Relations of Writing, Publishing, and Technologies

One of my research interests is how we are changing the way we write because of our use of new technologies. Usually people agree and say, “Yes, we must be changing our writing.” But I struggle with studying, observing, and articulating how it is changing.

My master’s project developed out of a quarter-long study in my first-year Writing & Rhetoric class. I developed and taught a Twitter-themed course as a way to see how students were writing in that online space. I was inspired by the research being done by other scholars that I heard about at conferences which involved Facebook and texting in the classroom. What I would argue after this study is that the kind of “play” with language that happens on Twitter is actually semi-sophisticated rhetorical decision making. Whether users realize it or not doesn’t matter as much to me—just because they cannot articulate why they make writing choices doesn’t mean they don’t know how to make writing choices.

This is the kind of research that fascinates me. However, I worry that the overwhelming conversation about technology and its effects is causing me to withdraw my curiosity. More and more I wonder how to approach writing in online spaces if I don’t narrow my focus. And then, what good does it bring to a conversation that is, like I said before, already overwhelming?

I do think that most computer technologies require writing and reading of some sort. Writing and technologies are intertwined, and some researchers and scholars already have attempted to explain how users know how to write in these spaces. (Our readings from this week fit into this: Crystal in Txtng and indicated by the various research on CACD referred to by Warschauer.) But as fast as technology changes, I wonder if we can ever fully understand how we adapt just as quickly.

The aforementioned master’s project took the form of a webtext. I wanted to reach a broader audience, so I wrote my findings in two ways: like a scholarly research article and like a blog. Thus, the website I created allowed both for a formal (linear) reading and for a dialogical reading of the text where the two voices could mix depending on a reader’s navigation. My project needs work, including a lot of design work. But that’s not the reason I stopped thinking about publishing it. 

Very often (maybe twice?) have I been assigned a webtext to read for class, like something found on Kairos. And when we did discuss these in class, there was much grumbling about what the text couldn’t do or didn’t do and why we couldn’t really talk about it in the same way as print texts because it was hard to reference and return to certain points. So why would I want to publish a text this way if it’s not valued by those in my field or those in English departments?

That last bit is meant to be controversial. But it is certainly an argument that I would make judging by the amount of print texts we read in classes and because other scholars seem to recognize it too. Collin Brooke in the first chapter of Lingua Fracta discusses an email-exchange-turned-article that appeared in Kairos in 1999. Brooke mentions there has been a movement to include technological work as the kind of publications needed for tenure or promotions. But he ultimately argues that this article “is not really the kind of work that is recognized by our institutions” (4). This presents a problem for both teachers and grad students. Would a webtext I authored hold as much value as a print publication on my CV?

Cynthia Selfe in “The Movement of Air, the Breath of Meaning: Aurality and Multimodal Composing,” references her use of a print journal to publish: "The irony of making an argument about aurality in print is not lost on me, nor, I suspect, will it be on most other readers of this article. Indeed, it is very much the point of what I try to say in the following pages" (619). When we talked about this article in class, a student was really irked about this irony. But I kept trying to get across that maybe an argument for change isn’t effective unless you address your audience in the old, comfortable way. And I guarantee more comp/rhet scholars and teachers read CCC than Kairos.

Even if I wanted to add a video or audio component to a text it’d be complicated. Selfe invites readers to look at links she includes with her piece, but how many readers make that effort? (I would! Academic rigor!) Or I could consider an online journal to publish my work, but it might not be taken as seriously. A professor once told me, “Computers andComposition Online is a good place for grad students to try to publish.” True or not, that statement assures me that there are various values and levels of prestige that come with choices made for publications.

So my argument here is obviously that our field values certain things, and when we write to publish, we have to decide whether or not to adopt these values. While some voices seem to be effectively suggesting change with this idea, it is a slow process that might be holding back the scholarship of our field. We can talk about technology all we want, but until we practice what we’re preaching, people in our field will remain in different camps with different values regarding our own writing with technology. 

Works Cited

Brooke, Collin Gifford. Lingua Fracta: Towards a Rhetoric of New Media. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton, 2009. Print.

Selfe, Cynthia L. "The Movement of Air, the Breath of Meaning: Aurality and Multimodal Composing." CCC 60.4 (2009): 616-63. Print.