This book brings together Patricia F. Carini's concept of the developing child as a "maker of works" and M.M. Bakhtin's theory of language as "hero" to re-examine how we have defined and researched early written language development. Through a collection of five essays and a documentary account of one young writer, Himley explores fundamental questions about development, language use and learning, and phenomenological reading or description as a possible interpretive methodology in education and research. She demonstrates how to understand writing as the complex semiotic authoring of self and...