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Nestwork: New Material Rhetorics for Precarious Species Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2024-01-29 Alexandra Gunnells
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Ahead of Print, 2024)
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A Stasis Network Methodology to Reckon with the Rhetorical Process of Data: How a Data Team Qualified Meaning and Practices Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2024-01-16 Chris A. Lindgren
Prior scholarship argues that facts derived from data are not separate from their contexts and values. In this study of a data journalism team, I define and apply a sociotechnical network approach ...
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Please Provide the Following Information: Enthymemes and the Logics of Individual Responsibility in the Patient Medical History Form Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-12-29 Kelly A. Whitney
Despite the overwhelming evidence that health and risk are multifactorial, medical texts that interface with publics continue to circulate logics of individual responsibility of health. This articl...
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Vaccine Rhetorics Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-12-26 Raj K. Baral
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 33, No. 1, 2024)
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Decolonizing mHealth Technology for User Empowerment and Persuasion in the Global South Healthcare Context: A Case Study Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-12-22 Keshab Raj Acharya
This article explores the extent to which Global North mHealth apps are designed for user empowerment and persuasion in the Global South healthcare context. Findings from a case study underscore th...
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Processes: Writing Across Academic Careers Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-12-12 Caylie Cox
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 33, No. 2, 2024)
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The Paradigm Shift to UX and the Durability of Usability in TPC Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-10-29 Emma J. Rose, Heather N. Turner
The past two decades have experienced a paradigm shift from a narrow conception of usability to a broader process of user experience. We argue that durable connections to usability remain in TPC. I...
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The Profession and Practice of Technical Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-09-13 Christopher Maggio
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 33, No. 1, 2024)
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’F---- Shark Tank:’ Rethinking the Centrality of the Business Pitch in Microenterprise Entrepreneurship Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-08-21 Mason T. Pellegrini
ABSTRACT This project investigates how the goals of microenterprise entrepreneurs affect their use of communication genres. Although slide-based business pitches are key for traditional entrepreneurs, microenterprise entrepreneurs have little interest in investment. Therefore, acquiring customers through short elevator pitches takes this central position. This article also explores the social justice
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“I Feel Like I’m in a Box”: Contrasting Virtual Reality “Imaginaries” in the Context of Academic Innovation Labs Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-08-10 Brent Lucia, Matthew A. Vetter, David A. Solberg
ABSTRACT As immersive technology grows in popularity, universities are developing academic innovation labs (AIL) that often introduce students to virtual reality (VR) and other emerging cross reality applications. Although these labs help educate students on emerging technology, a more critical eye is needed to examine user experience (UX). This article reports on a qualitative, multimethod study that
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Social Justice and “Harmful Tech”: Dis-Orienting Militarized Research Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-08-08 Calvin Pollak, Sanvi Bhardwaj
ABSTRACT This study examines technological research in higher education as a social justice issue. Focusing on technologies developed for war, surveillance, and policing at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), we compare institutional and activist discourses about these projects, uncovering significant differences in accommodation strategies and values-based arguments. We conclude that locally situated
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A Role for Community-Engaged Technical Communicators in Interpretive Planning Processes Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-07-27 Lauren E. Cagle
ABSTRACT Non-formal learning institutions use interpretive plans to create effective interpretation (mission-based communications) for their visitors. This article argues that interpretive planning offers professional and technical communicators great potential for engaging with communities. Following an introduction to the field of interpretation and interpretive planning, I explain how interpretive
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Editors’ Use of Comprehensive Style Guides: The Case of Singular They Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-07-26 Jo Mackiewicz, Shaya Kraut, Allison Durazzi
ABSTRACT We asked 15 editors about their perceptions of five sentences using singular they in different contexts and about the style guides that inform their work. Editors appreciated the inclusivity of indefinite and definite singular they and recognized APA for its leading-edge stance. Our findings indicate the need for editors to develop a heuristic for determining when to deviate from style guide
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A Dangerous, Costly Neighborhood: A Critique of Blight and Obsolescence Claims in Local Media Coverage of a Planning Project Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-07-16 Timothy J. Elliott
This article examines how local newspaper stories in a college town created a dominant cultural narrative about an urban redevelopment project using tropes of physical blight and financial obsolesc...
