CCR 760: Diehl et al (2008) "Grassroots: Supporting the knowledge work of everyday life"

Diehl, A., Grabill, J.T., & Hart-Davidson, W. (2008). Grassroots: Supporting the knowledge work of everyday life. Technical Communication Quarterly 17(4), 413-434.

Abstract from article:

“This article introduces a simple mapping tool called Grassroots, a software product from a longitudinal study examining the use of information communication technologies and knowledge work in communities. Grassroots is an asset-based mapping tool made possible by theWeb 2.0 movement, a movement which allows for the creation of more adaptable interfaces by making data and underlying database structures more openly available via syndication and open source software. This article forwards three arguments. First is an argument about the nature of the knowledge work of everyday life, or an argument about the complex technological and rhetorical tasks necessary to solve commonplace problems through writing. Second is an argument about specific technologies and genres of community-based knowledge work, about why making maps is such an essential genre, and about why making asset maps is potentially transformative. Third is an argument about the making of Grassroots itself; a statement about how we should best express, test, and verify our theories about writing and knowledge work” (413).

Summary:

The authors report their experiences with and reasons for developing a mapping software called Grassroots, an interface comparable to Google Maps except Grassroots also works in conjunction with Web 2.0 features that permit users to design their own routes and store information. The authors draw on their research in WIDE (Writing in Digital Environments) and CACI (Capital Area Community Information) projects. These studies often included field observations, usability evaluations, and interviews with citizens working with designers for creating knowledge work. Based on their research, the authors examine how knowledge work is accomplished in the writing and using of mapping software, especially in regard to the rhetoric of mapmaking, the problems with mapping use in communities, and the potential possibilities made through Grassroots. They argue that since “the ability to create usable knowledge and meaningful action are too often assumed by planners” then, “Actual writing—work—is invisible” (419). Therefore, the authors present Grassroots as a means of making “visible the knowledge work activity that is required for common forms of civic participation” (422). Grassroots is illustrated as being an interface that is more accessible for users to accomplish their specific rhetorical and community-building needs in mapping: users can create their own maps; add photos, texts, and other media; augment information; add tags for searching; share and collaborate; etc.

Definitions:

• Knowledge work: “By knowledge work, we mean analytical activity requiring problem solving and abstract reasoning, particularly with (and through) advanced information technologies and particularly with and through acts of writing. Johnson-Eilola (2005) notes that knowledge work is also typically concerned with the production of information, as distinct from the production of material goods, and he also points out that many of us do not just work with information, we inhabit it. Thus knowledge work, or what Johnson-Eilola calls symbolic production, is the making of largely discursive performances that, quite literally, do work (pp. 3–4)” (414).
• Asset-based community development (Kretzmann & McKnight, 1993): “whereby community building is based on seeing communities as active participants of change and not passive clients (see also Turner & Pinkett, 2000)” (415).
• GIS: Geographic Information Systems (GIS) tools as they have developed are principally geospatial databases meant for experts, although their use has been transferred to public domains as well” (418).
• Web 2.0: “The Web 2.0 movement perhaps can be best described as the untethering of content and information available via the Web from the very places and pages with which we usually associated that content. That is, the information or content itself becomes the product and is created and distributed in such a way that it can be easily syndicated, repurposed, or added upon in ways quite possibly unimagined by the original content creators or distributors” (424).
• XML: “Extensible Markup Language (XML) is not a traditional coding language, but rather a set of rules and standards for creating and distributing a semantically appropriate language for content, in a way that styles can then be applied separately and that allow for the contextual granulation of larger pieces of information into more discrete, separate units” (425).
• Grassroots: “a simple tool (http://grassroots.wide.msu.edu)...based largely on Google Maps so it allows users to create map locations using addresses or by clicking on the map, and we also added the ability to draw routes on the map” (415). This way, Grassroots acts not only as a map, but as a database for storing routes and other map additions added on by users. The authors “understand Grassroots to be an asset-mapping tool, by which we mean that it is intended to enable communities to name, locate, and thereby create maps of their communities using variables of their choosing and focusing as much on capacities as deficits” (427).

