Business/Tech Writing

The Art of Good Writing is a discussion of Stanley Fish’s new book, but it is more than that. It is also an articulation of a stance on writing.

Though never explicitly political, The Elements of Style is unmistakably a product of its time. Its calls for “vigour” and “toughness” in language, its analogy of sentences to smoothly functioning machines, its distrust of vernacular and foreign language phrases all conform to that disciplined, buttoned-down and most self-assured stretch of the American century from the armistice through the height of the cold war. A time before race riots, feminism and the collapse of the gold standard. It is a book full of sound advice addressed to a class of all-male Ivy-Leaguers wearing neckties and with neatly parted hair. This, of course, is part of its continuing appeal. It is spoken in the voice of unquestioned authority in a world where that no longer exists.

I was taught using Strunk & White. I never matched it with the literature we were reading, so perhaps I always saw the discussion of writing in brevity as a business proposition. (There is significant evidence for this. Until last summer I have always perceived of emails as internet memos rather than as a faster version of snail mail. Business writing seems to be my primary mode of thought for writing of all sorts.)

What the author says about other modes of writing, though, is particularly striking.

How to Fail in Grant Writing offers ” proven techniques. We gathered these in the course of serving on grant panels or as program officers, and, in some cases, through firsthand experimentation.”

It’s funny and well written.

Perhaps even more important, it could provide a rubric or checklist for students in a grant-writing class.

ABC: Association for Business Communication
AMWA: American Medical Writers Association
ACM-SIG DOC: Special Interest Group on Design of Communication
CPTSC: Council for Programs in Technical and Scientific Communication
CCC: College Composition and Communication
IEEE Professional Communication Society
MLA: Modern Language Association
NCA: National Communication Association
NCTE: National Council of Teachers of English
RSA: Rhetoric Society of America
STC: Society for Technical Communication
WPA: Writing Program Administration

An article on the winners introduces me to the concept.

I attempt to help my business writing students think through some ethics issues related to their job fields.

I think this is a great thing. I’ll see if I can’t get my school involved.

Someone asked me if, as a rhetoric person, I could do technical communication. I said of course. I think the person didn’t understand what technical communication means.

Five characteristics distinguish technical communication from the more traditional composition courses in college curricula. Technical communication
is situation oriented and often directed to very specific audiences
has a strong visual component
has ties to other fields, including psychology and computer science

says Rebecca Kelly

I think that the first two points are true of business writing in general. However the last three are what make technical communication unique.

“Visual rhetoric” is becoming a hot topic in conferences so it may be that the visual component is not as unique to tech comm as I perceive it to be.

But this definition is a starting place for a conversation.

Arizona State University has a list of individual journals that publish in the area of multimedia writing and technical communication.

Examples:

Computers and Composition
Articles devoted to exploring the use of computers in writing classes, writing programs, and writing research.

Ethics and Information Technology
Articles on the social and ethical dimensions of emerging information technology.

Journal of Business and Technical Communication
Latest communication practices, problems and trends in both business and academic settings

Journal of Computer Mediated Communication
The Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication (JCMC) is a web-based, peer-reviewed scholarly journal. Its focus is social science research on computer-mediated communication via the Internet, the World Wide Web, and wireless technologies.

Business Degree Online has 100 good websites, including YouTube videos, on business writing.

There is some good stuff there that I will use for my next business writing class.

Discussion of Powerpoints and simultaneity versus seriality.

Interesting discussion.

Right now I am working with my business writing students on ethics’ research. They are doing primary as well as secondary research.

So, Erin O’Connor’s Case Study in Academic Ethics really caught my attention.

It begins with a letter to the Chronicle‘s Ms. Mentor. The instructor is aware that the student probably did not write a paper for her class. The student is married to Big Wig and the instructor supposes Big Wig wrote the paper for the student. Ms. Mentor says to keep safe and not be a martyr.

As I have had to deal with minimal support for censuring plagiarism, this caught my attention. The student who had particularly egregious plagiarisms also had a paper that I doubt seriously that he wrote. (Yes, if I were called as an expert witness I would testify to that.) Just like the instructor in the letter, though, the paper wasn’t purchased off the internet. Someone wrote it for the student personally.

Sometimes you can catch students at this. Have them come in and discuss the paper with you. Ask them for explanations of vocabulary they used that was significantly beyond them.

But if this instructor did that, the Big Wig would not be happy with her. (Obviously not if he wrote the plagiarized paper, as the instructor surmises.)

Erin O’Connor is not happy with this. “[I]t’s this sort of “not my problem, save my own ass” attitude that lies at the root of the widespread problems academia is having with establishing and maintaining ethical standards.”

Imagine that the school cultivated a local culture in which adhering to the highest standards of integrity was a matter of pride–and mutual responsibility. Imagine what that would mean for the quality of research produced and also for the morale of departments and colleges. Imagine, too, that this pride translated into classrooms where hard work and honest effort were rewarded–and where plagiarism, cheating, and slacking were not. Imagine what that would mean for learning–not just about subject matter and skills, but also about what it feels like to work hard, to be honest, and to bank your future on your merits, rather than on your ability to game the system. Imagine that.

My other college is doing this. It is a matter of pride that the college supports the ethics of integrity.

It is an issue of integrity versus… When we choose our careers over integrity, we don’t value integrity (as Dr. L.M. Smith of Texas A&M pointed out to me recently).

Of course, I’ve been a whistleblower before. I know that mine worked out very well and many people’s don’t. I also know that right now I don’t have a “career,” so there’s not much that would change if I were in a position to blow the whistle.

HOWEVER, there is one thing Ms. O’Connor did not consider. The instructor in question has no proof of plagiarism. She doesn’t have a purchased paper or one which was stolen off the internet. I wouldn’t be surprised if she couldn’t talk to the Big Wig’s wife and trip her up, but how would that prove plagiarism?

So, really, the instructor doesn’t have an opportunity to pull the plug on plagiarism. She has no proof and in this country, even when you are guilty, you are considered innocent until it has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that you are guilty.