Review: Starring the Text: The Place of Rhetoric in Science Studies    

Given Alan G. Gross's substantial contributions to the rhetoric of science, most recently with Joseph E. Harmon and Michael Reidy (2002) in Communicating Science, I looked forward to reading Gross's latest work, Starring the Text: The Place of Rhetoric in Science Studies--until I read the preface. In the preface, Gross notes that Starring the Text is not a new con- tribution but a 'major refiguring' (p. ix) of his earlier work The Rhetoric of Science (1990). Like most readers, I am decidedly less enthusiastic about reading a revision of an older contribution than I am about reading a new contribution.

Paul, Danette. Journal of Business and Technical Communication (2008). Articles>Reviews>Rhetoric>Scientific Communication

Steps to a Successful Interview: Presentation

Give yourself a hand. Your presentation starts with your handshake. Make it firm, business-like, and brief. Your hand should be thumb up with fingers straight. The interviewer isn’t going to kiss your hand or lead you into a waltz.

O'Keefe, Karen, Rebecca Forrest and Jean Fudge. Between the Lines (2007). Careers>Interviewing>Rhetoric

Stories and Maps: Postmodernism and Professional Communication  

Communication used to be about telling stories, about listening to narratives of discovery, learning, redemption, and war. Not just little stories, but big stories: heaven, hell, utopia. Relatively recently, though, the map has started to replace the story as our fundamental way of knowing. The new emphasis on spatial rather than temporal or historical concerns goes by a number of titles -- postcapitalism, networked workplaces, nonhierarchical management -- but the most popular (and often misunderstood) is postmodernism. In this text, I sketch out some of the ways that postmodernist tendencies affect the careers and possibilities for business and technical communicators. Briefly, I see the potential for increased responsibility, prestige, and influence for business and technical communicators, but only if we are able to reconceive what we think of as the value of our work; that is, we must reposition ourselves as mapmakers rather than authors.

Johnson-Eilola, Johndan. Kairos (1995). Articles>TC>Rhetoric

Stories are the Human Experience

Usability through storytelling, the theme for the UPA 2006 conference, was examined from many angles. Presenters looked at how stories fit into our work, throughout the entire user-centered design process.

Quesenbery, Whitney. uiGarden (2006). Articles>User Experience>Rhetoric

Story Telling

Story telling has been going on for millennium; it is a wonderful way to entertain and to engage others. Stories are not direct or personal, but they convey a message that can be interpreted by other world views. Various story-telling devices, such as films, novels and plays have become part of a vast entertainment industry that often reflects cultural ideals. Religions often use a book of stories, such as the bible, to convey moral beliefs. So it is perhaps not surprising that HCI has developed forms of narrative to convey stories and messages about people's lives that it wants other world views to hear.

Jones, Rachel. uiGarden (2006). Articles>Rhetoric>User Experience

Storytelling and PR: A Novel Way of Telling Your Tale

Once upon a time, a former CBS newsman devised a new strategy for telling a company's story: classic storytelling. Robbie Vorhaus founded his own public relations firm based on this principle. He shares the story of how it works in this interview with About Public Relations.

Vorhaus, Robbie. Communication World Bulletin (2004). Articles>Communication>Public Relations>Rhetoric

Storytelling Photos

Anyone can relate the facts of an event, just like anyone can hold a camera up to a scene and document it. But bare facts and badly composed images make for poor communication. It takes skill and talent to write a good story, one that will inform and entertain. The same is true for photography. Images have always been storytellers. A good image can relay large amounts of data in a format that is pleasing and quickly absorbed by the viewer. That makes photos potentially more influential than a massive amount of words.

Salvo, Suzanne. Communication World Bulletin (2007). Articles>Graphic Design>Photography>Visual Rhetoric

Storytelling: Using Narrative to Communicate Design Ideas  

What makes a story appropriate? Convincing?

