IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO.

3, SEPTEMBER 2009

303

Devising Collective Knowledges for the Technical Writing

Classroom: A Course-Based Approach to Using Web 2.0
Writing Technologies in Collaborative Work
Tutorial
Feature by
J. A. RICE
AbstractTechnical and professional writing pedagogies have traditionally understood collaborative writing as an
aggregate, cooperative venture between writers and subject matter experts. In contrast, this tutorial argues that Web
2.0 technologies offer technical and professional communication pedagogies more advantageous conceptions and
practices of collaborative writing. The tutorial analyzes how new media technologies create a different collaborative
writing environment and then discusses how these environments help collaborative writing methods create an
alternative writing situation. The study concludes by examining the outcomes of student Web 2.0 research projects
and by offering technical and professional writing instructors new pedagogical strategies for teaching collaborative
writing.
Index TermsCollaboration, environment, introduction to technical writing, knowledge production, pedagogy,
rhetoric, Web 2.0, writing.

With the onset of the information economy,

one of the more fundamental challenges technical
and professional writing instructors face is the
conceptual and practical relationship among
technology, knowledge, and pedagogical application.
As Spinuzzi claims, the primary difficulty the
information-economy context presents is how
instructors will devise new teaching strategies
that address the coordinative, polycontextual,
crossdisciplinary work that splices together
divergent work activities (separated by time, space,
organizations, and objectives) and that enables
the transformations of information and texts that
characterize work [1, p. 266]. Indicative of this
challenge is the role collaborative writing plays in
both the classroom and general academic practice.
Though many instructors emphasize collaborative
writing as a cornerstone of their classroom
pedagogy, they often overlook the rhetorical and
dynamic opportunities Web 2.0 technologies offer
students technical writing practices.
Manuscript received November 15, 2008; revised February 11,
2009. Current version published August 21, 2009.
The author is with the University Writing Program, University of
Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 USA (email: jarice@ufl.edu).
This paper has supplementary downloadable material at
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org, provided by the authors. These files
are the technical manual and feasibility report assignment
prompts and rubrics as well as the ITW syllabus. This material
is 113 kB in size.
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are
available online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
IEEE 10.1109/TPC.2009.2025310

0361-1434/$26.00 2009 IEEE

The social and recursive collaborative writing

methods found in Web 2.0 practices help reconceive
collaborative writing to better address the contexts
and methods of the information economy.
Specifically, when collaboration is understood as
a collective and contingent rhetorical situation,
writers are able to produce documents and projects
that emphasize the production of knowledge and
not how that knowledge was created or who created
it. Accordingly, the purpose of this tutorial is to
outline and develop key pedagogical strategies and
ideas through a technical writing course based in
the intersections of writing, rhetorical theory, and
collaborative knowledge production. By imagining
these conceptual intersections differently, technical
writing instruction can move away from models of
collaborative writing based in individual knowledges
and toward a more collective knowledge production.

COLLABORATIVE WRITING PRACTICES AND WEB

2.0 ENVIRONMENTS
The difficult relationship that collaborative writing,
knowledge production, and technological contexts
share is the result of a conceptual discrepancy
between traditional technical writing instruction
paradigms and the new technological contexts
that challenge them. Traditionally conceived,
collaborative writing pedagogies and practices are
emphasized as a mode of knowledge construction
between various group members. In technical
and professional writing scholarship, this method

304

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2009

of knowledge construction is representatively

conceived through problem-solving approaches,
dialogical groups, or hierarchical methods. For
problem-solving approaches, collaborative writing
is a matter of planning and coordinating; [and]
although groups may need to judge, discussion
and consensus building are not the predominant
characteristics [2, p. 235]. Though it may seem
like group dynamics are a distant concern, the
determined scope of problem-solving methods
translates group concerns into a formalized,
regulatory logic. Problem-solving approaches
therefore frequently signify this translation by
focusing on such organizational principles as
coordination or group awareness, regardless of
whether they are face-to-face or technologically
distributed [3], [4]. In a similar vein, dialogical
conceptions of collaborative writing envision
knowledge construction as a dynamically
negotiated process, where the goal of the process
is to derive a common language and taxonomy that
groups best thinking [5, p. 34].
represents the
As a result, dialogical collaborative concepts and
practices tend to be divided more symmetrically,
without a single participant dominating the
conversation; multiple topics might be raised at
the same time, and [members] responses may
overlap one another [6, p. 444]. Departing slightly
from the assertions that ground problem-solving
approaches and dialogical groups, hierarchical
constructions realize the relationship between
collaborative writing and knowledge construction
as an institutional affair. In hierarchies, writers
often outline, devise, and work with other
writers and/or subject matter experts (SMEs)
to create coherent professional documents and
projects. In such a model, writers work within
a hierarchical structure of writers and SMEs,
while academic instruction and goals creat[e]
collaborative research engagements with local
agencies to produce analyses of needs assessment,
communications training, and other professional
services [7, p. 311]. Of course, this also means that
collaboration entails maintaining strict, pragmatic
boundaries that give group members roles with
which they are familiar, even if individuals may
learn each others roles and expertises over a
course of time [8, p. 197].
Of these three collaborative methods, hierarchical
constructions seem to be the preferred pedagogical
model, especially since technical writing
textbooks predominantly use hierarchies to define
collaborative writing ideas and practices. Like
technical and professional writing scholarship,

