Playing with Techne: A Propaedeutic for Technical Communication

Tech Writing, Meet Tomb Raider: Video and Computer Games in the Technical Communication Classroom

“…For some technical writing students, the prospect of spending an entire semester reviewing the traditional assignments -résumé writing, usability studies, even software documentation -is met with a sense of begrudging obligation. As Moeller and McAllister (2002) point out, many college students enroll in technical writing courses with a limited view of what writing is like in this field: 'Students usually believe, initially at least, that their work needs to be 'technical' -related to numbers or highly specialized theoretical or applied scientific knowledge, for example, in order to be good ' (p. 191). At the outset many assume that learning to compose in the technical writing classroom simply entails the production of a series of lock-step genres of writing, each discrete from the next: the memo, the résumé, the lab report, the instructional document, and so on.…”

Craft and Narrative in DIY Instructions

“…In conveying craft knowledge through narratives, authors writing many entries on the Web site, Instructables.com, accomplish what Moeller and McAllister (2002) have called for in their reconsideration of the value of the rhetorical concept of techne for technical communication:…”

“…Moeller and McAllister (2002) noted how misleading a sidebar in such a manual can be when it describes the ''trick'' professional roofers use to efficiently pound in roofing nails with one swift hammer stroke and suggests that readers can learn the trick simply by following the instructions. This ability is not learned conceptually: It is an embodied knowledge, earned through practice.…”