One of the most frequent questions technical communicators encounter is what style they should write in. Unfortunately it is not an easy question. The answer to this question should come from careful theoretical studies and deliberate analysis of the audience and many other factors, such as social environment. In this paper, I wish to analyze theories, which guide the style in technical communication, from three angles: reader analysis, interpretive communities and whether technical communication is plain, instructional, or rhetorical. In the conclusion section, I will try to analyze the importance of extracting valuable parts from each theory and how the valid points from each theory work together to guide technical communicators to choose the right style in technical communication.

To study technical communication theory, we first have to understand what technical communication means. So what is technical communication? While technical theorist, writers, teacher and students are struggling to figure out how to pass technical information to the readers more effectively, few of them have attempted to define technical communication. As discussed in class, a conventional definition for technical communication is “the study of how to represent complex technical, scientific and professional information”. In their book, Scientific and Technical Communication, Theory, Practice, and Policy, James H. Collier and David M. Toomey offer a rather unique definition for technical communication:

Scientific and Technical Communication is a process of gathering, organizing, presenting, and refining information. It is also a process of persuasion that often appeals to objectivity to convince an audience. Finally, it is a process shaped by the contexts in which it occurs and that is improved when it recognizes these contexts. (Collier and Toomey, 3)

The first part of this definition says that when technical communicators write something, such as a proposal, for the first time, they are likely to follow a preestablished form strictly. As they write this form of document more often, they will “accent certain sections, downplay others; [they] may use different sources of information; [they] may prepare different versions of the same proposal.” (Collier and Toomey, 4) Eventually, the form serves them merely as a rough outline to which they adjust as they learn more about the purpose, the needs of the audience and their relationship to them. The second part of the definition acknowledges that “technical communication is fundamentally persuasive.” (Collier and Toomey, 4) Readers are more likely to believe what they read if the information is objective. But absolute objectivity is impossible. Technical communication happens in a world with constantly changing economics, political ideas, developing nations, global communication networks, diminishing natural resources, and so on.  The rhetorical choices are made within these contexts. The final part of the definition consists of “examining and translating the language, theories, explanations, and interests of one group” into those of anther group.

While it is arguable whether it is proper to define technical communication as a process rather than a field of study or technique, this definition reflects the complexity and depth technical communication theorists have brought to technical communication in the past several decades. They try to probe technical communication in philosophical, social, political, anthropological, rhetorical, cognitive and other contexts. The topics of arguments are wide and varied. I think many of these theories contribute to the topic of the style of technical writing. By studying them critically, we may arrive at a relatively comprehensive understanding.

 Reader Analysis

Before a writer starts to write, he/she usually thinks about who they are writing for. But different theorists believe differently in the role the reader plays in technical communication. Some theorists believe in the “readers addressed” theory, which means they believe the readers are passive recipients of information. They do not play any role in the writing process. On the contrary, many theorists believe in the "readers invoked" theory, which means readers play an active role in communication. Within that group, theorists differ in opinions, too. Some theorists believe the writer should imagine a person with a name, personality and so on to be their “mock reader”, or “ideal reader”. They write as if they are writing to this person. Some theorists argue that writers not only have to image the characteristics, they also have to analyze their reading patterns, habits and sense of satisfaction. I will give an overview of these theories in this section. Theorists have used both terms of "reader analysis" and "audience analysis" in their articles and books. I am discussing them as two terms with the same meanings in this paper.

