Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Sun, 5 Apr 1992 16:10:32 EDT
From:         rselfe@MTU.EDU
Subject:      LOOOng message--elements of dissensus

WARNING--LONG MESSAGE ABOUT AN ANALYSIS OF AN E-MAIL
DISCUSSION.

I was hoping to get some direction from some of the excellent
rhetoricians and linguists in this group.  I have collected a
two-month e-mail conference concerning issues in electronic
publishing.  I'm currently looking closely at one strand of
the discussion that dealt with censorship, and the technical
communicator's potential role as censor.  What I'm trying to
do is flesh out the subtleties of what John Trimber calls the
rhetoric of dissensus.  What I think I'm seeing in such
discussions is a type of dissensus that is substantially different than a
simply resistance to the dominant structure of the discussion,
something more akin to a conversational lubricant.
These seem to be techniques that tend to continue/complicate the
conversation, to avoid (what I often see in my classroom
discussions and even in hour-long synchronous electronic
conversations) premature closure on topics of great
complexity (such as censorship and our own complicity in that
censorship).

Anyway, what I'm after are suggestions for the kind of
linguistic or rhetorical "units" that I could look for/count
as I analyze the conversation.  Also, I'm very interested any
sources that would help me with this type of
linguistic/rhetorical analysis.

If you're interested in the content of the discussion and
some of the general trends that I have picked out so far, I've
included below the original message and a series of (what I'm
calling) "elements of dissensus" that I see the participants
using along with excerpts from their messages.

I began the discussion with the following message:

  Date:         Tue, 08 Oct 91 15:16:34 EST
  From:         Dickie Selfe
  Subject:      Pub. Manager as Censor

  In class the other day, we discussed the dilemma that CAP
editors and pub. managers face: we often choose what
information goes into print.  We leave out what we think is
inappropriate or unacceptable.  The question is, how are we
any different than a censor?  Well, we do not wait until
after-the-fact, until the document has already been produced.
But isn't the fact that we ask certain people for articles or
ask only certain people for interviews just as restricting?
In fact in some ways it's is even harder to combat
discrimination and restrictions of this sort because the
audience or public never has a chance to react one way or the
other.  If I have control of a newsletter, and all I ever
allow to go to press are stories and articles that praise the
company, what subtle message does that send to those in the
company who see problems and want the rest of the institution
to debate those problems? I suspect those "problem" articles
never get written.  What are the responsibilities that we
have as people concerned with information flow?  I think
those responsibilities are considerable, and they often
conflict with our need to pay attention to the needs and
wants of a specific audience, a specific boss a picky expert
consultant.  What to do ?  What to do?


USING QUESTIONING STRATEGIES, THE PARTICIPANTS
     DESCRIBED THEIR OWN UNCERTAINTIES AND LEFT THEM
     UNANSWERED (THE UNSTATED QUESTION).
  I'm not sure how to encourage our students to tackle such
  a hidden problem as self-policing, aka censorship.
     COMPLICATED THE PREVIOUS QUESTION.
  Does this mean that the person who is afraid to publish
  the censor?  Or is it the person, party, etc. that causes
  that fear the censor?  Even unknowingly?
     DISCUSSED ANOTHER DISCIPLINE'S OR PROFESSION'S SOLUTIONS
     AND HOW THOSE REMAIN PROBLEMATIC.
  Librarians get around the problem of selection/censorship
  in several ways: 1.develop a "selection policy"--define
  what areas you plan to cover. 2. Determine t he degree of
  coverage (comprehensive, local, worldwide, definite slant)
  3. Determine the level of coverage . . . .  A real problem
  for us is the growth of proprietary information sources.
  Will indexes and abstracts include only materials that
  sell?  What of "freedom of information"?
     REQUESTED ELABORATION ON PREVIOUS EXAMPLES THROUGH A
     SERIES OF QUESTIONS (BOTH RHETORICAL AND REAL).
  Ms is in an interesting situation.  Who are they
  responsible to?  Their subscribers?  Their editorial board?
  Who else?  It seems like an ideal situation, doesn't it?
     SIMPLY ENDED WITH A QUESTION OR SERIES OF QUESTIONS.
    But how far should we take this?  If, for example, I use
  manipulated clip art in a publication, do I credit clip art
  for the original work? Or is clip art considered shareware
  and therefore needs no credit?

