Editors' Introduction to Volume 9 Issue 2

Editors' Introduction to Volume 9 Issue 1

Editors' Introduction to Volume 8 issue 4

Through qualitative interviews with seven professional and technical writers (PTWs) who majored in literature or creative writing, this study examines how students' emotions and beliefs about English as literary brought them to major in English but also limited their confidence in pursuing writing careers. Findings suggest that PTW concentrations in traditional English departments must account for their majors' affinity for the literary while also providing sufficient coursework that helps them understand how English actually leads to specific writing careers.

Abstract Recently, scholars have suggested that reading narratives helps develop students’ phronesis (the Greek term for wise judgment and decision-making skills), which is crucial for efforts to understand today's major political, environmental, and transnational contexts. Although much of this research has centered on the usefulness of reading narratives in developing good judgment in complex and ambiguous settings, the author contends that writing narratives similarly cultivates wise judgment and decision-making skills precisely because, as the author argues here, narratives themselves are ambiguous and complex. Borrowing from Horst W. J. Rittel and Melvin M. Webber's concept of wicked problems, the author terms the type of narratives that students produce in community-engaged settings as wicked stories, or wicked storywork, in that students confront uncertainty, contradiction, and failure in their attempt to tame multiple perspectives on an issue and impose their own authority. The author argues that working with wicked stories can increase students’ discernment and judgement, particularly in the writing situations that they will encounter beyond the confines of the classroom.

Editors' Introduction to Rhetoric of Health and Medicine 8-1.

This article combines historical research with demographic analysis and neoliberal/rhetorical critique to put forth the concept of slow civic violence—indirect injuries on civic process, particularly within marginalized communities. The author ties the United States Postal Service's (USPS) rationale for removing mail sorting machines during the 2020 election year to systemic moves that damage democratic participation. The author conducts an empirical analysis of where the USPS mail sorting machines were removed to show how neoliberal arguments in favor of cost cutting make voting by mail a more precarious and uncertain act primarily for those who reside in communities of color.

Technical communication research has relied heavily on participatory, user-focused strategies as well as “participative”, posthuman frameworks. Both research methodologies have various strengths, yet also have been critiqued for underplaying the role of human and non-human agency (respectively) in rhetorical situations. Through an analysis of an urban planning comic book, I suggest that turning to the Greek concept of methexis – or “participation” – may help technical communication researchers bridge posthuman and user-centered investigative approaches.

This pilot study of a mental health call center clinician’s workplace tools, processes, and organizational structures proposes a preliminary theory of “distributed and mediated ethos.” A distributed and mediated ethos refers to how an organization uses various resources—artifacts, technologies, and processes—situated across dis¬parate locations in order to expand and control their identity in the service of extend¬ing their reach and capacity to render essential services. An analysis of a participant clinician’s rhetorical context flowcharts and network pictures shows how an agency’s ethos is mediated through various technologies. Findings suggest that a distributed ethos (1) projects the impression of being “always there”; (2) relies on dexterity across several human and nonhuman actors; and (3) necessitates targeted tasks from branches that extend ethos farther from the organization. This pilot study, thus, provides researchers of rhetoric of health and medicine (RHM) with a new tool for exploring the intricate and complex nature of health at a distance and other complicated 21st century healthcare delivery formats.

Oral presentations are a common genre in technical and business communication courses. While it is important for students to develop a professional ethos when presenting information, in this article I argue that textbooks’ discussion of professional dress and voice privilege cisgendered bodies and erase the differences and bodily experiences that transgendered individuals face. This may cause dissonance in trans students who may come to believe that they must choose between their genders and being professional.

This article discusses the advantages of asking students to consider issues of access and disability as they map campus spaces. Putting place-based and mapping pedagogy in conversation with scholarship on disability, I propose that having students learn to better account for different uses of space can help them consider the ideologies that shape spaces.

Design has come to be understood as an essential aspect of the work that technical communicators claim. As a result, research in the field of technical communication has approached studies of design in numerous ways. This article showcases how technical communication researchers assume the roles of observers, testers, critics, creators, and consultants in their handling of design artifacts. Such a model regarding these roles may help us to better understand the design relationships researchers presume as they further knowledge of design within our field. This article offers a framework to leverage into a comprehensive and integrated model for explaining our work on design to others outside of technical communication.