technical writing textbooks articulate collaboration

as a method of knowledge construction. However,
textbooks further complicate these collaborative
premises by transforming contextualized writing
practices into idealized imperatives. Here,
hierarchical strategies are decontextualized into
abstract, guiding principles that aim to quell
potential problems of group management. As
a part of collaborative writing practices, for
example, students are advised to appoint a group
manager, define a clear and definite goal, [and]
identify the type of document required [9, p.
97]. Once this structure is put into conceptual
and real practice, students can then better
understand the advantages and disadvantages of
collaborative writing, such as how [it] draws on
a greater knowledge base and helps acclimate
new employees to an organization, while also
running the risk of lead[ing] to groupthink
[10, p. 47]. Beyond these distinct functional
parameters, students are additionally encouraged
to practice collaboration as an extension of their
daily social interactions. Much like discussing
different driving directions, collaborative writing
is a matter of taking time to talk with others
about the information in order to spark new
ideas [11, p. 134]. As a reflection of their everyday
social interactions and familiar cultural literacies,
students collaborative writing practices therefore
work to piece bits of information and organ[ize]
and rev[ise] that information into useful, readable
documents [11, p. 153].
Although these traditional ideas of collaborative
work are pedagogically reliable, they can potentially
limit writing pedagogies to a static and relatively
underdeveloped conception of collaborative writing.
Consider, for instance, how these accounts outline
the relationship between knowledge production and
individual writers. By addressing the paradigmatic
conjunction between, say, writers and SMEs,
teaching strategies and goals like those above often
base their practice in a conception of a collaborative
aggregation, where individual writers come
together to produce a jointly written document.
In both collaborative writing scholarship and
pedagogical practice, these aggregate paradigms
create a rhetorical context that prioritizes an
individuals contribution by using both descriptive
language, like the examples mentioned earlier,
and strategies for group organization, such as
the following: Members of your team will begin
to accept their responsibilities and their role in
the project [12, p. 371]. This firm distinction
between writer and knowledge production is further

RICE: DEVISING COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGES FOR THE TECHNICAL WRITING CLASSROOM

complicated when more traditional definitions

of collaborative work influence how writers do
such work in newer technological contexts, as is
the case, for example, in industry wikis. In these
contexts, work is distributed via decentralized
and/or networked technological environments,
but writers and SMEs maintain traditional
roles. These static conceptions and practices of
collaboration often make successful group writing
that much more difficult because distributed work
environments challenge team members attention
and commitment to the project in ways that
localized environments do not [13, p. 335]. As a
result of this aggregate paradigm, the contingent
and collaborative dimensions of both workplace
writing and knowledge are overlooked by rhetorical
concepts that emphasize individual writers and
not writing, and group formalization and not
collaboration.
This paradigmatic disconnect between writer and
knowledge production undoubtedly informs how
technical writing pedagogies are realized in the
classroom. Indeed, in a questionnaire administered
after a unit on collaborative writing, most technical
writing students felt that the textbooks had not
improved their collaborative skills and/or had not
clearly delineated how collaborative writing offered
any new skill, critical or otherwise. The following
items are some of the more representative student
comments:
Our group did not come up with any good ideas.
Im not sure why groupwork is necessary in a
writing class. I can work better on my own.
Maybe we did not understand the book good
enough but my group had a hard time following
the outlines.
This chapter does not tell us what to do in a group,
just what not to do in a group.
It was boring.
We got along okay.
It was annoying to have to constantly try to get in
touch and meet to do the work.
Did not read it.
The book is ok. Although it does not explain how
to do group research very well.
Group writing is a waste.
Our group did not do a good job distributing the
work.
The textbooks suggestions only helped a little bit.
Textbook sucks.
Though these comments attend to both conceptual
and practical issues, they nonetheless collectively
highlight how aggregate conceptions of collaborative
writing complicate gaps between what it means

305

to be a writer and what it means to produce

knowledge.
In some respects, the aggregate paradigm persists
because traditional forms of collaborative work rely
on outdated technologies that do not resemble
those newer technologies users are familiar
with. When traditional forms of collaborative
technologylike document-sharing programs,
email, IM, and so forthlocate individuals
as distinct from the constant and immediate
connectivity that newer technologies seem to offer,
users cannot determine how these collaborative
technologies synthesize what they have learned
or how they should employ those new processes
in different situations. Usersin this case,
studentsknow how to operate newer consumer
technologies like text messaging, Facebook, and
iPods to their fullest functional and social extent,
but cannot figure out (or do not care to learn) how
the traditional methods/standards of professional
communication create a group dynamic. But
rather than categorizing their inability to research
and collaborate efficiently as a deficiency in
critical skills, I consider these difficulties to
represent a minor shift in epistemological and
social logics. Unlike the outdated collaborative
technologies, students do not construct knowledge
or informational contexts through conversation
or research; instead, they rely on a referential,
affective technological environment that is just as
dependent on space, time, and context as it is on
users and predetermined purposes. When asked
to research some small factoid, most students will
simply pull out their iPhone, and find whatever
term, picture, or fact is needed at that moment,
and then relay it to the immediate context.
Consequently, this technological principle suggests
that the method and purpose of working with
both information and others is to fundamentally
discount neither. To collaborate, to create dialogic
knowledge about some task or bit of information,
means to rely on both how information produces
the immediate context and that context itself. And
since we never leave the referential technological
contextwe do, after all, keep our cell phones,
text messaging devices, and Google search
engines within reach at all timesthe context,
and its networked logic, is how we fundamentally
understand information and others. Obviously,
such referential, decentralized logic sharply
contrasts with the planned, hierarchical, and
process-driven collaborative strategies often
deployed in traditional technical writing contexts.

