Donna Bain Butler
Adjunct Professor, International Legal Studies Program
E-mail: dbbutler@wcl.american.edu
Donna Bain Butler, Ph.D. is an Adjunct Professor at American University’s Washington College of Law. She designs and teaches intensive language courses for Master of Laws (LL.M.) students, doctoral students, visiting scholars, and judges. Her courses build on international students’ competencies for professional proficiency in speaking and in writing. Professor Bain Butler also participates in the Washington College of Law's (a) Ritsumeikan Washington Seminar, and (b) Summer Legal Institute English Institute summer programs.
Currently Teaching
Areas of Specialization
- Advanced Academic Literacy for International Graduate Students
- Advanced Professional Proficiency in Speaking and in Writing
- English for Specific Purposes (ESP): Business and Legal
- English for Academic Purposes (EAP) and Scholarly Writing
Degrees & Universities
- Ph.D., University of Maryland College Park
- M.A. TESOL, American University
- B.A., Nathaniel Hawthorne College
Selected Publications
- Donna Bain Butler, Applied Linguistics; Discourse Analysis, Review of Academic Writing and Plagiarism: A Linguistic Analysis (Mar. 23, 2011).
- Donna Bain Butler, From the Desk of the Legal Writing Specialist: Use Metacognitive Strategies to Promote Learning and Advance Writing Proficiency, 25 The Second Draft 18 (Spring 2011).
- Donna Bain Butler, How L2 Legal Writers Use Strategies for Scholarly Writing: A Mixed Methods Study, Proquest Pub. (Nov. 13, 2010).
- D. Bain Butler & Y. Zhou, Teaching and Learning to Near-Native Levels of Language Proficiency IV: Proceedings of the Fall 2006 & 2007 Conference of the Coalition of Distinguished Language Centers (Baint Butlr & Zhou, eds., MSI Press 2008).
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Selected Works in Progress- Donna Bain Butler, Foreign Graduate Students’ Perceptions of Academic English Writing, (an empirical research study disclosing what may be needed for the acquisition of academic literacy by culturally distanced English language learners choosing to study in the U.S. English medium) (forthcoming).
- Donna Bain Butler, • When the Culture of Teaching and Learning Plays a Role in Academic English Writing, 9 ESP Across Cultures __ (forthcoming 2012).
