Project #5 Annotated Bibliography: Listening Professional Writing and Technical Communication

I constructed the annotated bibliography below in WRA 841: Professional Writing Theory andResearch as the beginning annotated bibliography for my concentration exam. I include it here to demonstrate how much my understanding of listening inProfessional Writing and Technical Communication has grown since then. For instance, this annotated bibliography does not include scholarship on community engagement projects. At the time that I created this early bibliography, I had not yet reflected on and integrated the understanding gained from my interview with Leslie (see Project #3). I have also been able to take advantage of the time between the conclusion of my concentration coursework and the completing of this essay to reflect on the Professional Writing and Technical Communication’s treatment of listening in several contexts (e.g., in working with the GEUPedagogy Committee, iTeachMSU Commons, and the Collaborating for ChangeLearning Community).

Erin Schaefer
WRA 841
Professor Ben Lauren
Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Annotated Bibliography
Bekins, Linn K. and Sean D. Williams. “Positioning Technical Communication for the Creative Economy.” Technical Communication 53.3 (2006): 287-295. Web.

Linn K. Bekins and Sean D. Williams work is useful for existing and emerging technical communicators who seek to understand/construct their identity in the current economy. It outlines the critical skills necessary to succeed in a creative economy, one that centered on “‘high skills’ that include creativity, ability to navigate ambiguity, comfort with multiplicity and complexity, interpersonal understanding and empathy, synthesis, pattern recognition, and the ability to tell good stories” (289). Bekins and Williams argue that the field of technical communication needs a new curriculum that responds to the creativity economy, if the field and its members are to thrive.

While the authors acknowledge that their work challenges some of the (288), their suggested curriculum nods to and builds from past core technical communication principles. They suggest three core elements of a new curriculum: “1. Teach the rhetorical tradition to build SMEs [subject matter experts] 2. Provide broad experiential learning opportunities to build managers 3. Create a culture of continuous learning to build leaders” (289). Numbers two and three of this curriculum emphasize the importance of gaining diverse experiences that will allow technical communicators to respond to ever changing organizational contexts, responding to these changes with an entrepreneurial spirit of innovation and leadership. Instructors of professional writing must work hard to integrate these “‘real world’ writing situations” for students, while also emphasizing the importance of articulating the deep ways that technical communicators can transform an organization.

This work is important given more recent literature on the networked nature of society, such as Lee Rainie and Barry Wellman’s Networked: The New Social Operating System which emphasizes the importance of orchestrating complex webs of relationships. Bekin and Williams complements the works of Clasy Spinuzzi’s “Technical Communication in the Age of Distributed Work” and Stacey Pigg’s “Coordinating Constant Invention: Social Media’s Role in Distributed Work,” for instance, which emphasize the polycontextual nature of technical communication work. Bekins and Williams have a somewhat unique focuses on empathy. They write, for instance, that “Rhetorical analysis and collaborating with others are ‘high concept’ skills that require empathy” and that “the ability to have empathy, to design, to tell a good story are all key aspects of the creative class” (290-1). Their work connects with others who have examined the difficulty in navigating difficult emotions and fixed habits of mind, such as Jim Suchan’s “Changing

Organizational Communication Practices and Norms.” This focus on empathy should also be of interest to many mainstream leadership programs that emphasize the importance of empathy as one of many dimensions of emotional intelligence.

The articles presented in this annotated bibliography in some way or another focus on communication (intrapersonal and interpersonal), including the emotional intelligence that professional communicators need to call on in their work. Bekins and Williams’s piece shows that a core characteristic of these skills is mental fluidity; professional communicators need to be comfortable switching between contexts, between perspectives (i.e., through practicing empathy), and engage in creativity.

This focus on mental fluidity should provide an interesting dynamic to articles that focus on challenges in communication. Suchan, for instance, discusses how technical communicators are often faced with the opposite of mental fluidity: people stuck in limiting narratives and cognitive schemata. Bringing these two pieces into conversation can create a rather focused research question: how can technical communicators both practice mental fluidity for themselves and teach mental fluidity to organizations who they work? Furthermore, what practices or pedagogical strategies could a professional communicator use to facilitate these processes?