306

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2009

If these newer technologies are indeed the

socialityor perhaps cultural literacyof todays
technical writing contexts, then the social and
connective bases of new internet technologies
have problematized the processes and foci of
technical and professional writing well beyond
traditional conceptions. Collaborative technical
writing pedagogies will therefore need to adjust
both their theories and practices to account for this
new paradigm shift.
Consider, for instance, how Web 2.0 and
new media technologies exemplify the social,
collaborative connectivity often found in more
consumerist technologies, like iPhones. Websites
and internet writing technologies articulate
a different collaborative environment, where
knowledge production is not limited to an aggregate
collaboration between SMEs and technical
writers. New media sites that are designed
for and encourage interaction from multiple
and anonymous userslike YouTube, blogs,
message boards, wikis, and so ondo not relegate
collaborative processes and practices to a particular
method, group formation, or environment. Rather,
these sites reorganize collaboration as a temporary
instance in an indeterminable context. YouTube,
for example, allows users to create and upload
videos and then revise and reject, produce a
channel (genre), create video responses to other
users videos. In the YouTube tutorial You Suck
at Photoshop, users disseminate and (re)direct
information to and from other social networking
sites, while simultaneously creating temporary
and flexible directories that reorganize the videos
(rhetorical) strengths and weaknesses. As a result
of this collaborative effort, the initial creator of
You Suck at Photoshop addressed other users
suggestions and revised his tutorial accordingly.
However, his video series also prompted other users
to create supplementary, alternative Photoshop
tutorials that are linked to and exist alongside You
Suck at Photoshop. As such, the collaborative
rhetorical context and dynamic of the You Suck
at Photoshop tutorial focuses more on the
interchangeability and contingency of information
processes and equivalent exchanges than it does on
the creators or group formations.
But perhaps most important, Web 2.0 technologies
create newer and more complex systems of
interactive information processes that situate
knowledge and group collaboration within reflexive
technological environments. Like YouTube, social
networking and tagging sites, such as Facebook
and Delicious, allow users to produce and alter

profile pages/accounts according to personal

desires and fluid technological contexts. But unlike
YouTube, these sites technological environment
also autonomously changesrevises, recommends,
alters, and so onuser pages according to user
history. The social bookmarking site Delicious, for
instance, not only collects information according
to my search terms, but also creates a reflexive
database out of related topics, themes, search
popularity, other users suggestions, subscriptions,
and networks. In such a scenario, both technology
and flesh-and-blood users have the ability
to revise and incorporate information based
solely on contextual participation, regardless of
collaborative role or knowledge in subject matter.
In Web 2.0 environments, collaborative writing
is not only a practical tool, but also a fluid,
dialogical situation that exists among writers,
objects, and the informational contexts. This
contingent and reflexive collaborative dynamic is
what sociologist Latour describes as a collective
interaction or organization: the association of
humans and nonhumans and society [14, p. 4].
In Latours view, collaborative writing in Web 2.0
environments would suggest that there is no real
distinction between writers and SMEs. Rather,
collaborative writing would entail an engagement
between the productive capacities of technological
and informational environments and the work
sequences, networks, and techniques of argument
that the various writers use to constitute them [15,
p. 188]. As a result, collaborative and collective
writing that derives from new media practices
considers how collaboration and writing occur in
various technological environmentsincluding
what rhetorical opportunities are afforded in those
environments.
By realizing the dynamic relationship between
writing and knowledge, Web 2.0 technologies alter
some of the fundamental assumptions collaborative
writing pedagogies hold. Instead of writing for
a predetermined purpose, writing pedagogies
can, within professional limitations, consistently
create writing strategies and purposes at the
same time. More important, in an ever-changing
informational landscape, such pedagogical
strategies help realize the rhetorical conditions
of every writing environment, including the
processes by which information creates those
environments. Teaching technical and professional
writing for the information economy would
therefore also mean attending to information
mediation in addition to the more traditional
issues of feasibility, usability, and practicality. But

RICE: DEVISING COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGES FOR THE TECHNICAL WRITING CLASSROOM

concentrating on information mediation does not

mean teaching new, decontextualized rhetorical
skills. Rather, interactive pedagogies address every
communicative interaction as an invested and
temporary rhetorical situation. As Kent notes,
this means understanding that communicative
interaction[s] cannot be predicted in advance and
that all meaningful utterances exist in an already
rhetoricized condition [16, p. 16]. And since new
media writing environments will rapidly change in
form, categorization methodology, writing modes,
and so on, collective writing has to navigate the
environmental alterations in an effort to create
meaningful and practical knowledge. Writing
and collaboration, therefore, would cease to be
pedagogical and technical concepts; instead, they
would signify particular and reflexive rhetorical
moments within an indeterminate writing situation.

COLLABORATIVE WRITING IN THE COLLECTIVE

CONTEXTS OF WEB 2.0: PEDAGOGICAL
ORIENTATIONS
Shifting pedagogical practice from static
conceptions of collaborative writing to instances
of collective interaction means focusing on what
writing and Web 2.0 environments can do for both
knowledge production and pedagogical strategies.
Since Web 2.0 technologies stress the conceptual
and rhetorical relationship between knowledge and
environment, the Introduction to Technical Writing
(ITW) course discussed here was designed to engage
with these new technologies contextual dynamics.
This particular course was developed over five
semesters at the University of Florida (UF), a public
land-grant research institution that educates more
than 48,000 full- and part-time students. Like
most large, public universities, UF requires many
professional majors to take an ITW course as their
disciplinary writing requirement. Because of this
general requirement, it is not uncommon for a
single ITW course to represent diverse disciplines
and knowledge bases, such as mechanical
engineering, nursing, and landscape architecture.
Most of these students have either had UFs
introductory composition courses (Introduction
to Rhetoric and College Writing; Introduction to
Argument and Persuasion) or have tested out
of such requirements via Advanced Placement
credits. Perhaps more important, because many
ITW students are not required to take another
professional writing course at UF, they are expected
to achieve industry-level writing competency by the
end of the term.

