Chad Garrett

Writing in the Trenches

Mediatory Discourse in Corporate Document

Production

Chad Garrett

Technical Communicators

Many people believe that technical communicators– Sit outcast in their cubes.– Write alone.– Read silently.– Know stuff.

Chad Garrett

Windowpane Theory

Many early technical writing textbooks instructed students to have no noticeable writing style at all. Rather, the books said that writing should serve as a “windowpane,” something readers could “see through” to the integral information conveyed in the document.

Chad Garrett

Windowpane Theory

EssentialFacts

User/Reader

Technical Writer

Chad Garrett

STC Bridge Theory

For many years, the STC description of a technical writer’s responsibilities featured a picture of a large suspension-style bridge, and began with a sentence that said something to the effect of “I am the bridge between the people who create ideas and the people who use them.” In the 1990s, after significant debate, this metaphor was scrapped.

--Karen Kuralt

Chad Garrett

STC Bridge Theory

Technical Writer

Subject-MatterExpert

User/Reader

Chad Garrett

My Disconnect

This was not my experience.– I wriggled within a power structure.– I worked with people.– I spoke.– I did not know everything.

Chad Garrett

My Resolution

Even the words I wrote represented a legacy of thought, knowledge, and language amassed by multiple minds over many years. Yes, I typed them, tweaked them, edited them; nevertheless, the fact became obvious that I did not own them. No one did. Rather, the knowledge, message, and text were all formed through the interactions of team members/coworkers, mandates from management, and legacy documents.

Chad Garrett

My Support

“Moreover, the actual documents may not represent the writer’s expert judgment in every sentence. Real-world documents are compromises.”--Janice “Ginny” Redish & Susan Rosen

Chad Garrett

Thus, the Thesis

My thesis idea resulted from how I really worked:– Within a power structure– Within a collaborative team

And, from other interests:– In filmmaking– In collaborative writing

Chad Garrett

The Role of PowerWithout power, companies would have little direction and accomplish few goals. In short, most companies would spiral into a vortex of “analysis paralysis” if no one had the power to make or guide decisions. I will not attempt to negate this fact. Instead, I will readily acknowledge the existence and value of power in collaboration. I posit that teams work within the power structure using negotiation, which represents the give-and-take between what power figures dictate from the top down and what teams interpret and deliver.

Chad Garrett

Power (Negotiation)Level 1

Management

Level 3 Management

Level 2 Management

Level 4 Management

The Collaborative Team

Chad Garrett

The Role of Collaboration

Traditional rhetoric seemed inadequate:–Forensic–Deliberative

Mediatory rhetoric fit:“Whatever other purposes rhetoric may serve, it is, fundamentally, a means of achieving social cooperation: The writer’s goal is to engage in some sort of cooperative activity with the reader.”

--Young, Becker, & Pike

Chad Garrett

Mediation

• A type of collaboration that takes place within teams among members of relatively the same “power class.”

• “Writing and speaking are the principal means that man has developed for promoting social cooperation and, hence, for maintaining and improving a civilized community.” --Young, Becker, & Pike

• Key tool is Rogerian Argument

Chad Garrett

Rogerian Argument

“Rogerian argument rests on the assumption that out of a need to preserve the stability of his image, a person will refuse to consider alternatives that he feels are threatening, and hence, that changing a person’s image depends on eliminating this sense of threat.” [original emphasis]

--Young, Becker, & Pike

Chad Garrett

In the beginning…

Chad Garrett

Mediation

Chad Garrett

Mediation

Chad Garrett

Mediation

Chad Garrett

Mediation happens

Chad Garrett

The Study

• Observing employees at a local film company

• Shadowing the short but entire process

• Performing an ethnography• Producing (essentially) two results:

– A thick description of the ethnography– An analysis grounded in theory