Gruber, David R. “Mirror Neurons in a Group Analysis of ‘Hall of Mirrors’: Translation as a Rhetorical Approach to Neurodisciplinary Writing.” Technical Communication Quarterly 23 (2014): 207-226. Web.

David R. Gruber looks at how neurodisciplinary writers – typically humanities scholars outside of the field of neuroscience – integrate a popular neuroscience discovery: mirror neurons. Mirror neurons, active in animals and humans, mimic the neuronal activity of those who surround us. Gruber’s method labels neurodisciplinary writers’ adoption of mirror neurons as an act of translation in actor network theory. His work, then, contributes to discussions of actor network theory. It also helps characterize interdisciplinary translations: what is lost or transformed in these translations? He argues that neurodisciplinary writing is an active of invention because it changes the meaning from the original text.

Gruber’s work also connects to the other articles presented here on communication skills. Since mirror neurons are commonly associated with empathy and interpersonal communication, those interested in the neurological dimensions of these skills should be interested in knowing whether neurodisciplinary writings on this subject are valid and/or productive. Gruber’s work suggests that even though these writings are presented as going in new directions, the translations between the actor networks (the two disciplines) are framed in ways that conform to the home discipline’s existing narratives and interests. Additionally, some translations decontextualize or oversimplify neuroscience research. For instance, an author writing about group analysis characterized mirror neurons using a literal mirror as a metaphor. This metaphor was carried out beyond accurate limits (216).

Given Suchan’s discussion of shared habits in an organization and the difficulty in changing these habits, neurodisciplinary writings about mirror neurons – done carefully – may provide a useful perspective on this problem. Given that mirror neurons are popular in humanities discourses currently, this perspective is important in conversations about empathy, such as Leonard’s “Understanding the Managing Conflict in a Technical Communication Department “and Lynch’s “Rhetorics of Proximity: Empathy in Temple Grandin and Cornel West” Gruber’s discussion of neurodisciplinary writings also points to the need to examine a variety of writings that may relate to intra/interpersonal communication as professional communicators.

Housley Gaffney, Amy L. “Communication Instruction in Landscape Architecture Courses: A Model and Effects on Students’ Self-Efficacy.”

Amy L. Housley Gaffney’s study compares a traditional architecture course to a modified one to understand the modified course’s effect on students’ self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is defined as students’ perceptions about how well they might “perform tasks at varying levels,” and high rates of self-efficacy are associated with higher levels of actual performance (163). Explorations of pedagogical methods that support self-efficacy are valuable because they support students in developing communication skills that are in high demand by employers. These methods are also critical for workers in professional communication work contexts. This study is also valuable because it seeks to assess students’ perceptions of their communication abilities. Such a study should be of interests to professional writing/professional communication instructors, who similarly should ask whether students feel self-efficacy before entering the job market.

According to the authors, self-efficacy stems from four sources: “enactive mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, verbal persuasion and social influence, and physiological and affective states” (164). This crucial dynamic for communicative success in the workplace, then, is connected to both social and psychological contexts that are constantly in flux. In comparing the traditional course with the modified one, Housley Gaffney used qualitative analysis to understand the effects of adding 180 minutes (dispersed over several lessons) of applied communication instruction. These lessons gave students a chance to practice five competencies: concept, credibility, argument, visuals, and audience. The last competency refers to “students’ ability to interact with audience members in an open, respectful manner” (170). The modified course not only increased students’ perceived self-efficacy, but it also more fully embodied the kind of situated-learning approach (an approach that emphasizes experience in real-life contexts) that the department values.

Housley Gaffney’s work points to the pedagogical realm of professional communicator’s intra/interpersonal communication skills. The situated learning model may be useful in responding to Suchan’s ponderings about how to change communication habits. If professional communicators need to learn to embody the kind of mental fluidity described by Bekins and Williams, Housley Gaffney’s work suggests students learn a set of communication skills through practice tin relevant contexts. The need for real contexts is

not surprising; the skills Housley Gaffney teaches require interaction with real audiences. For instance, one of the skills is the ability to talk openly with an audience. Such a task requires a live crowd for professional communicators to respond to in the moment through improvisation.

The success of Housley Gaffney’s pedagogy may also inform Tuleja and Roberts’s discussion of training programs that are geared toward listening and service. This training used mock scenarios and was not as successful in improving hotel supervisor’s communication skills. Had the authors applied the situated learning aspects of Housley Gaffney’s teachings, these trainings may have been more successful.