307

To help account for such diverse rosters and

writing experiences, ITW courses generally take a
skills-based approach to technical research and
composition. This approach is primarily achieved
through a common textbook and a standardized
syllabus. In this tutorial course, 19 students
(10 male, 9 female) were asked to learn how to
construct basic technical documents, collect
and test information, and work collaboratively
toward a common project goal. To help students
understand the reflexive rhetorical relationship
between technical communication, collaborative
practices, and new media technologies, the course
was structured according to three interrelated
thematic units: Unit 1: Rhetoric & Technical
Communication, Unit 2: Web 2.0 Technologies
& Collaborative Technical Writing, and Unit 3:
Using Technical Writing to Solve Real Problems.
(A complete sample ITW syllabus is available
online as supplementary downloadable material at
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. Also available online are
the assignments discussed in this paper.) Students
started the term with a brief study of rhetoric,
specifically the ideas of Aristotle and Kent. This
first unit began in the middle of the first week and
extended to the end of the second week, and also
laid the groundwork for working with both the
genre conventions of technical writing and Web 2.0
technologies. Classes met 3 times a week for 50
minutes each.
In week 1, students read selections from Aristotles
The Art of Rhetoric and discussed the text as both
systemization of method (how rhetoric is made
a rational, technical practice) and as a manual
that shows how to perform introductory research
(how Aristotle determined the scope and context
for pathos appeals, for example) [17]. By focusing
almost exclusively on what Aristotle treats as
rhetoric and how he treats it, students got a better
sense of how language, thought, and technique
engage in a dynamic relationship that intervenes in
both knowledge and reality.
Once students understood this dynamic, they
took week 2 to tarry with Kents conceptions of
paralogic rhetoric and post-process writing. Kents
theories, at their most basic, demonstrate how
the contingency of any communicative act is an
essential consideration in technical composition.
Kent claims writing is (1) public; (2) interpretive;
and (3) situated, and as such, cannot be codifiable
or generalizable in any way [18, p. 1]. To help
reflect these general ideas, class discussions about
Kents theories drew out the implications such
viewpoints have for technical writing, for example:

308

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2009

How would an immediate change in scope and

context affect technical definitions?
How might the unpredictable aspects of language
alter your methodological approach to a
particular technical purpose?
Would you try to account for various
contingencies?
Does informations rhetoricized condition offer
different ways of organizing knowledge, writing,
and purpose in, say, a memo?
After discussing the nuances of paralogic rhetoric,
the first unit culminated in a capstone writing
assignment that asked students to reconcile
the technical systemization they learned from
Aristotle with the unpredictable and constantly
changing communicative contexts Kent points
out. Students were required to form groups of
three to four and collaboratively synthesize the
essential characteristics of each rhetorical theory
for future students in a mini-manual format, as
the assignment sheet in the Appendix illustrates.
To be sure, since the point of this assignment is to
get students thinking rhetorically about technical
communication, the mini-manuals were far from
conventional. My grading practices definitely took
this unfinished aspect into consideration: Each
manuals success was determined solely by its
logical consistency, conciseness, and rhetorical
appropriateness for the context at hand.
The second part of the course (weeks 3 to 7) moved
from the more explicitly rhetorical focus to the
implicit relationship between collaborative writing
and knowledge production. Web 2.0 technologies
were introduced at this stage and became an
integral part of the underlying course premise
from this point on. Though many of this sections
assignments focused on producing the more
traditional technical writing documentsletters,
memos, rsums, and so onthey also promoted
the rhetorical culture of both collaborative thinking
and the indeterminacy of informational contexts.
In week 3, I provided students a few brief wiki and
blog tutorials, using sites and hosts that resembled
and used the same basic word-processing principles
students were familiar with. (PBWiki and Blogger
were the most successful.) The class then prepared
to work in small groups of three to four on this
units various assignments in the class wiki, such
as devising a professional rsum. But rather
than solely focusing on the concision, clarity,
and appropriateness of each groups technical
document, this units assignments also emphasized
how writing, as a rhetorical technology, influenced
informational contexts. In the professional rsum

assignment, for instance, student groups were each

given a different employment advertisement prompt
and had to perform two interrelated tasks:
(1) Use the wiki to write a rsum for an imaginary
person. Much like traditional rsums, this
document needed to meet the conditions of the
employment advertisement prompt.
(2) Slightly alter other groups employment
advertisement to reflect different skills or
work functions once a class period. Unlike
predetermined assignment prompts, these
real-time changes to particular assignments
were designed to encourage rhetorical strategy,
while also forcing students to attend to the
informational contexts unpredictability.
(The professional rsum assignment is available
online as supplementary downloadable material
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.) To help further
reinforce this sections conception of collective
writing practices and knowledge production, each
groups rsum assignment was judged by what
the class saw as the most professional document.
In lieu of a traditional rubric, then, students
determined how well each document addressed
the final assignment prompt, and whether or not
they would grant the candidate an interview based
on this information.
Though both the first and second units taught
students some basics of rhetorical theory and
how to work with various Web 2.0 technologies,
they ultimately served to prepare students
to work collaboratively and write as part of a
research project group. Though the most basic
ITW research project aims to teach students how
to work collaboratively toward a common goal,
the project outlined here additionally emphasized
the relationship between knowledge production
and technologyand specifically computer-aided
research and Web 2.0 environments. Thus, in the
third and most important section of the course
(weeks 8 to 16), students were asked to consider
or attend to a real-world problem in need of some
technical and/or professional adjustment, addition,
or correction, by creating a feasibility report or
technical manual.
The scope for these projects was quite wide
and encompassed everything from designing an
environmentally sound UF Freshman Campus Tour
to developing an orientation handbook for a local
travel nursing company. Regardless of content,
focus, or new media technology, student projects
were still required to fulfill more traditional rubrics
and assignment parameters, as the technical
manual and feasibility report assignment prompt

RICE: DEVISING COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGES FOR THE TECHNICAL WRITING CLASSROOM

Fig. 1.

309

Example of a student wiki.

and rubric make clear. (The technical manual and

feasibility report assignment prompt and rubric are
available online as supplementary downloadable
material at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.) For
instance, among other things, the successful
project document included:
a report or manual that is at least eight to ten
pages long, including both text and rhetorically
appropriate images;
a project-based wiki for all collaborative writing,
including Web 2.0 research, usability tests,
technical definitions, technical instructions, and
informal reports;
documentation of at least three different
technological research methodologies. These
included anything from RSS feeds, to forums,
other wikis, social networking sites, and so on.
In addition to these more formal requirements, I
asked students to keep a blog that traced real-time
informational and contextual changes to their
research projects overall scope and purpose.
Finally, grades were determined not only by
how feasible, appropriate, and well written a
groups report or manual was, but also how well
they revised and (re)formulated their research to
compensate for collaborative and real-time changes
in their informational contexts.

COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGE PRODUCTION

The pedagogical strategy outlined here was
developed with the hope that by documenting

and demonstrating how both users (writers) and

technology (environment) helped create changes
in informational context and technical projects
purposes, students could better grasp how
collaborative writing involves more attentionboth
rhetorical and epistemologicalthan the static,
traditional collaborative conceptions permit.
Most student projects successfully met these
goals by navigating informations constantly
changing technical contexts, and by producing
research methodologies and final projects that were
rhetorically dynamic. In one ITW class, a student
group specifically developed their wiki database as
a rhetorical supplement to their ongoing research
on local bridge construction. Within their initial
planning stages, the group found that since the
I-35W Mississippi River bridge collapse, many
structural and engineering concerns centered on
exactly how bridges are maintained and regulated
as functionally safe. Accordingly, these students
decided to focus their research methodologies
on such topics. In conjunction with assignment
requirements and course goals, they used Web
2.0 resources and technologieswikis, forums,
social networking sites, and the liketo construct
a better and more advantageous information pool
on the problematic aspects of bridge construction.
As Fig. 1 illustrates, the students organized their
research according to temporary groups or topics in
an open-access, stand-alone wiki. It is important to
note how information was collected and networked

310

Fig. 2.

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2009

Student RSS feed about the I-35 Bridge collapse.

within an open space rather than structured

through a hierarchical list, as each topical grouping
in Fig. 1 shows. These unconventional research
methods allowed students to collect information
without limiting themselves to a narrow scope or
purpose.
As new information changed the context of their
research, they made appropriate adjustments to
how they categorized their information and how
this organization could create new directions for
their project, including their venture into the
unforeseen political influence on steel-truss-arch
bridge maintenance. To help determine how much
politics impacted and even exacerbated the I-35W
bridges deterioration, the students created an RSS
document that detailed changes in several online
forums and podcasting sites, as Fig. 2 shows.
Though they were initially apprehensive about
gathering information from untraditional sources
like HavenWorks.com (an independent political
news aggregate) or The Minnesota Monitor (an
independent media source), they quickly realized
how this information could redirect both their
projects purpose and the wikis composition.
Central to this methodological change was the
epistemological movement away from researching in
the writer-SME aggregate paradigm to the rhetorical
and logical patterns or circulation of information
and technological research contexts. For example,
if HavenWorks.com, Boing Boing (a popular group
blog), and Delicious all gathered and circulated

similar news accounts from various sources, the

students would test some of these search terms
by citing how frequently other news feeds and
aggregate services circulated the same terms. By
switching their focus from gathering information to
networking information, the students were able to
better understand how information itself altered
the scope and organization of their collaborative
work environment.
In the end, this methodological switch to
informational patterns fundamentally altered how
they approached their research project. Taking
the impact of local Minnesotan politics on civil
engineering projects as their representative cue,
the students created wiki links and browser feeds
to internet sites that frequently discussed how
much state funding is generally allocated to bridge
maintenance and mass transportation nationwide.
This was primarily done through Deliciousas
seen in Fig. 3and included both contemporary
search/tagged terms and those that yielded
information on the Department of Transportations
funding patterns from the past 20 years. As the
move to Delicious implies, this methodological
switch to a social bookmarking site enabled
students to adapt their research and rhetorical
context to the unpredictable and sometimes
inconvenient real-time flows of information. But
once Delicious and other RSS feeds were recognized
as a major component of their research method,
the students changed the form and content of

RICE: DEVISING COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGES FOR THE TECHNICAL WRITING CLASSROOM

Fig. 3.