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Cannabis Risk Communication: A Scoping Review with a Research Agenda Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-06-29 Michael J. Madson
Government leaders have called for messaging and prevention programs that target cannabis, which, in recent years, has been viewed more favorably in the public eye. In these efforts, technical comm...
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Navigating Genres in Interdisciplinary Life Sciences Doctoral Programs Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-06-27 Sara Doody
This article explores how doctoral writers in interdisciplinary life sciences programs navigate genre-ing activities across multiple disciplines. In interdisciplinary environments, approaches to do...
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The CCCC Outstanding Dissertation Award in Technical Communication, 2004–2022: Doctoral Research Topics, Methods, and Implications for the Field Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-06-24 Jason Tham
This study extends the retrospective analysis of entries for the CCCC Outstanding Dissertation Award in Technical Communication (1999–2003) by Stuart Selber in 2004, focusing on the subsequent two ...
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“Dainty, Sparkling, Delicious”: Jell-O Constructions of White Femininity Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-06-02 Abby M. Dubisar
Joining the growing scholarly conversation on food rhetorics and technical and professional communication (TPC), this rhetorical analysis addresses two themes that arise in a Jell-O booklet (circa ...
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Toward Rhetorically Infused Methods for Relational Network Modeling: The Visualization of Agency in Seismic Risk Visuals Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-27 Danielle DeVasto
This article presents a pilot study in agentive modeling, a mixed-methods approach for visualizing networked models of agency. The study assesses technical and public seismic risk visuals from the ...
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Critical Approaches to Climate Justice, Technology, and Technical Communication Special Issue Introduction Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-17 Sarah Beth Hopton, Prashant Rajan
ABSTRACT This special issue amplifies the contributions of technical communicators working on climate justice initiatives across the Majority World. By Majority World, we refer not to a specific geography but to the conditions in which most of humanity lives: lacking economic, social, and/or political agency, and absent adequate institutional access to critical infrastructures. The articles in this
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Expanding the Scope and Scale of Risk in TPC: Water Access and the Colorado River Basin Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-12 Ehren Helmut Pflugfelder, Timothy R. Amidon, Donnie Johnson Sackey, Daniel P. Richards
ABSTRACT Building from a recent history of how technical and professional communication has addressed risk, we argue that the spatial and temporal frames through which the field has encountered risk must be confronted in working toward climate justice. We offer topoi that can be deployed to trace these interconnections and apply them to The Law of the River in the Colorado River Basin to illustrate
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Infrastructural Storytelling: A Methodological Approach for Narrating Environmental (In)justice in Technical and Professional Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-10 Dustin W. Edwards, Bridget Gelms, Rich Shivener
ABSTRACT This article offers infrastructural storytelling as a methodological approach attuned to the emplaced dynamics of digital infrastructure. Countering the clean progress narratives of sustainability reports in the technology sector, this approach follows digital infrastructure to two locations: San Francisco, California (Google) and Toronto, Ontario (Digital Realty). Infrastructural storytelling
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A Communicational Disconnect: Establishing Superordinate Identities in Climate Communication Through Transgenerational Responsibility Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-09 Julia Aylin Lehnert, Sara Doody, Justin Steinburg, Ashley Rose Mehlenbacher
ABSTRACT This paper explores opportunities for intergenerational communication to foster collective climate action and justice. While climate change communication can be framed as a site of intergenerational conflict and blame, we consider how the concept of superordinate identities offers rhetorical possibilities for generational coalition building to ultimately facilitate joint climate action.