The Readers Addressed Theory

Some theorists, such as Richard Lahnam and George Orwell, believe the “readers addressed” theory, which casts the readers as passive recipients of information. This theory lays the ultimate power of transferring information in the hands of writers. Thus, the writers guided by this theory tend to emphasize what information they would like to write about and how they would like to represent the information rather than analyzing what the readers need and how to make it easy for readers to receive the information. Similarly, Walter J. Ong thinks the writer controls how the text he/she writes is interpreted. He argues that the audience is always a fiction.  In “The Writer’s Audience is Always a Fiction,” he argues that an author needs to fictionalize his audience. His audience has learned to understand his writing and interact with his writing “not from daily life but from earlier writers who were fictionalizing in their imagination audiences they had learned to know from still earlier writers.” (Ong, 11) He tries to make general arguments for all types of writing. Unfortunately, I think his argument could have been much more persuasive to technical communicators if his arguments were supported not only by writings of novelists, but also by technical articles. Novels are different from technical documentation in many ways. One of the differences is a reader reads novels and short stories voluntarily for pleasure. He/She can choose to refuse to be the audience for an author at any time. On the contrary, readers of technical documents are very often forced to read and learn the content. If a writer is so self-indulged and refuses to analyze who he/she is writing for, how they read, and what they need, he/she can make the reading experience very painful and resentful for those readers who cannot quit even if they do not want to be his audience.

Redish’s Readers' behavior analysis Model

On the other hand, many theorists in the "readers invoked" group realize the function of reader analysis in technical communication, even though they may differ in opinion in its content

In “Understanding Readers”, Janice C. Redish elaborated a model for extensive reader analysis and how it affects the style of technical writing. She says that technical writers decide the type and the style of the document based on reader analysis. For example, the writer should accept that “readers decide how much attention to pay to a document.” (Redish 3) It means “they skim; they read just enough to reach a personal level of satisfaction with their new knowledge or until they reach a personal level of frustration with the document or product”. (Redish 3) To cope with that, the writer should choose a type of document preferred by the readers. He/she may choose step-by-step instructions and graphical illustrations. Another important element in reader behavior analysis is that readers use technical documents as tools. It means that they typically have formed a question or questions before they start reading. Their reading is actively interpretive and highly selective. The will try to use what they have read to solve their practical problem right afterwards. To meet these needs, good access tools, such as table of contents and indices, are critical. The writer should design the document for selective reading, such as adopting short paragraphs, and using headers, lists, tables, charts, and summaries to promote recall and so on. Readers also actively interpret as they read. Redish thinks that “meaning does not reside in the text of a document; it exists only in the minds of communicators who produce documents and readers who use documents.” (Redish 7) As many other theorists, Redish believes readers interpret documents in light of their own knowledge and expectations.” Successful documents are “those that make explicit connections to readers’ prior knowledge and expectations, or their ‘schemata’”. (Redish 12) Redish’s theory, I think, is not necessarily more complete than other reader analysis theories, such as Coney’s. It is just one example of modern reader analysis techniques adopted by and taught to technical communicators.

Collier’s Readers’ Reading Sequence Analysis Model

Collier and Toomey describe their theory for reader behavior analysis. Their model contains a first reading and a second reading process. They agree with Redish that formats plays an important role in technical writing. However, they believe that it is the common formatting technical documents share that has caused certain patterns readers read in. They think that, by adopting commonly recognized forms of format, technical documents are designed for certain readers to read only certain parts. A first reading of scientific and technical documentation “generally includes considering what you need and how you initially respond to the text.” (Collier and Toomey, 41) During a first reading, a reader will scan through the headings to identify the part or parts he/she needs to read to perform his/her task, and read only that part or those parts of the document. After the first reading, the reader may feel they would like to read some parts more closely. Then they perform what Collier and Toomey call “a second reading”. Alternatively they would simply put the document aside until one day they recall there is some helpful information in that article. They also come back for a second reading. A second reading is a more thoughtful reading. A reader is expected to comprehend aspects of a technical text by techniques he/she has learned in other disciplines. That knowledge is closely related to the interpretive community he/she belongs to. The activities of translating technical vocabulary, and interpreting metaphors and other rhetorical devices all happen in the second reading.