311

Students Delicious subscriptions and research.

their information database daily (and sometimes

hourly) to reflect what information was needed
and how it affected the overall project goal. Given
the amount of information and the frequency with
which it occurred, they successfully constructed a
research project methodology and final project that
intertwined voting patterns, building materials and
experts, and governmental funding.
More important, these students rarely took time to
assign tasks or discuss how particular writing acts
were going to occur. Instead, these technologies
helped them collectively mediate information, group
dynamics, and the reflexive processes of writing. For
example, rather than delegating a section of their
project to a particular member, they continued to
post most of their project in the open-access wiki.
Students within the group would then create, alter,
and revise sentences, paragraphs, and sections
as rhetorical and informational needs arose. But
perhaps more interesting was the input from other
students and the general internet audience. By
leaving their wiki public, this student group received
feedback, comments, ideas for further research, and
the like that helped them hone both their projects
focus and their writing strategies. As a member of the
group claimed in his project evaluation:
At first I was unsure about how the wiki would
I can say that the ability to
help our project
change things when you want to helps with
scheduling conflicts but it also helps you pay
attention to language and [Aristotles theory of]

the rhetorical triangle. This is one of the reasons

Im glad [a student] suggested we leave our wiki
open to the audiences comments. I got some really
good comments from people I didnt even know!
Though I did not endorse or plan that the students
would open their project to the web, their gamble
enacts the collectiveand unpredictablewriting
dynamic of Web 2.0 information environments and
their pedagogical implications.
This perception and application of Web 2.0 skills was
not confined to this group alone. In fact, many of my
ITW students have appreciated how this collective,
rhetorical approach to collaborative research
and writing offers them new communication
skills. To help gauge how well students
have connected the conceptual and practical
connections between Web 2.0 and collective
writing practices, the courses final assignment
requires students to complete reflective essay
prompts (available in the supplementary material
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org). In these reflective
essays, students discuss their thoughts about
both the supposed exegesis behind collaborative
work and how they see the diverse informational
environments influencing collaborative (rhetorical,
critical) knowledges. The following items
are some representative essay examples:
It was interesting to see how the group and
research information contributed to a goal
and how every form of writing has an implicit

312

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2009

argument. I definitely feel as though I can now

be more aware of various factors when writing
collaboratively.
When we were researching for our project, it was
actually nice knowing that we had things like
craigslist and the wiki to help do it. I think this
emphasizes how technology and writing connect
to our majors and how the collaborative skills we
need are part of a larger world beyond UF.
The collaborative structure [of the class] gave me
plenty of opportunity for that through groupwork
and the various websites we used for research
Our group projects were a great example of how
Web 2.0 technologies influence how we write
within changing situations in a knowledge
community.
I agree that using things like Facebook to help
research in class was really effective. It gave us a
chance to work with our peers and allowed us to
be completely honest since the [Facebook] groups
were anonymous.
I think we do collaborative work because it forces
you to read and revise your work like never before.
The brutal honesty I had to bring to group writing
I think that
processes was actually very useful
from now on I will incorporate detailed peer editing
in everything I write for public consumption.
When we used Web 2.0 technologies in class, it
seemed as if [knowledge] was always changing.
I think this was the turning point for me because
I always thought facts were facts. To me, this
meant that [knowledge] is more like opinion than
fact.
Being in this class has been a very interesting
experience. I have learned a lot about my own
writing and have realized that writing is not
always an individual experience . Collaborative
writing has really shown me that getting straight
to the point is just as important as understanding
your audience.
The internet technologies we used have
really shown me how to think about technical
information and how to use them to phrase my
research terms better. I think this shows how
technology is a partner in collaborative writing
and not just a tool.
Collaborative writing has taught me, I feel, to
write, incorporating new media technology and
creating documents that speak to the movements
of the real world. Using skills and methods such
as these make for stronger writing and provide
a substantial product.
We write collaboratively so that we get good
I also
experience with how others write

thought the Web 2.0 technolog[ies] helped show

how writing doesnt exist in a vacuum.
This courses use of collaborative writing
allowed for various views on a topic and
allowed for deciphering of ideas that may have
previously been vague. I guess thats the point of
collaborative writing, to clarify our ideas through
both individual points of view. Technology helped
with this because it was not just limited to writing
ideas but also how we communicate in the 21st
century.
Though the students interest in and enthusiasm for
the collective writing dynamic outlined here might
seem somewhat misplaced at first, it nonetheless
attests to their attention to and investment in
learning new collaborative writing skills. Following
Storchs theories, this means that as a primary
pedagogical principle, the more students can
actively invest in their writing situationsincluding
their technological, rhetorical, and professional
environmentsthe greater their ability to
productively innovate and execute writing tasks
in those situations [19]. Yet, at the same time,
this enthusiasm and general sense of investment
might have less to do with the new writing skills
students actually acquire and more to do with
how those new skills resemble practices they
already know. In other words, if students learn and
appreciate a Web 2.0 approach to collaborative
writing, it is because such a dynamic enacts the
technological and social context they inhabit and
participate in every day. However, this collective
approach was not without its problems. For
example, even though most students felt as though
they grasped what Web 2.0 technologies could
do for their collaborative research and writing
endeavors, some reflective essays also suggested
difficulty applying collaborative writing practices to
traditional technical writing purposes. For some
students, the opportunities afforded through Web
2.0 collaborative writing methods clashed with the
more-established collaborative technical writing
methods, such as problem-solving or hierarchical
processes. For instance, some students felt:
Too much time working in groups on the internet
and not enough time instructing.
This course and its readings allowed me to
understand what technical writing is and why
I have to know it, but its still unclear to me
how technologies we learned let me do anything
different
People choose to use technology and
that writing is something of an instinctive process.