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Geoengineering, Persuasion, and the Climate Crisis: A Geologic Rhetoric Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-09 Alexandra Rowe
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 32, No. 3, 2023)
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Disrupting Textual Regimes of Climate Disaster Recovery Governance Through Translation Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-07 Soyeon Lee
ABSTRACT Using data sets from ethnographic research, this article examines how language minorities navigate textual regimes in disaster recovery procedures governed by bureaucratic recovery technologies. To discuss the impacts of Western climate governance regimes and alternative disaster recovery communication, this article traces rhetorical practices of transnational multilingual communities of color
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POWHR to the People: Fighting for Climate Justice and Opposing the Mountain Valley Pipeline in Appalachia Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-07 Savannah Paige Murray
ABSTRACT This case study explores the rhetorical tactics and strategies of grassroots environmental efforts to oppose the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) in Appalachia. I emphasize the use of epideictic rhetoric by POWHR in their advocacy for climate justice
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The Use and Misuse of Indigenous Science Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-05-05 Ehren Helmut Pflugfelder, Olivia Goodfriend, Carlee Baker
ABSTRACT Knowledge about the use of the term “Indigenous science” (IS) is valuable to technical and scientific communication in the larger goal of exposing colonial, appropriative legacies. Using rhetorical content analysis, we analyze 61 instances of IS in US-based news articles and find that IS is often represented as an ongoing activity, connected to food production, and related to higher education
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(Re)locating the Decision Makers in Ecotourism: Emphasizing “Place” and “Grace” in a Global Industry’s DEI Efforts Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-04-20 Wesley Mathis
ABSTRACT This article examines the role that reformed hiring practices and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives within the global industry of ecotourism may (or may not) play in bringing multiply marginalized or underrepresented (MMU) voices to the forefront of environmental risk communication and sustainability efforts worldwide. Ultimately, the article argues that ecotourism companies
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Lessons of experience: Labor habits of a long-time, contingent online technical communication instructor Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-04-07 Patrick Love
The COVID-19 pandemic made nearly every teacher and student online teachers and students in some capacity. This article presents a case study of an experienced, contingent technical and professiona...
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Reddit and Engaged Science Communication Online: An Examination of Reddit’s R/Science Ask-Me-Anythings and Science Discussion Series Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-03-30 Devon Moriarty, Ashley Rose Mehlenbacher
Studies of emergent online science communication genres continuously seek to understand novel forms of popularizations aimed at facilitating expert-with-public engagement. To understand how scienti...
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Tying Creative Problem-Solving to Social Justice Work in Technical and Professional Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-03-24 Krista Speicher Sarraf
Problem-solving is central to technical and professional communication (TPC), but problem-solving’s economic roots may not align with social justice. This article introduces socially just creativit...
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Perspectives on Usability Testing with IoT Devices in Technical Communication Courses Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-03-22 David Wright
This article offers perspectives on adopting smart home technology into usability testing for technical and professional communication (TPC) courses. Usability is a valued skill for technical commu...
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Editors’ Perceptions of Singular They Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-03-13 Jo Mackiewicz, Allison Durazzi
We surveyed 80 editors about their perceptions of singular they in five sentences. We asked editors to choose among three responses: maintain, query, or edit. We also examined whether editors’ resp...
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The Ethics of Inclusion, Exclusion, and Protection in The Green Book Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2023-03-01 Josephine Walwema, Jared S. Colton, Steve Holmes
This article explores the ethical complexity of inclusion, exclusion, and protection in TPC, drawing upon a historical technical document, The Green Book, which helped Black American travelers in t...
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Agentive assemblages in online patient spaces Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-12-28 Shanna Cameron
ABSTRACT This article engages with TPC scholarship that calls for increased attention to agency as distributed and interdependent. This study analyzes 320 postings in one online health forum to better understand how patients come together to collaborate with one another, distribute information, and make health decisions. I argue that viewing crowdsourced forums as agentive assemblages may help researchers
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The Art of Assembly: Script, Platform, Document Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-12-28 Lisa Dush
ABSTRACT Drawing on fieldwork conducted with the designers of and participants in a new fellowship program to connect globally distributed grassroots leaders, this article defines a core set of communication-design practices that support emerging collectives and projects. The three practices detailed – creating a script, building a platform, and inventing protocols to document activity – can be understood
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Deciphering Nested Literacies: A Case Study of Allosaurus Fragilis at the Smithsonian’s Deep Time Exhibit Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-11-23 Lisa M. DeTora
ABSTRACT The author proposes a model for reading material characterized by “nested” literacies to decipher complex information where literacy operates in enmeshed and unpredictable ways. A case study of a nesting Allosaurus fragilis illustrates how deciphering multiple interacting literacies can identify areas needing technical communication intervention. In this context, multiple literacies include
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Rhetoric and Guns Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-11-17 Lisa Dush
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 32, No. 4, 2023)
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Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis for Technical Communication Research Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-11-11 G. Edzordzi Agbozo
ABSTRACT I propose Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA) as an approach for understanding the discursive and material implications of technical documents in distant sites. I provide a historical vignette of MCDA and exemplify how technical and professional communication (TPC) researchers can critically engage with distant sites through MCDA by analyzing materials about GhanaPostGPS, a geolocation
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Historicizing Power and Legitimacy After the Social Justice Turn: Resisting Narcissistic Tendencies Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-11-06 Cecilia D. Shelton, Sarah Warren-Riley
ABSTRACT As a field committed to solving problems, technical and professional communication (TPC) seems well positioned to engage the challenges that come with social justice work intellectually and respond with practical solutions. In this article, the authors argue that power and legitimacy are critical terms that can propel our social justice work, if we can recast them in our disciplinary history
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Instructional Design Pedagogy in Technical and Professional Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-10-03 Jason Tham
ABSTRACT This study investigates how instructional design manifests in TPC pedagogies and where educators draw resources from. As TPC expands into areas in which instructional design traditionally governs, scholars need to discern how TPC distinguishes its specialty while providing training to support instructional design practices. Through textbook and syllabus analysis, coupled with instructor interviews
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Design Justice: Community-Led Practices to Build the Worlds We Need Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-10-01 Rachael Jordan
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 32, No. 1, 2023)
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Teaching Professional and Technical Communication: A Practicum in a Book Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-09-30 Michael J. Faris
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 32, No. 2, 2023)
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Violent Exceptions: Children’s Human Rights and Humanitarian Rhetorics Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-09-18 Lindsey L. Novak
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 32, No. 1, 2023)
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Working to Resonate: Rhetorical Mapping of Disciplinary Stances about Technology, Risk, and the Brain Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-07-26 Kathryn Lambrecht
ABSTRACT Our largest multidisciplinary problems outpace disciplinary training designed to reinforce boundaries. Using an interdisciplinary conversation about adolescent brain imaging, I argue that disciplinary stances (interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary) operate like rhetorical stases, helping diagnose where conversations build or diverge among experts. Because what constitutes interdisciplinarity
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Effective Teaching of Technical Communication: Theory, Practice, and Application Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-07-18 Jacob Buller-Young
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 31, No. 4, 2022)
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Unofficial Vaccine Advocates: Technical Communication, Localization, and Care by COVID-19 Vaccine Trial Participants Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-07-17 Kari Campeau
ABSTRACT This article reports on an interview-based study with COVID-19 vaccine trial participants (n = 40) and addresses three strategies participants used to localize vaccine communication for their communities: (1) presenting embodied evidence, (2) demystifying clinical research, (3) operationalizing relationships. These strategies contribute to understandings of embodiment, relationships, and localization
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Raveling the Brain: Toward a Transdisciplinary Neurorhetoric Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-06-21 Elizabeth Skerpan-Wheeler
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 31, No. 4, 2022)
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Global Perspectives on Intercultural Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-06-15 Meghalee Das
Published in Technical Communication Quarterly (Vol. 31, No. 4, 2022)
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Slack, Social Justice, and Online Technical Communication Pedagogy Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-06-14 Jennifer Sano-Franchini, André M. Jones Jr., Priyanka Ganguly, Chloe J. Robertson, Luana J. Shafer, Marti Wagnon, Olayemi Awotayo, Megan Bronson
ABSTRACT This Methodologies and Approaches piece interfaces conversations about social justice pedagogies in technical and professional communication (TPC), Black TPC, and online TPC instruction to discuss the social justice affordances of Slack in online instruction. Drawing on our experiences using Slack within an online graduate course during the COVID-19 pandemic, we consider how Slack supports
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“Who Am I Fighting For? Who Am I Accountable To?”: Comradeship as a Frame for Nonprofit Community Work in Technical Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-06-11 Erin Brock Carlson
ABSTRACT While entrepreneurship is a pervasive cultural concept, it is not universally applicable. Drawing on a year-long study with nonprofit workers, this piece articulates a frame for understanding technical and professional communication work within nonprofits rooted in comradeship, which privileges community needs, everyday people, listening, and solidarity across stakeholder groups. Such a frame
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Regulating Emotions for Social Action: Emotional Intelligence’s Role in TPC Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-06-11 Brandi J. Fuglsby, Saveena (Chakrika) Veeramoothoo
ABSTRACT This article describes students’ emotional intelligence (EI) development when participating in the Trans-Atlantic and Pacific Project (TAPP) in two technical and professional communication (TPC) courses. The researchers used modified grounded theory to compile the emotions used for coding students’ weekly reflections, and content analyzed how the TAPP experience affected students’ EI development
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Embodying empathy: using game design as a maker pedagogy to teach design thinking Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-06-05 Rebekah Shultz Colby
ABSTRACT This article argues that game design can be used to teach design thinking within a pedagogy of making. It analyzes qualitative survey responses from 12 writing teachers who asked students to design social justice games and argues that games not only give students practice in design thinking but that, as multimodal, embodied systems, games can enact social theories and, as such, be a way for
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Making a Case for Political Technical Communication (Pxtc) Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-05-26 Ryan Cheek
ABSTRACT In this article, I argue that the accelerated adoption of political technology during the COVID-19 pandemic evinces exigency for a rhetorically grounded framework to teach, research, and practice political technical communication (PxTC) as a sub-discipline. As a starting point, I use a rhetorical genre studies approach to identify political social actions that separate political communication
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A Technical Hair Piece: Metis, Social Justice and Technical Communication in Black Hair Care on YouTube Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-05-24 Modupe Yusuf, Veena Namboodri Schioppa
ABSTRACT This article argues that through embodied presentations and the multimodal, international and intercultural affordances of YouTube, the rhetoric of Black hair care YouTubers is tactical TPC toward social justices. We note the interactive comments section as a place for technical communicators to identify and redress issues in normative instructional discourse. This scholarship extends TPC
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Building Better Machine Learning Models for Rhetorical Analyses: The Use of Rhetorical Feature Sets for Training Artificial Neural Network Models Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-05-23 Zoltan P. Majdik, James Wynn
ABSTRACT In this paper, we investigate two approaches to building artificial neural network models to compare their effectiveness for accurately classifying rhetorical structures across multiple (non-binary) classes in small textual datasets. We find that the most accurate type of model can be designed by using a custom rhetorical feature list coupled with general-language word vector representations
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Introduction to Special Issue: Black Technical and Professional Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-05-18 Temptaous Mckoy, Cecilia D. Shelton, Donnie Johnson Sackey, Natasha N. Jones, Constance Haywood, Ja’La Wourman, Kimberly C. Harper
ABSTRACT Black Technical and Professional Communication is defined as ”practices that are centered around Black community, culture, and rhetorical practices that are inherent in the Black lived experience. Black TPC is reflective of the cultural, economic, social, and political experiences of Black people across the Diaspora” (Black TPC Taskforce). This special issue emphasizes the importance of valuing
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The Work Before: A Model for Coalitional Alliance Toward Black Futures in Technical Communication Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-05-17 Floyd Pouncil, Nick Sanders
ABSTRACT This article offers an approach to providing identity-specific routes for engagement in pro-Black futures in distributed ways. We outline a model designed for Black practitioners and non-Black practitioners in professional environments to navigate their complex relationships given the historical, cultural, and social nature of coalitional work. We demonstrate this model as a possible pathway
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Black Women Imagining and Realizing Liberated Futures Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-04-30 Jessica Edwards, Josie Walwema
ABSTRACT In the summer of 1881, a group of Black women formed The Washing Society of Atlanta by deploying extraorganizational technical communication to collectively bargain for better working conditions and wages. In this article, we illuminate the ways that Black women operated in a world dominated by an established order of racial hierarchy. We argue that the Washerwomen manifested a particular
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Handling Family Business: Technical Communication Literacies in Black Family Reunions Technical Communication Quarterly Pub Date : 2022-04-29 Laura L. Allen
ABSTRACT This article highlights technical and professional communication (TPC) as a literacy practice used to plan and sustain Black family reunions. Specifically, I examine the work of three families who create and engage with technical and business writing genres to complete internal and external reunion organizing work. I argue that the field of TPC needs more focused inquiry into research that