, historical, scientific, economic, artistic, anthropological, etc.
• Reflect major connecting themes -- world unrest and conflict; mortality; politics; personal identity; public identity.
• Include: a narrative by modern day warrior Monster Kody Scott; a bizarre trip to the zoo with Haruki Murakami; and a dark humored retrospective by Jessica Mitford.

Shows students how to "utilize" rather than simply "use" a source -- how to research in a three-dimensional manner -- and how to use non-print media (film, art, and music) as part of the wealth of sources that can be drawn on for writing, e.g.:

• Uses photographs of Southern black gravestones and their monuments in a reading about grave design, decoration, and religious history to show students how a non-print media source functions as a research tool and as a source of specific detail in writing.

Offers a mix and match collection of both homework and in-class activities that reinforce all aspects of the writing process:

• Allows different perspectives and (ultimately) essays to come out of the same assignment.
• Helps students develop their own creativity and autonomy -- and to learn to write well, not just to try and imitate good writing.