Although the number of nonnative speakers of English in U.S. institutions of higher L education has been increasing continuously during the last four decades, the development of composition studies does not seem to reflect this trend.1 Until fairly recently, discussions of English as a Second Language (ESL) issues in composition studies have been few and far between. Few composition theorists include second-language perspectives in their discussions, and only a handful of empirical studies written and read by composition specialists consider second-language writers in their research design, interpretation of data and discussion of implications. It almost seems as though the presence of over 457,000 international students in colleges and universities across the nation (Davis 2) does not concern writing teachers and scholars.2 The presence of ESL students should be an important consideration for all teachers and scholars of writing because ESL students can be found in many writing courses across the United States. As Jessica Williams' survey of ESL writing program administration suggests, the vast majority of institutions continue to require undergraduate ESL students to enroll in firstyear composition courses, often in addition to special ESL writing courses.
Paul Kei Matsuda (Tue,) studied this question.