Category: Research Problems

Gender as a variable in writing studies–presentations and paper accepted

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As I noted back in November, I’m presenting “Gender as a variable in writing studies: Ethics and methodology” at the Writing Research Across Borders IV conference in Bogotá, Columbia, on Thursday, February 16. While preparing for WRAB, I wrote an article that has been accepted to appear in the peer-reviewed conference proceedings of the First Workshop on Ethics in Natural Language Processing in conjunction with the 2017 conference of the European Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics (EACL 2017), in Valencia, Spain. I’m traveling there to give that paper in early April. The article, titled “Gender as a variable Read More …

Empirical research into legal comm’n & professional status of LRW faculty

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I was delighted to finagle an invitation to speak on a panel at the Legal Writing Institute in Portland on July 12, during the meeting of the LWI Professional Status Committee. The committee met in a plenary session with a larger audience and conducted its business, and then we panelists were asked to comment in short form (two minutes each) on an angle or issue relating to the professional status of legal research and writing faculty. (For readers outside the legal academy, teachers of communication in that field face status challenges similar to those faced by teachers of writing in the broader academy Read More …

Readings for 8011 for November 29

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This week we’ll have a visit from Drs. Tom Reynolds and Patrick Bruch to talk about research in pedagogy. We had several readings to prepare for this discussion. Here they are: Herndl, C. G. (2004). Teaching discourse and reproducing culture: a critique of research and pedagogy in professional and non-academic writing. In J. Johnson-Eilola & S. A. Selber (Eds.), Central Works in Technical Communication (illustrated edition., pp. 220-231). Oxford University Press, USA. Young, I. (1990). Introduction. Justice and the politics of difference. Princeton  N.J.: Princeton University Press. Connors, R. J., & Lunsford, A. A. (1993). Teachers’ Rhetorical Comments on Student Read More …

Reflections on October 4 readings for 8011

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A critical turn Most of this week’s readings come out of the cultural or critical studies orientation. (Blyler and Thralls and Blyer explore this orientation in general terms; Longo employs it in her history of technical writing.) The only exception is Smagorinsky. I’ll share some observations about the first three, along with some questions I have about the critical/cultural orientation. Then I’ll consider Smagorinsky briefly. Blyler Blyler, N. (1998). Taking a political turn: The critical perspective and research in professional communication. Technical Communication Quarterly, 7(1), 33-52. (Page number here refer to Johnson-Eilola, J., & Selber, S. A. (Eds.). (2004). Central Read More …

Reflections on this week’s readings for 8011

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This is my reflective memo for this week’s readings in 8011 Research Methods in S&TC. Barton & Eggly Barton, E., & Eggly, S. (2009). Ethical or Unethical Persuasion?: The Rhetoric of Offers to Participate in Clinical Trials. Written Communication, 26(3), 295-319. One conclusion of this study: That researchers seeking informed consent from cancer patients to take part in clinical trials make “regular and rhetorical use of unethical persuasion” from the perspective of bioethics. This is a broad conclusion in light of the researchers’ methods: They coded written transcripts of 22 interviews between patients and their oncologists that were recorded with Read More …