Newsgroups: bit.listserv.mbu-l
Date:         Wed, 30 Sep 1992 09:22:16 EST
From:         "(Gary Beason)" <bubba@MACE.CC.PURDUE.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Computer vs? Writing
              at Sep 29, 92 8:05 am

Since Jim's post ties in with the conversation Eric and others have
been having, I'm reacting via Jim's post.


> want to deny that I see some connection, but the connection
> I see is relatively slight. On my campus, we teach written
> reasoning, and when we focus consistently on question,
> thesis, reasons, structures--the global issues of an
> argumentative essay--we make a lot of progress. Any time we
> spend on formatting, fonts, style sheets, and so on is time
> taken away from our primary goals. It's different, I think,
> for tech writing or professional writing or business
> writing. There the connection is closer. Although there the
> danger of conflating the teaching of writing with the
> teaching of computer use is probably greater, too.
>   A course in written reasoning, which is what our first
> year composition course is, is not a course on what the
> computer will do, or what current software can do. We can't

I think "structure" is a key word in terms of understanding the
relation between learning about the computers and about writing.  All
the things you mention about formatting and design are means of
structuring.  Consider that now Word now offers graphic
capabilities--students now have even an easier access to visual
structures.

That formatting and related issues are more relevant to professional
writing suggests that such courses have less to do with writing than
with "structures."

The fact is that structures are argumentative.  Formatting *is*
writing in that it deals with all those goals you noted,
Jim--reasoning, focusing, arguing.  Structuring the text visually
throws the writers back into the lap of the audience.

If nothing else, design decisions communicate an ethos of the writer.

> a little training. The purpose of the word processor will be
> to make writing and revising easier. I want to make the
> technology a medium instead of an object as quickly as
> possible.

I've thought about this issue of transparency--it's assumed that
writers should work "beyond" the technology.  I understand the level
at which y'all are speaking:  interaction with the technology without
communication impediments.

But if the goal is to have students commmunicate via computers with
the same sort of oblivion/unconsciousness/? as writers have with
pencils, then why are we working with computers and writing?

At a certain point, it is fecund for the students to focus on the
computer as medium/object.  It's not so much a choice between "medium"
or "object" but one between an awareness of the computer as impacting
on communication decision and attention to the computer as machine, as
something to be understood for machine purposes.

And I say fecund because when my students learn something as simple as
using borders in MSWords, they've learned some design tool but a means
of structuring an argument in their resumes. And they become
interested in what else the

What I try to do is to combine learning about the computer and the
software with learning about communication principles and decisions.

I know this point has been made in this thread, and that Jim did
acknowledge it, but I wanted to rework the terms of the relationship,
if I could.

-----

Gary Beason			 bubba@mace.cc.purdue.edu
Purdue University, English       bubba@expert.cc.purdue.edu (Eudora)
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU