Leah’s Dinner Party

Attached is my drawn map of my "dinner party". At each table is a different theme with different authors sitting at those tables, representing their works I read covering the theme.

Image explanation: It may be hard to see, but table one where the black arrow says I first started exploring is themed "What is professional communication?" There sits our first few readings from the class-- the "Visualize a triangle" reading, R. C. Selfe, Porter, and Slack. Next I went to a table labelled "The tech. in technical communication" where I categorized Longo's piece. From there I hopped over to a table labelled "different genre technical writing" where I read a lot of my earlier chosen articles to summarize. Here I include authors covering the genres of video games and prescription medicine. One of the video game authors said similar things to Longo, so I had him hopping back and forth between the tables, or themes. Further, any articles that referred to each other I kept near each other and any articles discussing similar topics I noted with a talk-bubble. After this, arrow number 4 shows that I hop back to Longo's table, realizing I wanted to focus more on the technology in technical communication rather than genres. The last arrow shows that I then moved around to a new table with my most recent readings: Technology in professional and technical writing in the classrooms and pedagogy. From here I wish to explore this topic more from the perspective of a student and a learner rather than of a professor or teacher.

As you can see from my following notes on my most recent thoughts on my essay topic, I am having a hard time making it a singular specific topic that relates to my own professional experiences, so any ideas, comments, or criticisms help!

Essay idea: I dislike the lack of consistent use of technology in the classroom and fear this push of technology in the field, for better or worse, so I am learning the "better or the worst part" of this situation or “if I am facing the thing I fear most (technology), what is it?”

• • Taking it on from the angle of being a student or audience perspective
    • Mainly utilizing expectations and what the audience needs, maybe related to students (I need to find more articles to tie this into the piece but it is a main point for it, but this is what I wish to explore more)

The topics to possibly discuss within my major essay idea (GOAL-from the perspective of the audience or a student): 

• Is it efficient and helpful in the classroom? Maybe no when it comes to grades but yes when it comes to going above and beyond in developing and showing personal skills.
• How is digital culture is intertwined with the field? (based on readings it seems most information is relevant to how tech can be helped in the classroom)
  • Since it is always intertwined, this could be problematic (noted from brainstorm with the professor)
    • Maybe we are jumping to it in order to create knowledge when we don’t have??
    •          Especially due to generational differences between professors and students now with their mindsets on technology
    • Technology always changes rapidly!!!

Sources to be used so far:

• Chapter 4: “Visualize a Triangle” What’s Professional about Professional Communication?

  “A robust democracy, according to Krause, requires a productive  tension among the three domains as each sector holds the other two within productive boundaries. Krause uses a triangle metaphor here, with each sector sustaining, restricting, and defining the other two,” (Faber 120)… “Instead, professional communication could be seen as the enactment of crucial checks and balances at particular, necessary, and strategic moments,” (Faber 121).

• R&C Selfe: What Are the Boundaries, Artifacts, and Identities of Technical Communication?

  “…Text clouds as a way of mapping technical communication and of describing the boundaries, artifacts, and identities that constitute the field, (Selfe R. & Selfe C .19)

• Porter; Solving Problems In Technical Communication“…rhetoric theory, significantly informs the practice of technical communication,” (Porter 127).

• Slack, Miller, Doak; The Technical Communicator as Author—Meaning, Power, Authority“The discourses created by technical communicators have not been considered authored discourses; the technical communicator may be a transmitter of messages or a translator of meanings, but he or she is not—or at least not until now—considered an author,” (Slack et al. 13).

• Longo; Human + Machine Culture; where we work“When I work at my computer, I may feel that my primary relationship is between myself and my machine. But whether I am writing an article, visiting an immersive world, or writing on a friend’s wall in Facebook, I have a sense that other people lurk behind my screen—and I want a relationship with those other people, even if it is mediated by the machine that is a physical manifestation of the virtual relationship…Community formation relies on acts of inclusion and exclusion. As technical communicators and information designers, we rely on our understanding of audience, community, and culture to guide our decisions about what to include in, and what to exclude from the documents and other media we develop. Our implicit assumptions about communities and cultures within which we work shape our notions of what is (in)appropriate and what is (in)effective in our communications.” (Longo 147).

• SPECIAL ISSUE: Games in Technical Communication

  Robinson, Look Before You Lead: Seeing Virtual Teams Through the Lens of Games“Therefore, I consider the question: Are leadership theories derived from face-to-face leadership situations applicable in virtual contexts such as in MMO games?... In the following study, I identify and analyze the leader roles used during teaming in a MMO to see if they align with results expected in traditional leadership theory. Although quantifying leadership roles in a particular setting is not new, researchers have yet to examine whether a specific theory operationalizes similarly in virtual environments.”

• Jablonski & Nagelhout, “Assessing Professional Writing Programs Using Technology as a Site of Praxis” from the book Assessment in Technical and Professional Communication

  “students need accesses to cutting-edge writing technologies and multiple spaces for interaction. Robert Kramer and Stephen Bernhardt’s (1999) report on Glyph, a Web-based instruction environment at New Mexico State, showed how moving instruction to online spaces facilitates the development of rhetorical, visual, and ‘multi-tasking’ (i.e., computer) literacy, A web-based professional writing curriculum would provide assessable modes of instruction and resources that help guide students more effectively and provide them with the kinds of experiences necessary to participate in an information-rich society.” (Jablonski & Nagelhout 173).

• Selber, et. al: Professional Development in the Age of Electronic Writing and Communication

  “In classroom setting where the functions and features of technical communication are represented in narrow terms – by outmoded textbooks, underprepared teachers, or both - computer technologies are often treated naively: they support, but do not centrally influence, writing and communication practices.” (Selber, et. al 581).

• Jenson & Morrison, Textbooks Versus Technology: Teaching Professional Writing to the Next Generation of Technical Communicators

• “In higher education classrooms everywhere, instructors at all ranks and levels have been pressured to incorporate technology-enhanced methods into their teaching. This is certainly true for those teaching courses designed to prepare students seeking professional positions in technical or scientific fields. Despite this pressure, relatively few have added a truly meaningful technological component to their courses… many remain skeptical that cost, both financially and personally, is worth the effort when little evidence exists to prove technology-enhanced methods produce desired results and better than the tried and true.” (Jenson & Morrison 234).