Francis J. Sullivan, Susan Wells, On Constructing Enduring Works: Contingency and Absolutism in the Discourse of Student Needs, College Composition and Communication, Vol. 51, No. 3 (Feb., 2000), pp. 469-472

Preview this article: Responses to "After Wyoming: Labor Practices in Two University Writing Programs, Page 1 of 1 < Previous page | Next page > /docserver/preview/fulltext/ccc/51/3/collegecompositionandcommunication1389-1.gif

Francis J. Sullivan, Arabella Lyon, Dennis Lebofsky, Susan Wells, Eli Goldblatt, The Reform of Service, the Service of Reform, College Composition and Communication, Vol. 49, No. 2 (May, 1998), pp. 264-266

Preview this article: Student Needs and Strong Composition: The Dialectics of Writing Program Reform, Page 1 of 1 < Previous page | Next page > /docserver/preview/fulltext/ccc/48/3/collegecompositionandcommunication3155-1.gif

Emerging from the development of a workplace literacy program for entry-level tax examiners, this case study examines ways in which conflicts between management and workers over the division of labor are textually enacted in the two kinds of manuals that govern the work of tax examiners in an IRS Service Center. The first kind of manual, called an IRM, is the official government manual operationalizing the procedures for interpreting tax law and IRS regulations. The second, called a Desk Reference, is intended as an unofficial “translation” of the former. Closer analysis, using a critical application of systemic linguistics, reveals that systematic differences between the two manuals project contradictory views of the tax examiners' work. Consequently, tax examiners are put into the impossible position of attempting to be the compliant subjects of two opposing discourses.