Plan For Tonight
- Syllabus and course requirements
- Make sure you get copies of our textbooks:
- Kolln, Martha J. and Gray, Loretta S. Rhetorical Grammar: Grammatical Choices, Rhetorical Effects (8th Edition). Pearson: 2017. {978-0-13-4080376}
- Barrett, Grant. Perfect English Grammar: The Indispensable Guide to Excellent Writing and Speaking. Zephyros P: 2016. {978-1-62315-714-2}
- You will have specific exercises to do in the Kolln & Gray textbook, so make sure you have the 8th edition.
- Do the Canvas Introduction; report back to class
- Fabulous First-Day-of-Class Exam!–on Canvas
- It is a diagnostic for me to gauge the class’s familiarity and isn’t graded but required.
- Not doing it will drop your Portfolio grade by 10%.
“Technical Writing” vs “Technical Communication”
Before we get too far into the specific reading, let’s consider the difference between “technical writing” and “technical communication.” Is there really a difference? Let’s focus on “writing” and “communication.”
This course is not necessarily an introduction to document design because, presumably, you’ve already had that in English 2116 and other Technical Communication courses/situations, or you’re a quick learner. Instead, this course is an intermediate (or advanced) step in your becoming effective technical communicators. Whether or not you actually become an employee with the title “Technical Writer,” is irrelevant: ALL OF YOU WILL HAVE TO COMMUNICATE TECHNICAL INFORMATION TO AUDIENCES.
Make sure you’re reading the assigned material. Your Midterm and Final (which is slightly cumulative) will be based nearly entirely on the reading. I’m going to try my best to make sure we use the vocabulary from the book because I think the concepts are very useful. In different contexts the terms might have different meanings, but the ideas and strategies the terms describe are practically universal.
Ethos, Pathos, Logos
Although this isn’t a rhetorical theory class, we will need to understand rhetoric to help guide our writing and editing choices. Below is a quick overview of ethos, pathos, and logos.
- Ethos: appeal or presentation of one’s character or credibility.
- Pathos: appeal to emotions; evoking emotional responses.
- appeal to fear
- appeal to patriotism
- appeal to desires
- Logos: appeals to logic or facts in a message.
- Syllogisms
- Deductive arguments
- Implicit or explicit message that “if you’re smart, successful, important, etc., you wil do something” (i.e., quit paying more for…)
- Graphs, statistics, legal codes
Please consider the above elements when doing your assignments. Also, consider how you can craft your prose (or edit the prose of others) for a rhetorical effect. What can we say about the following advertisement?
I don’t mind living with “addition,” but I certainly don’t want to live with “multiplying”! What might the above ad do to the ethos of Palm Partners?
Something that is difficult to catch–especially in our own work–is when we use homonyms, which are words that sound the same but have different meanings. Spell checkers in word processors are pretty good and can even check multiple languages simultaneously. Grammar checkers aren’t as good, but they’re getting better. A grammar checker wouldn’t catch “addition” as incorrect, but it might catch the difference between the following homonyms from the above sentence:
- ad…add
- do…due…dew…doo (ha! couldn’t resist)
Consider strategies to check for homonyms. I hate for you to right something incorrect that wood effect you’re ethos…
David Frike’s “The E Street Band Keep Rolling in ’09”
At some point, I decided that this class needed a writing reviews component. Even though this is a “technical writing” class, I’m trying to provide assignments that might broaden your professional writing profile. Basically, if you can focus on how your prose communicates, you’ll be better able to adapt to a variety of communication settings. Also, word economy and efficiency are overall goals for technical communication, so these short reviews will be helpful.
The article I wanted you to read for this week is supposed to demonstrate an intangible in writing. Of course, this isn’t a class on music history, so I’m not asking you to read this for information. Instead, consider how the author describes the album Working on a Dream. By the way, what’s going on with subject verb agreement in “The E Street Band Keep…”? Don’t we write “keeps” for singular subjects? This is something for you to ponder for the next 15 weeks.
Fricke’s article is a series of prepackaged ideas that carry his discussion of the Springsteen album. Phrases such as “pop stomps loaded with Beatlesque guitar jangle,” “1966-Beach Boys vocal harmonies,” and “pedal steel guitar a la Bob Dylan’s Nashville Skyline” (para. 3) are loaded with information–hypercompressed–and are references requiring readers to have fairly good music knowledge. Consider audience, purpose, and situation (context).
This article was originally in print, but it has since gone online. What are some differences you notice between the print (PDF) and online versions? The print version is on Canvas, so check that out if you haven’t already.
Suzy Feay’s review of the Netflix series Away
You can only access the above webpage once, so I recommend saving it using the Adobe Acrobat extension. I didn’t realize this until after I had already closed out and tried to re-access it. You should be able to re-access it on a different computer. Fortunately, UNC Charlotte has a Financial Times subscription, so I have the PDF of it up on Canvas.
Both reviews are similar in that they use a montage approach to listing attributes of their media. However, even though Feay is absolutely correct that Away is garbage, her review is sloppy, depending on a pastiche approach that throws references from the show together but doesn’t weave them into an appropriate review that provides a fuller interpretation. Fricke makes many references to other musicians’ works, but he doesn’t just list them; he uses references to weave together an impression. Consider these passages from both:
- Fricke: Ironically, “Tomorrow Never Knows” is not the Beatles’ Revolver song but a Springsteen original outfitted with fiddle, strings and pedal steel guitar à la Bob Dylan‘s Nashville Skyline.
- Feay: “Spacewalk is like war!” snarls Misha (Mark Ivanir, respectable). “I can do it”’ “You’re crazy!” “What the hell is she doing?” The Brit starts praying. “We’ve lost visual!”
Fricke’s word economy compares a song to two well-known albums; whereas, Feay lists out-of-context lines from a new, not-very-well-known TV show. Again, Feay’s review is correct that Away is a trite, poorly written show with a run-of-the mill plot that puts Hilary Swank, an Oscar-winning actress, into a Razzie-winning Lifetime Network role. This review would get a 70% grade and not because its 432 words are nearly half the required length. In order to truly understand the banal nature of the show based on this review, you’d have to watch the show. This review didn’t paint an appropriate picture, so I had to watch the show, and that’s an hour I’ll never get back. Reviews are to pique the interest of readers: writers are not trying to provide in-depth descriptions or full synopses.
By the way, trite, banal, and run-of-the-mill are all synonyms for “common.”
Next Week
The books have been listed on the bookstore’s website since March, so you should have them by today, but I hope you have them by next week. Review the syllabus to keep up with the reading. Here’s what you should have read before next week:
- Rhetorical Grammar “Introduction” (pp. 1-3) and Ch. 1 (pp. 5-16)
- Perfect English Grammar “Introduction” (pp. 11-15) and Ch. 1, 2, & 3 (pp. 16-38)
In two weeks, you’ll have homework based on the exercises in Kolln & Gray’s 8th edition, so get these books soon if you haven’t already.