Writing on the Computer: Craft or Knack

1
Writing on the Computer Craft or Knack?

• Shaun Slattery
• Department of EnglishDePaul University

http//condor.depaul.edu/sslatte1/ http//textual
coordination.blogspot.com/ sslatte1_at_depaul.eduAIM
slattsrpi
2
Craft? Knack?

• Rhetorical concept of techne (art or craft)
• Craft
• the knowledge necessary for producing
  preconceived results by conscious, directed
  action
• Knack
• habit acquired through repeated experience
• (Richard Young, 1980)

technique
mere habit
3
The value of craft (techne)

• It is a plan for future activity (techniques,
  strategies)
• Provides some control over chance (local
  conditions) (Gordon, 2002, p.148 )
• It is an articulateable, teachable art

4
Something in the way we teach

• Teaching of writing historically focused on
• Writing alone
• Habit-forming (some good, some bad)
• Reacting to local conditions (material rhet.)
• Idiosyncratic composing makes teamwork hard

5
Something in the way we teach

• Teaching of writing historically focused on
• Not teaching technology
• (Rightfully) Dont want classes to become tech
  training
• Rather teach only critical awareness of tech than
  constantly changing technologies
• BUT
• We often experience communication through the IT
  we use (Slattery, 2005)

6
But thats not what writing looks like

• Workplace writing is highly collaborative,
  distributed, technologically mediated
• Texts and technologies have to be coordinated and
  often used in concert
• And theres lots of them!

7
But thats not what writing looks like

• Tech Writer Dirk 1h 40min, 20 docs, 15 programs

8
What Dirk is up to

• Textual Coordination the coordinated use of
  texts and technologies, a mode of composing

9
Beholden to local conditions doubleplus ungood
10
Weve only just begun

• To develop ways to study mediated writing
• To identify techniques of writing in digital
  environments (a related presentation)
• (DeVoss McKee, forthcoming Geisler, 2001
  Geisler Slattery, forthcoming Hart-Davidson,
  2003 Slattery, 2005 Spinuzzi, 2003 Spinuzzi,
  Hart-Davidson, Zachry, 2004)
• But we know enough to start changing our pedagogy

11
Suggestions

• Reveal your own composing processes

12
Suggestions

• Consider showing students how to
• Locate sources
• Manage information
• Annotate for later use
• Incorporate sources into target documents
• Use various information technologies
• Write collaboratively
• Consider including student-led technology
  workshops (an excellent student presentation
  task!)

13
Suggestions

• Use the computer classroom as a place to
• share strategies and teach one another techniques
  by using technology together
• allow occasional eXtreme writing (have students
  co-author on one computer, concept borrowed from
  eXtreme programming)

14
Foster Craft
15
My questions for the group

• How do we balance teaching writing as both a
  rhetorical act and a mediated process? (And how
  can we highlight the interplay between these
  aspects of writing?)
• How do we keep our classes from becoming mere
  technology training?
• How can we best identify and teach techniques of
  mediated writing?
• What do you do along these lines in your classes?

16
Works Cited

• DeVoss, D. H. McKee, eds. (forthcoming).
  Digital writing research Technologies,
  methodologies, and ethical issues. Cresskill, NJ
  Hampton Press.
• Geisler, C. (2001). Textual objects Accounting
  for the role of texts in the everyday life of
  complex organizations. Written Communication, 18,
  296-325.
• Geisler, C. S. Slattery. (forthcoming).
  Capturing the activity of digital writing Using,
  analyzing, and supplementing video screen
  capture. In Digital Writing Research
  Technologies, Methodologies, and Ethical Issues.
  Eds. Dànielle DeVoss Heidi McKee. Cresskill,
  NJ Hampton Press.
• Gordon, Jay. (2002). Techne and Technical
  Communication Toward a Dialogue. Technical
  Communication Quarterly 11.2 13147.
• Hart-Davidson, W. (2003). Seeing the project
  Mapping patterns of intra-team communication
  events. Proceedings of ACM SIGDOC New York ACM.
• Slattery, S. (2005). Understanding technical
  writing as textual coordination. Technical
  Communication 52.3.
• Spinuzzi, C. (2003). Tracing genres through
  organizations. Cambridge MIT Press.
• Spinuzzi, C., Hart-Davidson, W., Zachry, M.
  (2004). Modeling Knowledge Work. Computer Writing
  Research Lab Whitepaper 040505-1.
  http//www.cwrl.utexas.edu/research/whitepapers/20
  04/040505-1.pdf
• Young, R. (1980). Arts, crafts, gifts and knacks
  Some disharmonies in the new rhetoric.
  Reinventing the new rhetoric. Eds., A. Freedman
  I. Pringle. Ottawa Canadian Council of Teachers
  of English, 53-60.

17
Im just a click away

• Shaun Slattery
• Department of EnglishDePaul University
• sslatte1_at_depaul.edu
• http//condor.depaul.edu/sslatte1/
• http//textualcoordination.blogspot.com/
• AIM slattsrpi