Goodwin’s Emplotting the Readers Analysis Model

Disagreeing with both Redish and Collier, on the selective reading nature of technical communication, In “Emplotting The Reader: Motivation and Technical Document”, David Goodwin argues that the technical writers should create a document in which the reader can take the role of the hero and successfully fulfill their task. His idea of a manual emplotting the reader means the manual “must create an action-oriented role within a storyline that transforms the reader from a hesitant, if not reluctant neophyte, into a [hero who completed the tasks.]” He also stresses the importance of reader analysis. He calls the imagined reader “authorial reader”. The more resemblance the authorial reader and the actual reader have, the more likely it is for the reader to acquire the skills and goals set by the writer. Note that he argues the writer sets the goals and decides what the skills the reader wants to read. Unlike Redish and Collier, he does not think the readers will read selectively, instead, he expects them to follow a well developed plot and become the “hero” and complete the tasks in the end.

His theory is interesting in two aspects particularly. Many theorists are indulged in the nonlinear nature of technical writing. They tend to ignore the fact that only part of technical communication is nonlinear. Much of it is linear. It is very important to develop technical writing theory for linear writing. The other interesting part of his theory is that he encourages writers to design a plot for the reader, in a way almost the same to oral communication with someone. These aspects are especially important for current technical communication because in the future, writing will not be the only main form of technical communication. As technology progresses, online technical documentation may be in audio or video formats. Theories have yet to probe of technical communication with both written and oral models.

Lay’s Customization Analysis Model

If we think that Redish’s model of reader analysis is a vertical model, considering each layer of the readers’ needs, we can call Mary M. Lay et al’s model a horizontal model, considering different aspects of the readers’ needs. In their book Technical Communication, Lay et al pointed out, sometimes technical communicators are writing for “simple, homogeneous audiences”, who is one person, or a group of people with similar backgrounds. In this case, they can use similar terms. Sometimes, they have “multiple audiences”, which consists “several readers, viewers, or listener now or in the future, and inside or outside the organization.” (Lay et al, 75) Sometimes a single or homogeneous audience may have multiple needs. Sometimes multiple audiences have multiple needs. Reader analysis means to analyze their needs by analyzing their roles: transmitters, decision maker and action takers, advisors, learners, implementers. Each of these roles will result in a different reading behavior. They also have to analyze the readers’ attitude towards your message, towards you, and towards your writing while they read. They have to analyze the readers’ interpretive communities. “You will need to assess your audience’s attitudes, assumptions and prejudices toward your message and to anticipate, address, reinforce or counter these attitudes within your communication.” (Lay et al, 99)

Lay also thinks there is a “textual reader”.

A reader in the text is implied by the language and conventions employed by the writer and by background knowledge assumed by the writer. Just as every document contains an implied author, a narrator, (or persona…), who may or may not have a lot in common with the real author, so too documents contain implied readers (created by writers that my or may not have much in common with the real audience. (Lay et al, 94)

A good example to understand Lay’s contextual reader theory is the dummies books. In the context, it is implied that the target audiences are “dummies”. The contextual author is casual and helpful friend-like, which may be different from the real writer.

Interpretive Community

From the above section, we can see although the theorists may not agree on the depth of reader analysis, they share the idea that the readers’ prior experience with information decoding is very important in molding the style of technical communication. According to the experience they have, they can be grouped into communities. Some theorists argue that technical communicators are not addressing any particular “mock reader”, instead, they are addressing to the communities, within which people share similar experience and may interpret texts in similar ways.

Kuhn’s Scientific Community Theory

Thomas S. Kuhn first put the idea of community into theory. In his “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” he argues that:

‘Normal science’ means research firmly based upon one or more particular scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its future practice. (1962, 10)

He calls the accepted achievements “paradigms”. He thinks that before a paradigm is established, all the writings have to start from the basics of the research for people to understand, as well as to be persuaded to accept their model of thought and research. After a paradigm is established, which means the scientific community has already accepted a common model and been educated about the common knowledge of a subject, the writers will write with less detail about background information. “Instead they will usually appear as brief articles addressed only to professional colleagues, the men whose knowledge of a shared paradigm can be assumed and who prove to be the only ones able to read the papers addressed to them.”(1962, 20) This pattern will continue until the existing paradigm is substituted by another paradigm, and a new cycle begins.