RICE: DEVISING COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGES FOR THE TECHNICAL WRITING CLASSROOM

This course would be better if more time were

spent learning technical writing methods and less
on writing collaboratively on the web.
I liked how you made technical writing
assignments (memos, letters, job rsums,
etc.) relevant and different from other English
assignments. However, I thought the technologies
were useless.
I came in to this course not thinking too much
of collaborative writing and Im leaving with the
same feelings. The technologies were confusing at
In fact, my group used search engines
times
mostly.
I wont use Web 2.0 technology in my internship
or future job. Why do I need to learn something
that Ill probably never use in my profession?
I honestly cannot cite any specific examples of
what I have learned about collaborative writing
over the past semester taking this course. I
would say, however, that I liked the technologies,
even if I think your argument [that they produce
knowledge] is nonsense.
On the surface, these student comments seem
unfocused and relatively confused, especially
when compared to those student comments
that embraced Web 2.0 technologies. However,
I interpret this confusion as a general symptom
of conceptual resistance. As such, students
resistance to these new collaborative methods is a
conceptual disagreement based on two interrelated
premises: (1) Writing is a solitary, expressive act
(People choose to use technology and that writing
is something of an instinctive process), and (2)
collaborative research reflects such concepts by
treating information as an object to be discovered
(The technologies were confusing at times
In fact, my group used search engines mostly.)
Admittedly, combating such prevalent notions on
their cultural and ideological grounds is beyond
the scope of an individual course, but creating
consistent, localized strategies to reconceive
writing as applied collaboration is not. Instructors,
therefore, can address student resistance like
this by frequently attuning and extending
their pedagogical practices to the collaborative
possibilities of every writing environment.
Instructors could, for instance, conduct most large
class discussions as an opportunity to workshop
student work through class-based wikis. During
these times, individual students or student groups
would facilitate collaborative peer-review sessions
where the entire class would discuss, edit, and
revise their work-in-progress according to audience
expectations and document purposes. Such

313

pedagogical practices help demonstrate to even the

most resistant student that collaborative writing is
more a question of context or environment than
it is an issue of established method. And as a
result, students are more willing to entertainif
not pursuethe conceptual and pragmatic
opportunities collaborative writing technologies
offer.

CONCLUSION
Overall, the collective writing pedagogy outlined
here provides students with the knowledge skills
needed for the dynamics of the information
economy. This is the case because such an
approach has a few distinct advantages over
traditional conceptions of collaborative technical
writing. First, it enables an active, rhetorical
engagement with information, writing, and the
public uses of both. Second, it allows writers
to continually and collectively (re)compose
subject matter to better fit real-time changes in
technological and rhetorical situationssomething
most ITW students will frequently do in their
professional careers. Taken together, these ideas
can help create the active, reflexive technical writing
skills needed to produce both dynamic knowledge
and the modes/environments for that knowledge.
Nonetheless, there are still a few institutional
considerations one should take into account
when devising a Web 2.0 collaborative writing
course, especially in terms of curriculum and
educational implementation. In the localized
classroom, institutional concerns can manifest as
anything from student deficiencies in technological
literacy to apprehension about intellectual property
rights. This latter concern can become a central
issue when official class assignments are written
in an open, public domain. Administrators and
instructors, however, are not without recourse
to several open copyright licensing sources,
such as CopyLeft or Creative Commons. Yet, as
Botterbusch and Parker point out, instructors
should determine their copyright licensing source
on the basis of teaching strategies and the goals of
their pedagogical practices and course objectives
[20]. Because the approach I outline here focuses
so heavily on the localized, rhetorical dynamic of
Web 2.0 collaboration, I have found the Creative
Commons noncommercial license best fits the
courses (and students) needs.
At the same time, these intellectual property
issues point out another potential problem with

314

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION, VOL. 52, NO. 3, SEPTEMBER 2009

institutionalization. At their most basic level, a

Web 2.0 pedagogical strategy calls for an open,
collaborative method that outlines a reflexive
and nonhierarchical intellectual and professional
culture. Certainly, some corporate and university
cultures may not be as receptive to a collective
writing paradigm, particularly if it disregards norms
of workplace or curriculum policies and practices.
But neither can technical writing classrooms
guarantee a professional and intellectual culture
that traditional instructional tools, textbooks, and
educational software frequently assume. Instead,
this responsibility lies with programs various,
contextually sensitive pedagogies, classroom
practices, and course outcomes. Instructors, for
example, could recreate the pedagogical mediation
of the technical writing class by using free or
Creative Commons software not just as a guardian

of intellectual property, but also as the teaching

strategy itself. Since these technologies are
grounded in ideas of common use, they help rethink
the manner in which institutions understand their
objectthat is, the production and ownership of
knowledge. Technical writing courses can therefore
emphasize how language, information, and user
input all contribute to the general parameters of
both knowledge and conceptions of institutional
legality in todays information economy. By devising
unconventional uses and contexts for collaborative
software and/or texts, technical writing and
knowledge become not static things to be learned,
but a fluid environment dependent on time,
availability, and rhetorical needs. Understood in
this way, writing is the collective technology that
the idea of collaboration was meant to promote.

APPENDIX
ENC 2210: RHETORICAL MINI-MANUAL
ASSIGNMENT
Instructions For your first major assignment,
you must form groups of 34 and collaboratively
synthesize or combine the rhetorical theories of
Aristotle and Thomas Kent into a mini-manual
for future ENC 2210 students. This manual
should aim to present the foundational points
or characteristics of each respective rhetorical
theory into clear, easy-to-grasp concepts or
sections. Likewise, it should present its material
according to one of the technical writing methods
and purposes we have discussed thus far:
sequential, chronological, order of importance,
general/specific, division, classification, cause and
effect, comparison/contrast, and spatial. Finally,
since ENC 2210 audiences differ from semester
to semester, your group will have to compile
information and write for a broad, college-based
readership.
Objectives
To create exegesis through an appeal to
future students ENC 2210 technical writing
and rhetorical needs.
To establish ethos through a well-organized
logical and rhetorical method.
To limit the possibility for miscommunication
by clearly and concisely presenting the

purposeto explain, to inform, to persuadeof

your rhetorical mini-manual to your audience.
Formal Writing Requirements
34 pages, including Introduction (front
matter), Body (applied logic or method),
Conclusion (end matter).
Professional format, including: subject
headings, acceptable font, and page numbers.
Professional-quality binding.
Considerations You may approach this task in a
variety of ways, but here are a few recommended
procedures:
Determine what each rhetorical theory
argues first, then decide what your purpose
is and how to best present that information
to your audience. This approach helps when
you want to emphasize the information over
the audiences and contexts idiosyncrasies.
Consider the audience and purpose first, and
then determine what information is needed.
This approach works well when you want to
adjust information to the particular audience
and/or purpose.
Once your group has decided on how to approach
the theories, analyze how each theory argues its
main point:
Pay attention to language, style, and
organizational writing strategies. For example,
look at how a particular chapter organizes

RICE: DEVISING COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGES FOR THE TECHNICAL WRITING CLASSROOM

information and how it helps develop the

authors rhetorical goal. Does it effectively
inform, instruct, or persuade?
Next, consider what each theory shares in common
(beyond the most generic observations, i.e., they
both talk about rhetoric.):
How does Aristotle discuss rhetoric? In
what ways does Aristotles attention to the
technical aspects of rhetoric relate to Kents
communicative guesses or principles? How
might Kents more contextual approach

315

resemble the way Aristotle explains pathos

appeals?
Have Further Questions?
Consult Technical Communication in the
Twenty-First Century Chapter 2 for questions
about rhetoric and technical communication.
Consult Technical Communication in the
Twenty-First Century Chapter 18 for questions
about manuals.

REFERENCES
[1] C. Spinuzzi, Guest editors introduction: Technical communication in the age of distributed work, Tech.
Commun. Quart., vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 265277, 2007.
[2] M. Morgan, The group writing task: A schema for collaborative assignment making, in Professional
Communication: The Social Perspective, N. R. Blyler and C. Thralls, Eds. Newberry Park, CA: SAGE, 1993,
pp. 230242.
[3] P. B. Lowry and J. F. Nunamaker, Jr., Using internet-based, distributed collaborative writing tools to improve
coordination and group awareness in writing teams, IEEE Trans. Prof. Commun., vol. 46, no. 4, pp. 277297,
Dec. 2003.
[4] P. B. Lowry, A. Curtis, and M. R. Lowry, Building a taxonomy and nomenclature of collaborative writing to
improve interdisciplinary research and practice, J. Bus. Commun., vol. 41, no. 1, pp. 6699, 2004.
[5] J. Forman, Opening the aperture: Research and theory on collaborative writing, J. Bus. Commun., vol. 41,
no. 1, pp. 2736, 2004.
[6] T. A. Fredrick, Facilitating better teamwork: Analyzing the challenges and strategies of classroom-based
collaboration, Bus. Commun. Quart., vol. 71, no. 4, pp. 439455, 2008.
[7] D. Clark, Is professional writing relevant? A model for action research, Tech. Commun. Quart., vol. 13, no.
3, pp. 307323, 2004.
[8] G. A. Cross, Forming the Collective Mind: A Contextual Exploration of Large-Scale Collaborative Writing in
Industry. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton, 2001.
[9] J. M. Lannon, Technical Communication, 11th ed. New York: Pearson/Longman, 2008.
[10] M. Markel, Technical Communication, 8th ed. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martins, 2007.
[11] S. I. Dobrin, C. J. Keller, and C. R. Weisser, Technical Communication in the Twenty-First Century. Upper
Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2008.
[12] R. Johnson-Sheehan, Technical Communication Today. New York: Pearson/Longman, 2005.
[13] M. C. Paretti, L. D. McNair, and L. Holloway-Attaway, Teaching technical communication in an era of
distributed work: A case study of collaboration between U.S. and Swedish students, Tech. Commun. Quart.,
vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 327352, 2007.
[14] B. Latour, We Have Never Been Modern. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993.
[15] B. Latour and S. Woolgar, Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1986.
[16] T. Kent, Paralogic Rhetoric: A Theory of Communicative Interaction. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University
Press, 1993.
[17] Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric, New York: Penguin, 1991.
[18] T. Kent, Post-Process Theory: Writing after the Process Paradigm. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University
Press, 1999.
[19] N. Storch, Collaborative writing: Product, process, and students reflections, J. Second Language Writing, vol.
14, pp. 153173, 2005.
[20] H. Botterbusch and P. Parker, Copyright and collaborative spaces: Open licensing and wikis, TechTrends,
vol. 52, no. 1, pp. 79, 2008.

J. A. Rice is a lecturer and writing coordinator for the University Writing Program at the University of Florida, where he teaches
courses in technical writing, argument and persuasion, and writing in the humanities. His primary research interests include
collaborative writing pedagogies, rhetorical theory, and ideologies of communication. His most recent work appears in Business
Communication Quarterly, Composition Forum, and Educational Philosophy and Theory.