Points of Interest with Questions:

• The authors liken “knowledge work” to “invisible work” where the value of writing, especially writing done well, is not visible (414). This reminds me of Marx’s argument in Capital about the fetishism of use value where labor becomes invisible in the commodification of products (414). Could this be a case for how much power TCers have in information design and/or an argument that TCers ought to be more ethically conscious of how design and rhetorical choices are made invisible?
• The authors see an “intersection of writing and civic activity” (415), and since they believe that some mapping interfaces “can prevent people from acting as citizens,” they explain that their goal for Grassroots is to “render visible the knowledge work activity that is required for common forms of civic participation” (422). Connecting writing with citizenship and civic participation seems very Deweyan in the sense that education, especially as adopted in the composition classroom, recognizes learning and writing as a means of civic engagement. It seems from our authors’ understanding of writing, then, that writing is understood in the field of technical communication to be (at least in some cases) grounded in democratic conceptualizations. Though researchers from both disciplines may be accepting of this theory, I’m not so convinced that many students, of FYC or techn comm, would adopt such a stance on the purposes of writing (thus, service-learning in comp comes into play). Since I’m less versed in the pedagogical practice of the tech comm classroom, I wonder: What strides are (or can be) taken in teaching tech comm that foster a more democratic conceptualization of information and interface design? Is Web 2.0 our best solution?

CCR 691: Logan's (2008) *Liberating Language*

Logan, Shirley Wilson. Liberating Language: Sites of Rhetorical Education in Nineteenth-Century Black America. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2008.

INTRODUCTION: “‘By the Way, Where Did You Learn to Speak?’”

An overview of her study, scope, method, and purpose as explained in her “Introduction”:

1. WHAT and WHEN: Logan seeks to answer the question, “Where did [African Americans in the late 18^th-early 19^th century] learn to speak?” Specifically, she’s interested in identifying and analyzing sites of rhetorical education—those places where AAs were instructed explicitly or implicitly in being rhetorical in their communicative experiences.

2. WHERE and HOW: Her sites of research and textual artifacts analyzed within her book are:

a. CH1: “white-sponsored slave missions and initiatives emerging from within communities of the enslaved,” “the black Union regiments during the Civil War,” “the activities of the Republican Loyal League” (6-7)

b. CH2: diaries from multiple individuals; published advice manuals (7)

c. CH3: literacy societies “primarily in Philadelphia and New York, both single sex and mixed, church-affiliated, school-affiliated, and community-based” (7)

d. CH4: Black periodicals (8)

e. Throughout each of her chapters: calls on famous Black rhetors to make “cautious generalizations” (9)

3. WHY: She seeks answers to her research question because she hopes it will “broaden our approaches to contemporary rhetorical education and thereby help to further participation in democracy” (3). She also hopes to inform: “This study will expand our understanding of the various ways in which African Americans, faced with the consequences of enslavement and oppressive color prejudice, acquired rhetorical competence during the late eighteenth century and across the nineteenth century” (9).

Her strategies for supporting her methodology:

· Shows exigency in her study by providing a few examples of the challenges AAs faced in engaging in literacy practices and illustrating how so many white folks were shocked (this being “a form of ‘soft bigotry,’” quoting Anna Perez, 3).

· Defines her terms (e.g. rhetorical education, basic literacy) by calling on main rhetoric folks (Burke, Bitzer, Aristotle).

· Situates her methods of analyzing literacy practices of a population in the margins by likening her study to other main literacy folks (Royster, Williams, Jarratt, Zaluda, Gold).

· Situates her focus on AAs by citing others with a similar target population (Kates, Schneider, Anderson, Franklin, Porter, McHenry).

CHAPTER 1: “Free-Floating Literacy: Early African American Rhetorical Traditions”

Her method:

· She investigates rhetorical traditions and literacy practices in multiple sites to make claims about the experiences of AAs in the 18^th-19^th centuries. Sites and summaries include:

o “Plantation Literacies”: Records of “invisible institutions” (like group meetings in the woods where members could develop expression and worship) and slave missions where AAs received literacy education. These practices often helped to engrain the oral traditions of the culture.

o “Pulpit Literacies”: Missions helped AAs develop memorization skills. Rhetoric textbooks like The Columbian Orator helped AAs like Frederick Douglas realize the power of rhetoric in enacting freedom.

o “Battlefield Literacies”: Since AAs were coming together in the military and sharing literacy skills and since some military officials would initiate literacy education and/or develop schools for these soldiers, much of their rhetorical traditions were garnered through these experiences. Specifically, AA individuals participated in literacy practices by reading, discussing, and producing letters, newspapers, and speeches/poetry readings.

o “Political Literacies”: Sponsored by Union or Loyal League Movement, AAs also experienced literacy through night schools and other community gatherings aimed at promoting political activity and power.

o “Postbellum Workplace Literacies”: Some AAs may have also experienced literacy through working at cigar factories where they practiced la lectura, a custom where individuals were elected (based on mutual respect for their intelligence) to read texts aloud during cigar rolling and workers would use these texts as bases for debate and public argument.