IN ORDER TO ILLUSTRATE OTHER PERSPECTIVES, THEY
     AGREED TO A PREVIOUS COMMENT BUT ACKNOWLEDGE HOW OTHERS
     MIGHT DISAGREE.
    In a conversation with another person in our class we
  decided that we are NOT censors just because we deem
  something not appropriate for our publication.  But now . .
  . .
     AGREED BUT DESCRIBED THE MESSENGER'S INITIAL RESISTANCE
     TO THE IDEA.
    At first, when you talked about selecting the information
  to be included/ excluded, I thought you might be heavy
  handed in your choice of "censor" as others might call that
  selection "discrimination" (of the good taste variety).
  But your later surmise . . . .
     AGREED WITH PREVIOUS DISCUSSION THEN INITIATED A NEW
     TOPIC.
    I have read most of your comments and find that I do
  agree with most of them. What I would like to do now is
  bring up a new topic of discussion.

TO FURTHER CLARIFY THEIR OWN CONCERNS, THEY
     ADDED ANOTHER EXAMPLE THAT COMPLICATED THE DISCUSSION.
    I have long worried that media correspondents have not
  asked tough questions of national officials because they
  feared being out of favor in a press corps . . .
     OFFERED COUNTER EXAMPLES.
    . . . we don't really have access or the same ease- of-
  access to alternative information.  Witness what I have to
  go through to actually evaluate, text drive and purchase
  alternative means of transportation.
     BROUGHT IN ANOTHER PROFESSION'S DILEMMAS.
    Librarians, who make a living "selecting" materials are
  very aware of the charges of censorship made to them and
  also resulting from their selections.  They g et it both
  ways.  So do publishers.
     SUGGESTED RELATED AREAS OF EXPLORATION.
    . . . and the issue hits directly on the so-called "well-
  informed citizenry."
     REQUESTED RESPONSES TO A DILEMMA.
    How do we credit someone or some organization (sometimes
  it is a collaborated effort)?  Anyone with thoughts on the
  subject is welcome to respond.
     DESCRIBED REAL-WORLD PROBLEMS THAT DIDN'T FIT NEATLY
     INTO PREVIOUS EXPLANATIONS.
  The idea of a "visual quote" makes sense to me, but in
  what format do we credit the other person, company, etc.,
  and how do we always know who to credit?  Even such a
  seemingly simple item as whether or not to cut off the clip
  art credit because the artist doesn't like how it looks--
  when in fact we have already paid for the art, so DO we
  still need to credit stuff like clip art?-- these questions
  can haunt an editor/newsletter producer with a conscience
  who is on deadline.

TO REFINE THE LANGUAGE BEING USED, THEY
     DISAGREED WITH SOMEONE'S WORD CHOICE.
    I don't think I would call it censorship, but selectivity
  can certainly be discriminatory.
     OFFERED OTHER TERMS FROM ANOTHER DISCIPLINE AND
     DESCRIBED HOW THOSE TERMS CHANGED THE DISCUSSION.
    In the field of visual communication, I've heard the term
  "visual quote," which seems to mean the use of the flavor,
  setting, characters of a famous work of art to evoke a
  certain feeling in another context.
     APPLIED CONCEPTS FROM ANOTHER DISCIPLINE TO THE
     CONCEPT IN QUESTION.
    I mention rhetoric because I believe that editing is a
  type of rhetoric.  It takes out or emphasizes particular
  elements in a communication medium.
     REDEFINED AN IDEA OR DEFINITION TO CLARIFY A PREVIOUS
     STATEMENT.
    When I wrote those questions I wasn't thinking of taking
  someone's work without their permission, but rather
  manipulating the work to change it into something that the
  photographer did not intend.
     EXTENDED A DEFINITION.
    I thought you might be heavy handed in your choice of
  "censor" as others might call that selection
  "discrimination" (of the good taste variety).  But your
  later surmise "I suspect those 'problem' articles never get
  written." is on target with what I find most difficult to
  combat -- self-policing that is bred into people when they
  fear some unnamed authority.

