Ignore mod_rewrite Rules Sub-Directory

One problem I have is I want to change my document root of my domain to the public folder of my RoR application.  In the past when I hosted my own server I’d simply change the Apache DocumentRoot directive.  Now, however, I need to rely on .htaccess and mod_rewrite because now I use a shared hosting scenario.

I have an .htaccess file at my DocumentRoot to redirect request to subdirectories to a path of my dispatch.cgi of my Rails application.  However, I want to host a Wordpress blog in a subdirectory on the same server.  Obviously I do not want to existing .htaccess rules to apply to this subdirectory.

In my Wordpress subdirectory I add a .htaccess file with one rule: rewriteengine Off