This article explores narrative theory and research in fields closely allied with professional communication to clarify the value of narrative to our discipline. It addresses the move in many fields to reconceptualize research as narrative. Placing narrative within a postmodernist frame, it examines the centrality of ethnography within a postmodernist view. The importance of ethnography in research is related to two key narrative questions that ethnographic theorists in other disciplines are addressing: Who is telling the ethnographic story? For what purposes is the story told? This article supports the importance of taking a critical stance toward these questions and discusses the implications of postmodernist ethnographic theory for research in professional communication.

Scholars in professional communication have called for a reexamination of pedagogy, asking that it instruct students not simply in the forms of workplace discourse but also in the connections between that discourse and socially responsible communicative action. This article posits that narrative can provide a basis for a pedagogy of social action—for a pedagogy, that is, that enables students to understand the workings of power and cultural reproduction in professional settings and that fosters reflection, critique, and dialogue. The article first reviews narrative theory supporting this claim, then discusses ways that teachers can use narrative to help students critique examples of professional discourse and their own composing choices. The article closes by discussing both the concerns about and the possibilities for such a pedagogy.

This article claims that the debate over research in professional communication is grounded in ideology. The article discusses the ideologies of two research perspectives: a functionalist perspective, common in much social scientific research, and a critical interpretive perspective, currently emerging in disciplines other than our own. The article sets recent discussions of research in professional communication within a functionalist framework, then posits that a critical interpretive ideology provides an alternative. The interests advanced by both perspectives are discussed, and the viability of critical interpretive research in professional communication is supported.

The Construction of Negotiated Meaning. A Social Cognitive Theory of Writing. Linda Flower. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1994. 334 pp. Theory and Practice in the Teaching of Writing: Rethinking the Discipline. Lee Odell, ed. Carbondale: Southern Illinois UP, 1993. 329 pp. Audience and Rhetoric: An Archaeological Composition of the Discourse Community. James A. Porter. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1992. 185 pp. Approaches to Computer Writing Classrooms: Learning from Practical Experience. Ed. Linda Myers. Albany: State U of New York P, 1993. 225 pp. The Digital Word: Text‐Based Computing in the Humanities. Ed. George P. Landow and Paul Delany. Cambridge: MIT P, 1993. 362 pp. Electronic Quills: A Situated Evaluation of Using Computers for Writing in Classrooms. Bertram C. Bruce and Andee Rubin. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1993. 232 pp. The Tech Writing Game. Janet Van Wicklen. New York: Facts on File, 1992. Marketing Yourself with Technical Writing: A Guide for Today's Professionals. William M. Vatavuk. Boca Raton, FL: Lewis Publishers, 1992. Technical Writer's Freelancing Guide. Peter Kent. New York: Sterling Publishing Co., 1992. 160 pp.

This essay uses Jürgen Habermas' theory of communicative action to explore the issue of empowerment. The essay first describes a communicative situation now common in public life, where scientific and technological forces are arrayed against citizenry over concerns with public import. Next, the essay discusses Habermas' critique of communicative practices and his vision of the way in which the technocratic consciousness has usurped communicative action in social life. Third, the essay applies Habermas' theory to the situation previously described, supporting the claim that in such situations empowerment may remain only a communicative ideal.

As teachers integrate social theory into the technical communication classroom, it is clear that they interpret the connection between writing and culture in different ways. The result is a range of socially based pedagogies rather than a single paradigm for writing instruction. This essay describes four of these social pedagogies—the social constructionist, the ideologic, the social cognitive, and the paralogic hermeneutic—distinguishing them by their pedagogic aims and classroom practices. The essay closes by discussing the implications of the differences among socially based pedagogies for both _ teachers and programs in technical communication.

Business and technical communication have conventionally been separated in academe—a separation that formalist rhetorical theory has supported. Epistemic rhetorical theory, however, suggests that this separation does not reflect the profession's current understanding of workplace discourse. This article demonstrates that the labels business and technical communication are not helpful in understanding two workplace documents: a memorandum and a report. The article then explores the increased explanatory power in two epistemic theoretical approaches, social construction and paralogic hermeneutics, after which the article discusses the radical implications of these approaches for a curricular dialogue concerning workplace writing. Finally, the article describes interests inside and outside academe that preserve the status quo and thus mitigate against curricular change, positing that such change would be difficult, but not impossible, to achieve.

Public relations writing has been neglected as a research topic in professional communication. This article uses rhetorical theory from a number of fields to examine a topic of recent concern—shared, or negotiated, meaning—in relation to two very different samples of public relations writing: the public relations texts produced by political-advocacy organizations involved in the midwestern farm crisis of the 1980s and an entry from an organizational newsletter. More specifically, the article studies the role of four rhetorical elements—exophoric and intertextual references, metaphors, and narratives—in generating a shared meaning. In doing so, the article develops the thesis that narratives were particularly important to this public relations writing because they provided a comprehensive, compelling framework for belief and thus contributed greatly to the shared meaning created by writers and readers.

Although narration has been recognized as a complex mode of discourse, its role in professional communication has not been widely studied. This article examines narration in one form of professional communication—direct solicitations— and links narration to an important research issue: the social construction of knowledge, or the social justification of belief, through language. The direct solicitations are described, and the role of narration in justifying belief socially, for direct solicitations, is then discussed by examining narration and analysis as two means for organizing and expressing experience. The interweaving of these two means in direct solicitations is illustrated, but finally the importance of the narrational over the analytic in giving shape and significance to experience is asserted. Thus, the central role narratives play in justifying belief socially, for direct solicitations is described. Three sample narratives from three direct _ solicitations illustrate this discussion.

Reading theory is important because meaning is not located solely in texts, but instead results from an interaction between reader and text. Although guidelines for developing such consensual meaning have been derived for the informational level of communications, the arguments underlying this level are not well understood. Reading theory offers insights on this issue. Background is given on reading theory and on guidelines that have already been formulated. The inability of current guidelines to account for the reader impact of one type of persuasive business communication is demonstrated. Three aspects of reading—inferring, reasoning analogically, and learning—are discussed, and their role in building consensual meaning, for persuasive business communications, is demonstrated in sample texts. Four guidelines are proposed for persuasive business communications, to supplement those guidelines already developed.

Research on newsletters, a major form of organizational communication, has largely been practical rather than theoretical. Certain theories, such as those in organizational theory and mass communication, can be applied to newsletters as forms of organizational communication and as media. Rhetorical theory, however, has not been used to understand how newsletter writing achieves its effects. This study applies rhetorical theory to newsletters produced by two political-activist organizations. The newsletters and the organizations are described, as background for the study. Three aspects of rhetorical theory (schema theory, social construction, and theories about audience) are presented, and their application to the newsletters is illustrated with sample passages. An agenda is suggested for further research on rhetorical theory and newsletter writing.

A review of the current literature suggests that the concept of purpose has not received sufficient theoretical or pedagogical attention. In this article, theoretical depth is provided by a discussion of four components of purpose: purpose as associated with discourse types, purpose from the writer's viewpoint, purpose as it relates to situation, and purpose from the reader's viewpoint. Research is cited, and examples from computer documentation are used to illustrate each component. Cooperation and conflict among components are examined in a sample document, and classroom applications are discussed.