About

Tortoise a journal of writing pedagogy

Tortoise: A Journal of Writing Pedagogy is an annual journal that publishes excerpts of student scholarship from within the Princeton community. Showcasing writers from all disciplines and at all levels—both Princeton undergraduate and graduate students—we aim to emphasize the writing process as much as its “finished” product.

Excerpts of exemplary academic writing are curated with reflective commentaries on the research and writing methods underpinning the prose. Tortoise’s ambition is thus not just to share student writing with a wider audience but also to demonstrate how it works and how it was developed.

Tortoise is a student-run initiative. A small group of Writing Center Fellows serves as its editors; they review and evaluate submissions through a double-blind review process similar to that followed by academic journals. Editors work closely with the writers whose pieces are selected for publication to identify and revise an excerpt that spotlights specific moments of effective writing moves, grounded in the values articulated through the Princeton Writing Program’s Writing Lexicon. Writers whose work is published in the journal produce reflective commentaries about their writing process, with editors providing advice and guidance. Editors also write their own commentary on each excerpt, which highlights what they—from the perspective of a peer and outside reader—appreciated about that piece of writing.