The Golden Age of Technical Communication

Kimball, Miles A.

doi:10.1177/0047281616641927

Cited by 47 publications

(18 citation statements)

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“…The dramatic emergence of digital technology has made the investigation of multimodal phenomena in communication being captured more vividly. Furthermore, the technology enables a more specific domain like technical communication to be one of the most important aspects of human life [5]. Technical communication is defined as "the ability to analyze rhetorical situations, to learn and apply generic conventions intelligently in context, to use technologies to speak effectively to diverse audiences and to solve human problems through better communication" [3].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multimodality in Proximal Deixis in English as a Foreign Language for Technical Presentation

Antoni¹,

Puspita²

2019

Proceedings of the International Conference on Social Sciences, Humanities, Economics and Law

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Using verbal and other modes are inevitable when language is functioned as a device for meaning-making both in native and non-native English communication contexts. This study investigates what modes are used by non-native speakers when using English proximal deictic expressions "this/these/here" in presenting the technical process of making a brochure as a promotional tool of an Indonesian state Polytechnic profile. A multimodal discourse analysis was employed in this study. The research data were taken from video-recorded presentations of the students of a multimedia study program at an Indonesian polytechnic and annotated using ELAN software. The participants were chosen based on their score of an English readiness assessment provided by a professional third party. It was found that the speakers used the proximal deixis in together with various movements of body parts like fingers, head, palm, and postures. This study also reveals that the use of various modes in the technical process can function as a sign for locating what has been mentioned through verbal discourses, a clarification of the technicalities in the presentation materials, or compensation for certain vocabularies. The relevance of this study to technical English communication competence for students in vocational education context is also discussed.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multimodality in Proximal Deixis in English as a Foreign Language for Technical Presentation

Antoni¹,

Puspita²

2019

Proceedings of the International Conference on Social Sciences, Humanities, Economics and Law

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“…Thus, since cross industry relationships include the interaction with a much wider amount of stakeholders, communicating professionals get involved in sophisticated forms of workplace and public communication: "with sophisticated knowledge comes the need for sophisticated conversational skills" (Freeman, 2003, p. 165). So, the modern epoch has deserved to be called "the golden age of technical communication" (Kimball, 2016), which requires training technical communicators as "discourse workers" (Wilson & Wolford, 2016). Clearly, to complete professional tasks successfully in today's demanding workplace, a modern engineer is expected to demonstrate a greater degree of communicative flexibility.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nonverbal Component Of Engineer’s Communicative Competence

Tareva¹

2018

The European Proceedings of Social and Behavioural Sciences

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This paper explores the communicative competence of engineering professionals engaging in global communication. The authors highlight the need for expanding knowledge of the elements that constitute the second language (L2) communicative competence in global encounters within engineering practice. Among the least emphasized components are non-verbal vocal characteristics of a technical speaker that count the most for the message to be accepted at all the stages of any engineering project. The research sets a twofold aim: to evaluate and increase the level of engineering students' self-knowledge of their nonverbal features specific for a technical presentation. As a first step, the presentations from Russian learners of both undergraduate and postgraduate level were recorded and rated by IT professionals for a number of vocal characteristics. As a second step, the students engaged in self-reflective practice on the survey data and took part in the critical listening of models and anti-models of technical presentations. As a result, a set of specific oral challenges for engineering students was identified, as well as the lack of students' awareness of vocal tools to convey an adequate and clear message. The study's implications for teaching and future research include that more emphasis should be placed on the development of oral skills with a special focus on non-verbal delivery techniques being an integral part of effective intercultural technical communication and a key to professional success, previously ignored in the curriculum planning.

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“…However, a Google Search shows that in 2013, a blogger named "Aaron" coined the term "tertiary documentation" in this 2013 blog post: https://sharknet.us/2013/11/29/categorizing-documentation/. tertiary documentation (Kimball, 2016;Spinuzzi, 2009), but they have not yet sufficiently studied SQA documentation.…”

Section: Sqa Communication As Reaction and Interactionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As Spinuzzi (2009) notes, the sites' users who answer questions, whom I will call "answerers" (Gazan, 2011(Gazan, , p. 2305, "become active writers as they answer each other's questions about even the most specific and localized cases" (p. 256). This ability of askers and answerers to generate technical content has caused Kimball (2016) to argue that we exist in the "Golden Age" of technical communication, observing that, "at no time in human history have more people . .…”

Section: Chapter I: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contextual information, answerability, and the logical construction of social how-to questions

Baker

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The Golden Age of Technical Communication

Abstract: This article uses a historical perspective to describe the development of the profession of technical communication through three ages: Brass, Beige, and Glass.

Cited by 47 publications

References 47 publications

Multimodality in Proximal Deixis in English as a Foreign Language for Technical Presentation

Multimodality in Proximal Deixis in English as a Foreign Language for Technical Presentation

Nonverbal Component Of Engineer’s Communicative Competence

Contextual information, answerability, and the logical construction of social how-to questions

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