1: Liberal arts & technical writing

Rutter writes that “a project manager at a large electronics firm told me…that writers, to succeed at his company, have to do more than just write fluently. Technical writing, he said, is one-third writing proficiency, one-third problem-solving skill, and one-third ability to work with other people” (21). I do not consider myself a technical writer, and would be intimidated to find myself in a position where I had to apply for jobs in the industry, but I agree with this project manager’s conclusion. Being a good writer is not just being fluent in writing; a good writer is proficient, critical and intelligent, and personable. My understanding is that technical writers have become the liaisons between those split in the dichotomy laid out by Connors. According to Connors there were the engineering folk and the English folk, and I’ve come to define technical writers as those who speak “engineerese” and “English” and can get along with, clearly communicate with, and translate for both sides. I argue that, in many ways, technical writers are Renaissance people—they have to excel in many areas in order to succeed in their field.

This raises a point of personal interest for me, an opinion I’ve become more and more vested in with each course I’ve taken in WVU’s PWE master’s program. I attended a small, private liberal arts university for my undergraduate degree. There, I was required to dabble in a variety of departments while still declaring a major with an area of emphasis. I declared English with an emphasis in Fiction Writing and for four years took close to a 50/50 load of courses: English with psychology, sociology, art, math, and natural science, to name a few. And when I graduated with that English degree in hand, I had no intentions of being a teacher (skills for which I’d never been trained) or a novelist (skills for which I, arguably, again had never been trained, despite my emphasis in fiction). I wanted to travel, become a photographer, and write for a lifestyle and travel magazine—all skills for which I had experienced no training in my time at this self-touted, diversity-focused, expensive liberal arts university. I realized only after the fact—in my first job at a PR firm and now six years later in my master’s program—that I had few practical skills. And despite current opinions, like Rutter’s and his project manager friend, that a technical writer must be someone who can write well, think critically and problem solve, and play well with others (a sort of well-roundedness one arguably picks up at a liberal arts institution), I find myself reacting to these sentiments with a cry for more practicality! Where are the business letter writing courses of yore? I feel the need for a “complete reaction” against the overly-humanistic training so many college students receive today (Connors 7). Did I choose poorly in attending a liberal arts school? Should I have, instead, looked toward vocational schools or programs, or were public and state universities offering something my small, private university wasn’t?

I think our institutions of higher education are missing the target on a happy balance between “bread and butter” practicality and theoretical practicality (61). The way I interpret Miller’s argument is that the bread and butter is what’s going to get things done, these are the skills that will put food on your table (and the skills I feel I missed out on), while the high-sense practicality is what will keep the world turning, it’s the skills I gleaned from my days at undergrad—problem solving, critical thinking, and… . Of course, Connors illustrated it in his history of technical writing and Miller confirms it is still an issue, that technical writing is considered “practical in the low sense” (62). And as a young college student, and even now, as a young professional, I certainly, personally, don’t consider technical writing the lowest of the low, but rather still have this perception that technical writing, though challenging and important as it seems to be, is dry…dense…uncreative…even soulless (as one friend who worked for a few years as a project manager at an international pharmaceutical company once called technical writing). And that dryness, more than unfamiliarity of the skill/practice, is what I find most intimidating about technical writing.

I don’t know exactly what I’m postulating here (probably the impossible—a technical writing department within all English departments). I understand that I would have had to have chosen Technical Writing as my field of study if that’s what I wanted to do when I grow up. But it’s not what I want to do when I grow up. I’m still holding tight to that traveler/photographer/writer shtick. But what I’m wondering is: why has technical writing not been more a part of my training? Is there a genre of technical writing relevant to lifestyle-magazine writers? If I’m not writing manuals and don’t have a need to write reports, why do I still feel the need for more practical training? And practical training in what? I used to get asked all the time, when people found out I was an English major, what I wanted to do with my degree: teach? No. Write a book? No. Then, what? And it’s a good question, I think. Technical writers can go anywhere, it seems (I still know very little of the industry—technical, professional, or otherwise), and write manuals or work for technology or pharmaceutical or science or medical companies. Right? But what do I do with my ability to make up stories? I feel like I’ve converted, like I’ve betrayed those from whence I came, but fiction writing? I wonder if it’s not more the low sense of practical. (Creative nonfiction—i.e. lifestyle magazine writing—could be placed in that same category as far as its contribution to our world’s better good or its usefulness is concerned.)

Miller says: “We seem, that is, uncertain about where to locate norms, about whether the definition of ‘good writing’ is to be derived from academic knowledge or from nonacademic practices” (62).  I gained some of that academic knowledge in college and have spent many years making up for what sometimes feels like four years of lost time honing my nonacademic practices, and I can’t help but wonder about whether a solid foundation of good writing was laid at my undergrad university, or if I became a better writer because someone took a chance and gave me a (nonacademic) job?

WORKS CITED

Connors, Robert J. “The Rise of Technical Writing Instruction in America.” Central Works in Technical Communication. Eds. Johndan Johnson-Eilola and Stuart A. Selber. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. 3-19. Print.

Miller, Carolyn R. “What’s Practical About Technical Writing?” Professional Writing and Rhetoric: Readings from the Field. Ed. Tim Peeples. New York: Addison Wesley Educational Publishers, 2003. 61-70. Print.

Rutter, Russell. “History, Rhetoric, and Humanism: Toward a More Comprehensive Definition of Technical Communication.” Central Works in Technical Communication. Eds. Johndan Johnson-Eilola and Stuart A. Selber. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. 20-34. Print.

3 comments

  1. Jillian Swisher

    Like you, Rachel, I also left a liberal arts undergraduate education feeling like I had little to no practical skill under my belt to take to the job market. I couldn’t compose a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats Analysis on a company like my friends in business could, and I couldn’t wrap a swollen ankle like my friends in physical therapy could. I totally agree with you: at first glance, it doesn’t appear that majoring in English afford undergraduates many practical skills. I think that’s why I appreciated Rutter’s article so much, though. His ability to point out the benefits of a liberal education and the skills (although not as practical as wrapping a swollen ankle) with which those students walk into the job market was quite encouraging for me. It’s so easy for us to doubt ourselves and our abilities going into the job market, but our educations thus far have given us “power to see, power to choose, power to design new solutions” (32). Like Rutter explains, the ability to speak and write well will always be in demand. It’s convenient that my friend only has to search for jobs within the field of Physical Therapy (and I envy that convenience to an extent), but it’s empowering that we have the opportunity to work within countless fields. Also, as much as I sometimes yearn for classes in which I could simply be taught how to write a requirements specifications document or a user manual, I keep telling myself that I’ll be able to pick up those “practical” skills while I’m in the field with no problem because of my education in writing, problem solving, critical thinking, audience awareness, etc.

    • Rachel

      Jillian, I completely agree. I was actually quite taken with Rutter and felt hopeful after reading his article and thinking: all right, someone else out there gets it. Like you, I find myself constantly reassuring myself that my interpersonal skills and “mad” writing skills (haha) and ability to learn and be taught will ultimately land me any job I pursue. But I think you alluded to one issue: that we English majors, or liberal arts grads, sometimes lack the confidence to walk into an office and say: boom, this is what I can do for you. Definite. Clear cut. A skill set. I think my continued hesitation, a branch of what I wrote about originally, is that I wonder how aware our future, potential employers are. Do they, like Rutter, recognize the invaluability of “the development of people as people,” and not just a set of qualifying (or not) experiences?

      Again, I think Rutter raises some really strong and intriguing points: that “workplace writing is not well understood,” that further research into workplace culture will also better supplement our liberal arts backgrounds, and that technical communicators “have reached their enviable wisdom after several career changes and many years of work… People like this cannot be manufactured routinely in colleges and universities, no matter what cirriculum is available” (30-31). I certainly can’t deny that I gained something from my liberal education. I certainly know more than I did 10 years ago and could arguably be called a (somewhat) “sensible, informed, articulate” citizen (32). And I truly love his language: “With the advent of the information revolution, a communication revolution that focuses in large part on the human being, all that belongs to our personality, is valuable—what we sense, what we imagine, what we feel, what we think” (32). The idealist in me, which is the greater part of who I am, clings to this with an overwhelming hope that all it will take to succeed and live a fully and happy life is to be this whole and good person Rutter envisions. But his article and our other readings still have me wondering: is that ideal marketable? Perhaps it’s a consequence of having “come of age” in this economic schlump, but I feel like the “cold, hard” factual, practical edge of technical communications (more than the liberal arts’ humanities) is what sells.

      Obviously, I’m torn. I buy into Rutter’s call for humanness wholeheartedly. And struggle to sell my humanness in job interviews. :-)

  2. crdepottey

    I have had a similar experience with my liberal arts undergraduate education. While I graduated confident that I could analyze one of Shakespeare’s plays and write a creative fiction story, I felt that I had little practical experience that could help me find a job. I never learned grammar in a school setting (I basically taught myself), and I was taught how to make a resume only as a graduating senior. I do value my liberal education very highly; I think that without it, I would not have been able to teach myself many of the skills that I now possess. It has allowed me to be flexible, to adapt to new situations, and to seek innovative solutions to problems. On the other hand, I do think that there should have been at least one solely “practical” English course that was required. Because so many of my professors focused on increasing critical thinking skills, rather than on the practical aspects of writing – grammar, syntax, good constructions for arguments – I had to teach myself many skills.