Quesenbery, Whitney. WQusability (2001). Design>Collaboration>Rhetoric

Strategies for Building Web Pages--Understanding the Roles of Culture, History, and Language in Web Page Design  

Principles of intertextuality guided an upper-level Professional Writing class at the University of Houston-Downtown when they created a World Wide Web page for a professional group in Houston. The project gave the page’s creators practical experience in approaching the text as process, accommodating readers' and writers' intermingling roles, and working with the constraints that intertextuality imposes on writers. The insights the page's creators gained can assist them as they serve as managers of their own career portfolios.

Bartholomew, Barbara G. STC Proceedings (1997). Design>Web Design>Rhetoric

The Structure of Advanced Composition  

Every advanced composition course I taught had five elements: audience, purpose, voice, organization, and polish. 'If we teachers,' I thought, 'can visualize advanced composition as a structure with five components we should be able to teach any upper level writing course, no matter what the specific content, with confidence.' The purpose of this article is to explain the five components essential to advanced composition and to illustrate their general applicability with examples from technical writing, business writing, journalism, and academic writing.

Halpern, Jeanne W. JAC (1980). Articles>Rhetoric>Writing

Strunk and White Were Wrong: In Speechwriting, Personality Should Not Remain in the Background

A speech generally needs personal language because it is delivered by a live human being whose words should not sound, as Wabash College Professor William Norwood Brigance put it, "like an essay standing on its hind legs."

Tarver, Jerry. Communication World Bulletin (2005). Articles>Presentations>Rhetoric>Minimalism

Studies in Reading Theory and Document Design

This course will cover how reading theory interacts with a rhetoric of graphics to influence the way that documents are designed for maximum effect on the audience.

Zachry, Mark. Utah State University (2002). Academic>Courses>Graduate>Rhetoric

A Study of Theories on Style in Technical Communication

One of the most frequent questions technical communicators encounter is what style they should write in. Unfortunately it is not an easy question. The answer to this question should come from careful theoretical studies and deliberate analysis of the audience and many other factors, such as social environment. In this paper, I wish to analyze theories, which guide the style in technical communication, from three angles: reader analysis, interpretive communities and whether technical communication is plain, instructional, or rhetorical. In the conclusion section, I will try to analyze the importance of extracting valuable parts from each theory and how the valid points from each theory work together to guide technical communicators to choose the right style in technical communication.

Sun, Lily. Orange Journal, The (2001). Articles>Rhetoric>Theory

The Successes and Challenges of Visual Language  

Discusses efforts to create manuals that rely entirely on pictures for communication.

Hofmann, Patrick. Intercom (2004). Design>Document Design>Graphic Design>Visual Rhetoric

Sue Smith's Rhetorical Analysis Tools

Rhetorical analysis looks at writing to see how it achieves its purpose. The point of rhetorical analysis is to see not only what writing says, but how it says it. To use a rhetorical analysis chart, choose a text to analyze and look at the questions/list of ideas.

Smith, Sue. University of Arizona. Articles>Rhetoric>Methods

Supra-Textual Design: The Visual Rhetoric of Whole Documents    

Supra-textual design encompasses the global visual language of a document and operates in three modes: textual, spatial, and graphic. The rhetoric of supra-textual design includes structural functions that provide global organization and cohesion and stylistic functions that affect credibility, tone, emphasis, interest, and usability. Supra-textual rhetoric extends to other documents through conventional codes and through sets and series. Because writers may not control the end product of supra-textual design, intention may also be a rhetorical factor.

Kostelnick, Charles. Technical Communication Quarterly (1996). Articles>Document Design>Rhetoric>Visual Rhetoric

A Syntactic Approach To Readability    

Focusing on the issue of readability, this article examines problems that readability formulas present to the technical communicator, especially in terms of interaction with government agencies, and focuses on readability formula requirements mandated by The Office of Health and Industry programs [OHIP] for medical technology product support literature. Because the Flesch Reading Ease and the Flesch-Kincaid formulas are widely available, they are probably the ones most frequently used. Contemporary readability scholars have overlooked the Golub Syntactic Density Formula, which evaluates prose according to a sentence's syntax at a deeper level than the number of words per sentence and the number of syllables per word. The authors recommend it as a tool for evaluating readability. How it might be applied with current computer applications is discussed.