IN ORDER TO CHANGE THE CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK FOR THE
  DISCUSSION, THEY
     EXTEND ED THE CONCEPT TO ANOTHER ENDEAVOR.
    Photomanipulation- As editors/authors of newsletters and
  other publications, are we censors if we manipulate
  photographs electronically?
     SUGGESTED A LARGER FRAMEWORK FOR DISCUSSION.
    After all, if we can't read about certain items in one
  journal, those items, views, etc. are probably available to
  us from a different source, one that we have access to.
     BROUGHT IN EPISTEMOLOGICAL ISSUES (TRUTH CLAIMS VS.
     SOCIALLY CONSTRUCTED KNOWLEDGE).
    News is not news.  It's another, albeit slightly more
  serious, form of entertainment.  The news media is not a
  separate entity, it's almost always part of a larger
  organization (network, publishing family, University,
  etc.) which has a much different agenda that reporting the
  "TRUTH" to the public.
     RANK ORDERED SITUATIONS IN TERMS OF SERIOUSNESS.
    Photomanipulation goes deeper than censoring--in fact, I
  would dispute whether p-m and censoring can be considered
  together.
     SHOWED PARALLEL SOCIAL AND TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS
     THAT INFLUENCED THE TOPIC.
    . . . "(scientific journalism's) history is inseparable
  from the history of the development of scientific thought
  and  even more inextricably bound up with the social
  history of science . . .

AND FINALLY, TO MORE CLEARLY EXPLAIN A PREVIOUS STATEMENT,
  THEY
     GAVE SOME HISTORICAL BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSED THE
     IMPLICATIONS.
    scholarly information (not limited to scientific or
  technological) "sprang from the revival of learning
  (remember this is the late-mid 1600's--1665 to be exact),
  from the need to review its fruits and the wish to diffuse
  its spirit as widely as possible."
     GAVE ALTERNATIVE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND AND DISCUSSED
     THOSE IMPLICATIONS.
    Matts comments about Columbus is just one point.  Our
  history is loaded with this sort of thing.  Why did they
  leave this sort of thing out of the telling of history?
  Did they just miss it? Did they innocently think it wasn't
  important?  I have to question their motive even if it may
  be buried deep inside.
     QUOTED AUTHORITIES AND SHOWED HOW THE QUOTE ADDED TO ONE
     SIDE OF THE DISCUSSION.
    According to the Encyclopeadia Britannica and to Dave
  Kronick's "A History of Scientific and Technical
  Periodicals" the beginnings of such publications were to
  share information.
     CITED SOURCES FOR FURTHER READING.


This list, if anything, is an indication of how involved and
multifaceted e-mail discussions can become   My claim is that
the concept of dissensus encompasses more than the overt and
covert acts of refusal by students to 'buy into' the
institutional hegemony of the classroom.  Of course it is
important for us to acknowledge and incorporate into our
planning what Brooks calls disruptive underlife activities
(1987).  These types of resistances have a rather direct
impact on our goals as teachers: I had a student who refused
to join the conference I had worked so hard to set up.

But as important, perhaps more important, are the subtle
aspects of dissensus that allow our students to participate
directly, even passionately, in discussions of important
issues.  When their questions, points of information, and
arguments stand for themselves in a public forum, they
suddenly become more responsible for some of the educational
goals that I, typically, try to sustain in class:

     They have the opportunity to see, respond to, and
practice using an impressive variety of rhetorical devices.
     They have some control over the discussion by choosing
the topics to which they respond, and the amount of
importance they play in the conference is very likely related
to how well they present their suggestions, answers,
examples, questions and arguments.
     They must deal with divergence and multiple perspectives
from within and outside of the university.
     and finally, using the collaborative architecture of e-
mail conferences, they may work towards a consensus of
understanding differences.   But what they agree on may not
necessarily look like the top-down, business-as-usual
agreement of classroom consensus.  Electronic conferences
have the potential to be more elaborated and to take many
more turns in direction, they may never seem to resolve the
issues at hand, they may be more fragmented and disjointed.
Dickie Selfe   rselfe@mtu.edu  (NEW ADDRESS!!!)
1400 Townsend--102 Walker
Michigan Technological U.
Houghton, MI  49931
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU