My point is to begin discussion on how the DJ provides an alternative (not a replacement) writing space for composition studies. In particular, DJing functions as a type of writing that teaches invention, interlinking of disparate ideas, contextualization of one's position with previous work, and the production of new meaning. The question of how to juxtapose unlike material with personal insight is also the question of research. My example stems from my own temporal research.
Student writers, when told to provide content from their past experience or off the top of their heads, are denied the ability to use research as heuristic to produce knowledge. This, in effect, is the DJ method. The DJ researches his/her record collection and uses the findings to produce a new composition. The claim emerges from the collection. In the mix, the student writer does similarly. Here, in place of a record collection, I used 1979. In place of temporal moments, spatial locales, individual words, or genres could likewise serve the model of the mix.