Leonard, David C. “Understanding the Managing Conflict in a Technical Communication Department.” Technical Communication 40.1 (1993): 74-80. Web.

Although it is slightly dated, David C. Leonard’s work provides an important glimpse for how technical communication views interpersonal communication and the challenges associated with it. This work is also interesting in that it provides a particular framework of conflict: what conflict is, what causes it, and how to fix it. It presents a series of (simplistic) binaries: sensing/intuitive, thinking/feeling, judging/perceiving (77).

Like Housley Gaffney, this work looks at both psychological (personality, intrapersonal conflict) and social factors (interpersonal and intergroup interactions) that are part of conflict. Drawing from technical communication and organizational communication, this article offers a series of guidelines for responding to conflict appropriately. Workers, for instance, can focus on identifying sources of interdependence, knowing the psychological characteristics of themselves and co-workers, and keeping lines of communication open (79).

Leonard’s article could stand to be complicated by Lynch’s discussion of empathy. Leonard’s piece is too simplistic in covering psychological and social dynamics that may effect conflict. Leonard does not address the racial contexts that can make the supposed remedy to conflict – empathy - harmful. As mentioned earlier, this piece would also benefit from examining the importance of mental fluidity and creativity as elements of conflict. After all, the strategies offered by Leonard similarly point to a fluidity in understanding another person’s perspective.

Lynch, Dennis A. “Rhetorics of Proximity: Empathy in Temple Grandin and Cornel West.” Rhetoric Society Quarterly 28.1 (1998): 5-23. Web.

Dennis A. Lynch writes that empathy is core to rhetoric and has been highly present in the field, though sometimes under different guises. Poststructuralists and decolonial theorists, however, have critiqued calls for empathy, warning that a call for empathy “usually locates the obstacles to empathy – to listening and being heard – solely in the minds and habits of individual participant, and so obscures or ignores the political and economic and bodily dimensions of social struggles” (6). These scholars also express

concerns about the uneven playing field: marginalized groups often end up listening to already privileged voices, while those with privilege show little to no interest in listening to marginalized voices (9). Privileged voices who do desire to hear marginalized voices can do even worse harm; they can end up displacing the body of a marginalized person and/or assuming that they can fully grasp what it’s like to be in a marginalized person’s shoes.

Lynch offers the work of Temple Grandin and Cornel West as examples of calls to empathy that do not deny these dimensions of marginalized people’s struggle to be heard. Grandin’s work simultaneously invites empathy and discourages comfort or confidence in that empathy. This text models how a person can engage in empathy without assuming that he/she is really in another person’s shoes (11). West’s speech (and book) similarly addresses this assumption but through a different method: asking the reader to continually question the location of their own selves and bodies. It asks us “to look back towards ourselves, to our sense of our selves and our own bodies, and to how we believe we inhabit the social and bodily spaces we claim as our own” (14). West’s work, far from ignoring difficulties that marginalized voices have in being heard, discusses the erasure of black bodies throughout history (16). West also strategically asks white people to displace their own bodies, describing this strategy as such: “if I am to move towards another, without displacing that other, I must displace myself” (18).
Lynche’s work is important for any organization that cites the importance of empathy for professional communicators (i.e., Bekins and Williams; Leonard; and Moore and Elliott). Other authors have not even nodded to these issues, and yet ignoring the potentially harmful effects of empathy can be very damaging (especially for community work).

Moore, Kristen R. and Timothy J. Elliott. “From Participatory Design to a Listening Infrastructure: A Case of Urban Planning and Participation.” Journal of Business and Technical Communication 59-84 (2016): 59-84. Web.

Technical communicators are often faced with the task of designing materials or working on projects ¬that should respond to a large number of community members’ desires. Kristin R. Moore and Timothy J. Elliott propose that to do these kinds of projects effectively, technical communicators should draw from tacit knowledge – knowledge from doing – produced by conversations with participants (in this case, members of the community) (61). Unless these conversations are guided by a rhetoric of listening, however, the perspectives of participants gathered in “design charrettes, workshops, and open houses” will not translate into the final projects.

This article should be of value, therefore, to those working in governmental agencies where soliciting community participation is required, but also to those in a variety of professional writing organizational contexts (e.g., non-profit outreach committee meeting or a marketing focus group for a company). It is useful in offering practical steps to avoid silencing already marginalized groups of citizens while “support[ing] the views of only a few powerful decision makers” (62). This work may also answer calls from authors who have argued that designers need to be more socially aware and responsible

(i.e., rather than narrowly focusing on efficiency or profit), such as Langdon Winner’s “Do Artifacts Have Politics?”

Combined with notes from participatory observation, the authors participated in the gathering of data from the documents collected community solicitation events. The authors argue that participatory research design is not equipped to gather perspectives from very large groups, such as those participating in the public planning project of the study. To hear at least the vast majority of voices and to hear them accurately, public participation events should be viewed “not as affective, participatory opportunities but as data collection opportunities” (64). The collection of this data needs “to be more critically and carefully collected and analyzed” (65). To avoid collecting data that strips participants’ input of context, data collection should be guided by listening. This process should be made transparent to participants. Furthermore, data should be contextualized during analysis (77).

Moore’s piece is valuable because it acknowledges that professional communicators may be working in contexts where having empathy and listening means doing this with a large audience. It shifts our understanding of what it means to practice interpersonal communication; deep, contextual listening can be utilized when interacting with large groups and when recording/analyzing data collected from these interactions. The concept of listening rhetoric (which listens for and preserves a speaker’s context and complex perspective) could also be brought into conversation with authors like Suchan or Leonard who are concerned with responding to conflict and change in productive ways. Perhaps Moore’s listening rhetoric could help Suchan in his goal of understanding more deeply why some workers resist change.

Suchan, Jim. “Gauging Openness to Written Communication Change: The Predictive Power of Metaphor.” Journal of Business and Technical Communication 28.4 (2014): 447-476. Web.

Jim Suchan observed and then coded metaphors that workers used to describe their attitudes toward their own work, the organization, and the organizational norms. The metaphors were useful predictors of the workers’ attitudes towards potential change. As echoed in Suchan’s earlier work, “Changing Organizational Practices and Norms,” professional communicators that try to change the communicational norms must navigate habitual psychological and social habits. Suchan concludes that while it is useful to know which workers may resist or even sabotage systematic organizational changes (e.g., it’s communication patterns), there is still much research to be done to find out what is needed to respond to worker’s resistance (471).

The methods used in Suchan’s work, in addition to the connections I’ve already mentioned, could be used in pedagogies that seek to teach communication skills (e.g., Housley Gaffney’s piece). In assessing one’s self-efficacy, students could be asked to describe metaphors that reveal how they situate themselves in relation to stability and change. Those students who struggle with this element could be given special attention in developing mental fluidity.

Tuleja, Elizabeth A. and Elizabeth Roberts. “An Analysis of a Communication Training Program for Chinese Managers.” IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication 54.2 (2011): 185-200. Web.

Elizabeth A. Tuleja and Elizabeth Roberts study the effectiveness of a communication training program for Chinese managers working in a service-oriented company (an international hotel). This article’s purpose is to both understand what communication skills service-oriented managers regard as most important and to examine the effectiveness of one particular program. It speaks from and to professional communicators, human resource management, cross-cultural communication, and managerial communication (186). It is especially valuable since, as the authors argue, “effective communication skills may be the most important skills required of managers operating within the professional communication context” (197).

This program taught communication related skills to supervisors that showed promise for promotion to management: “understanding diversity, developing effective listening skills, giving feedback, understanding cross-cultural communication, using effective interviewing techniques, and managing the problem-solving process” (186). The study used both qualitative methods (in the form of interviews and content analysis of training materials) and quantitative methods (in the form of questionnaires). The authors note that participants saw the value of many of the skills covered in the training, such as creating a strong listening environment and engaging in cross-cultural communication (191). Although participants valued training in these areas, however, the program exercises did not actually improve their effectiveness as communicators (194). Given the importance of communication skills in professional communication contexts, the study suggests further studies are needed to understand how to make communication trainings more effective.

Tuleja and Roberts’s work is very important in that it points to a role that professional communicators might play: that of a person who might seek to change communication patterns in the workplace. These may occur through trainings. These trainings could be informed by the articles above, as discussed earlier.