I find this problem most evident in the "Technical Communicator as Author" piece. The authors state: "Rather than authors producing certain discourses, certain discourses are understood to produce authors" (25). Hmm. I like the use of chiasmus, but I'm dubious as to the truth of their claim. Something about this statement stinks, I just can't put my finger on why exactly. Maybe it's just the bleakness of it. Maybe because I'm not sure how this fits into their argument.
Slack et al, go on to argue that they "...would advance the re-articulation of technical communicators...as having authorial power" (41). Okay. I'm not sure exactly why this is a problem. Is it that the authors want tech communicators to take agency over their work and therefore be accountable for what they produce, or is the argument here that tech communicators aren't given their due? It seems like it's the latter, but I don't know why this is relevant to a tech writing class. Can someone help me on this one?! It's very likely that I'm missing a point.
Slack et al, go on to argue that they "...would advance the re-articulation of technical communicators...as having authorial power" (41). Okay. I'm not sure exactly why this is a problem. Is it that the authors want tech communicators to take agency over their work and therefore be accountable for what they produce, or is the argument here that tech communicators aren't given their due? It seems like it's the latter, but I don't know why this is relevant to a tech writing class. Can someone help me on this one?! It's very likely that I'm missing a point.
So, how this relates to my rant is that I think the goal of teaching tech writing is to increase the rhetorical effectiveness of the writer; to be able to communicate rhetorically in the ways that a business audience will appreciate, and that can lead to change. But articles like this one seem to have the goal of trying to make the comp field even bigger (too much paperwork), rather than getting to the root of the problem. In other words, creating more problems before solving the first set of issues.
I'm not suggesting that issues of social import aren't relevant to a tech writing course, but what I'm wondering here is-what needs to come first? Before we consider issues like this shouldn't we be more focused on what we're doing in the classroom to prepare students to become effective rhetors, even if they don't think of themselves in that way? And it seems that it would lend itself to the issues that these authors raise when they say, "In a sense, technical communicators need to be shaken from the somnambulistic faith that their work is ethically neutral" (43). That's a heck of a sweeping statement to make! As if they don't already have the knowledge that it isn't ethically neutral and are able to control it. That's where the rhetorical effectiveness comes into play.
The Dilger piece I felt met its goal of the implications of extreme usability. It was bringing the argument back to what the Johnson book had posited, only now the issue has changed from ignoring the user to now ignoring the user under the pretense of being "user-friendly." For example, Dilger gives a list of things that should be included in web-based text, like "paragraphs should contain one idea, using topic sentences and simple sentence structure" (53), all in the name of making the web text "user-friendly." The problem with this way of writing is that it would work for some businesses, but not all.
Moses and Katz's article was interesting to me on a personal level (i.e. it made me think about email and how it was designed with business in mind, and the ways in which the professional world is insidiously taking over the private sphere), but again I wonder, how would one teach this to students? I don't know, maybe social justice issues don't have much of a place within tech and professional writing classes. I can't imagine trying to get a group of students who already look with suspicious eyes on the humanities and try and get them to care about the social, ethical, and economic issues that surround the corporate culture. And even if I did get through, they'd be mighty disappointed once getting into the professional world, set on making changes, only to realize that businesses don't want you to try and change them.
My blog this week may seem really disjointed, and I guess that's because I'm trying to figure this all out. And the more I read, the less I know. Ha!
I'm not suggesting that issues of social import aren't relevant to a tech writing course, but what I'm wondering here is-what needs to come first? Before we consider issues like this shouldn't we be more focused on what we're doing in the classroom to prepare students to become effective rhetors, even if they don't think of themselves in that way? And it seems that it would lend itself to the issues that these authors raise when they say, "In a sense, technical communicators need to be shaken from the somnambulistic faith that their work is ethically neutral" (43). That's a heck of a sweeping statement to make! As if they don't already have the knowledge that it isn't ethically neutral and are able to control it. That's where the rhetorical effectiveness comes into play.
The Dilger piece I felt met its goal of the implications of extreme usability. It was bringing the argument back to what the Johnson book had posited, only now the issue has changed from ignoring the user to now ignoring the user under the pretense of being "user-friendly." For example, Dilger gives a list of things that should be included in web-based text, like "paragraphs should contain one idea, using topic sentences and simple sentence structure" (53), all in the name of making the web text "user-friendly." The problem with this way of writing is that it would work for some businesses, but not all.
Moses and Katz's article was interesting to me on a personal level (i.e. it made me think about email and how it was designed with business in mind, and the ways in which the professional world is insidiously taking over the private sphere), but again I wonder, how would one teach this to students? I don't know, maybe social justice issues don't have much of a place within tech and professional writing classes. I can't imagine trying to get a group of students who already look with suspicious eyes on the humanities and try and get them to care about the social, ethical, and economic issues that surround the corporate culture. And even if I did get through, they'd be mighty disappointed once getting into the professional world, set on making changes, only to realize that businesses don't want you to try and change them.
My blog this week may seem really disjointed, and I guess that's because I'm trying to figure this all out. And the more I read, the less I know. Ha!
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