· The evidence she presents come from various sources:

o Examples of AA’s experiences in the 19^th century and many of her terms of analysis from scholars’ previous studies (Costen, Nunley, Raboteau)

o References to historical moments, folks, or events (antebellum South, slave laws, slave mission movements, Militia Act, etc.)

o Analysis of primary texts of published AA writing and of AAs’ personal narratives (Elizabeth Johnson Harris, Frederick Douglas, Charles Colcock Jones, Amanda Berry Smith, Christian Recorder, Weekly Anglo-African)

· She keeps the analysis informational and refrains from making connections between the literacy practices of then to what’s happening today.

Key people and their terms:

· Ralph Ellison’s “free-floating literacy” (11)

· Shirley Brice Heath and Beverly J. Moss’ “literacy events” (11)

· Melva Wilson Costen’s “Invisible Institutions,” (12)

· Vorris L. Nunley’s “hush harbor rhetoric” (12)

My question:

Since in class we’ve been really emphasizing the importance of methods, methodology, and the building of a researcher ethos, it was a bit surprising to me that Logan does not spend time detailing her methods and methodologies. While she references primary sources and other scholarly work, we never seem to learn where and how she collected data. I then remembered how in our colloquium Lois focused less on step-by-step methods for a historical approach in her discussion of her research and Tolar Burton also stayed away from explicit discussion of procedural methods (even stating something about it might be boring for us to hear her methods). Although I imagine this trend for not detailing methods and methodologies is not unique to historiographers, I wonder why some are less inclined to provide such detailed accounts of data gathering and analysis. I wonder if we associate such descriptions as “boring” or too “science-like.” Maybe archival research feels too open-ended and exploratory to be defined methodologically. Maybe we just haven’t valued this practice as much until recently. Maybe historiographers assume we already know methods for historical approaches. Either way, I was interested to observe this trend, and I’m curious as to why researchers might be inclined to leave out discussions of their methods and methodologies and how we might work to address this issue.

CCR 720: Anson (2008): "The Intelligent Design of Writing Programs"

Anson, Chris M. "The Intelligent Design of Writing Programs: Reliance on Belief or a Future of Evidence." WPA: Writing Program Administration 32.1 (Fall 2008): 11-36.

Informal summary:

· Argues that the discipline of college composition needs to perform research in the field that provides actual evidence, not our own theory based on story-telling (lore, ethnography) of our experiences in the classroom. Get away from essay-driven articles and towards evidence-driven articles.

· Shows how one critic of composition classrooms (although not grounded in evidence either) has great power in damaging the discipline (in the sense of public opinion) (cites Nan Miller’s report, 2006).

· Likens our disciplinary dilemma to historical court case (State of Tennessee vs. John Scopes) where it was eventually overturned by the Surpreme Court (by way of technicality) that evolution theories be abolished in public schools over the Divine Creation of Man. Aruges, therefore, that we’re a discipline of intelligent design and not of evolution and

o “intelligent design theory is not ready for parallel treatment in the schools because it is based on belief, not on a preponderance of evidence. Current practice—in the teaching of science or the teaching of writing—needs to be supported not by hunches buy by the best that the research traditions of these tow disciplinary areas can provide us, with the understanding that their very existence depends on an openness to challenge and a spirit of continual inquiry” (20).

· Argues for six movements in our discipline

o Foundational research and synthesis (24)

o Replications and extensions (26)

o Graduate education (27)

o Connections with our publics (28)

o Increased scrutiny and critique (29)

o Improved research communities (31)

· Quotable quote:

o “My point is this: if we continue to rely on belief in our pedagogies and administrative decisions, whether theorized or not, whether argued from logic or anecdote, experience or conviction, we do not better to support a case for those decisions than what most detractors do to support cases against them. Instead, we need a more robust plan for building on the strong base of exiting research into our assumptions about how students best learn to write” (11-12).