Giles, Timothy D. and Brian Still. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2005). Articles>Writing>Assessment>Rhetoric

A Systematic Approach to Visual Language in Business Communication    

Although business communication relies heavily on the visual, current approaches to graphics and text design are prescriptive and unsystematic. A 12-cell schema of visual coding modes and levels provides a model for describing and evaluating business documents as flexible systems of visual language. Emphasizing clarity and objectivity, the 'information design' movement has generated guidelines for creating functional visual displays. However, visual language in business communication is seldom rhetorically 'neutral' and requires adaptation to the contextual variables of each document, a goal the writer can achieve by com bining visual and verbal planning in the same holistic process.

Kostelnick, Charles. JBC (1988). Articles>Business Communication>Document Design>Visual Rhetoric

Tabular Data: Finding the Best Format  

Discusses the results of a study comparing several formats for displaying data in tables.

Tullis, Tom and Stan Fleischman. Intercom (2004). Design>Document Design>Visual Rhetoric>Charts and Graphs

Tactics for Building Images of Audience in Organizational Contexts: An Ethnographic Study of Technical Communicators    

Discourse theories frequently emphasize the importance of understanding audience but seldom delve into how writers form conceptions of their audiences, especially in organizations. This study examines computer documentation writers' tactics for conceiving of their audiences. Based on two ethnographic case studies and insights from activity theory, the author describes and evaluates technical communicators' tactics for understanding audiences, constrained and supported by their organizations. She discusses the advantages and limitations of each tactic, looking at how each tactic might answer questions about audience. This research should be useful to technical communication educators as they expand students' options for audience research in nonacademic settings. In addition, the findings of this study can enhance theories about the ways writers create images of their audiences.

Rush Hovde, Marjorie. Journal of Business and Technical Communication (2000). Articles>Rhetoric>Audience Analysis

Take Control of Your Maps

It is now possible to replicate Google Maps' functionality with open source software and produce high-quality mapping applications tailored to your design goals. Paul Smith shows how.

Smith, Paul. List Apart, A (2008). Design>Web Design>Visual Rhetoric>Geography

Taking a Political Turn: The Critical Perspective and Research in Professional Communication      

This article examines the critical perspective as an alternative to our current descriptive, explanatory research focus. The critical perspective aims at empowerment and emancipation. It reinterprets the relationship between researcher and participants as one of collaboration, where participants define research questions that matter to them and where social action is the desired goal. Examples of critical research include feminist, radical educational, and participatory action research. Adopting the critical perspective would require that scholars in professional communication rethink their choices of research questions and sites, their views of the ownership of research results, and the types of funding they seek for research initiatives.

Blyler, Nancy. Technical Communication Quarterly (1998). Articles>TC>Writing>Rhetoric

Talent vs. Skill in the Modern Writer

Skill, not talent, is the distinguishing factor between the writer whose work others appreciate and the writer whose work only he enjoys. 'Ideas are a dime a dozen' is a helpful aphorism when separating writers into those who think of creating art and those who actually do.

Nihmey, John. Writer's Block (1995). Articles>Writing>Rhetoric

Talking with Virginia Postrel

Postrel's new book, The Substance of Style, explores the economic, cultural, social, personal, and political implications of the growing importance of aesthetics in business and society.

MacLaughlin, Steve. Boxes and Arrows (2003). Articles>Graphic Design>Cultural Theory>Visual Rhetoric

Teach Others To Write Clearly  

Simplicity is the key to clarity. Review basic principles of clear writing, such as using simpler words and using fewer words. (See sample curricula of two inhouse writing classes in the column to the right). Examine overheads used to teach these skills inhouse.

Medved, Jane E. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Writing>Rhetoric