Fish's Interpretive Community Theory

Both Stanley Fish and James Zappen studied the concept of community in technical communication in 1989. In "Change”, Fish defined his idea of “interpretive community” as:

 “not so much a group of individuals who shared a point of view, but a point of view or way of organizing experience that shared individuals in the sense that its assumed distinctions, categories of understanding and stipulations of relevance and irrelevance were the content of the consciousness of community members who were therefore no longer individuals, but, insofar as they were embedded in the community’s enterprise, community property. (1989, 141)

He argues that this concept should not make disciplinary and professional activity confined or ends in interpretive communities. Rather, interpretive communities are dynamic, or “engines of change.” (1989, 152) The assumptions of an interpretive community “are not a mechanism shutting out the world but for organizing it, for seeing phenomena as already related to the interests and goals that make the community what it is.” (1989, 150) The realms of different interpretive communities are also interdependent, rather than discrete. He agrees with Kuhn that progress is not technological. Instead, it is “evolution from the community’s state of knowledge at any given time.”(Kuhn in Fish, 159)

Zappen’s Discourse Community Theory

Unlike Fish, Zappen tries to study the concept of discourse community not only from the disciplinary and professional angle, but also from a social view. In “Discourse Community In Scientific and Technical Communication: Institutional and Social View”, Zappen gave an overview of Fish’s concept of interpretive community, which was discussed above, and some relevant research based on it. He also introduced Richard Rorty’s view of philosophy as conversation. In contrast to the traditional view that philosophy explains how the mind is able to construct accurate representation of what is outside it, Rorty suggests an “epistemological behaviorism” that explains knowledge “ ‘by reference to what society lets us say’ and ‘what it is good for us to believe.’” (1989, 6) Rorty thinks that conversation is the “social justification of belief” (Rorty in Zappen, 6). In this concept, the philosopher is merely a participant who tries to keep the conversation going. So is a technical writer. Zappen thinks Rorty’s theory has value in solving the problem of communication across the boundaries that separate organization from each other. Zappen thinks both Fish’s view and Rorty’s view are valuable to the teaching and practice of technical writing. Technical writing students should be prepared not only to communicate within the norms of several discourse communities, but also “to develop the ability to step out of the boundaries of particular discourse communities and to participate in conversation with others on problems of mutual interest and concern.” (1989, 9)

Killingsworth’s Local and Global Discourse Community Theory

M. Jimmie Killingsworth and Jacqueline S. Palmer also analyzed the concept of discourse community in their book Information in Action. They define discourse communities as “groups of people distinguished by how they talk, write, listen, and read.” (1999, 304) They explicitly state that everyone lives and works within many discourse communities. Discourse communities can be defined regionally, socially, occupationally and so on. A technical communicator has to communicate both within your discourse community and to other discourse communities. They also argue that one has to meet the needs of two discourse communities: a local discourse community -- your place of work; and a global discourse community -- the field with which you identify and share a special knowledge and language.

In essence, the global community says, “Learn our language so that you may gain our knowledge.” The local community says, “Speak our language so that you may join us in putting your knowledge to use.” (1999, 306)

Is Technical Communication Plain, Instructional, or Rhetorical?

Last but not least, I would like to review the debates on whether technical communication should adopt plain, instructional discourse or rhetorical style.

Positivism’s Plain Style

Positivism is one of the earliest theories in technical writing. Positivists, such as Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver, believe that “the truth” exists. If the writers can understand the truth precisely and write in a clear way, everyone should understand the text correctly. So below is what the style of technical writing should be according to the positivism theory:

Ideally, scientific discourse would consist of observation sentences using only logical terms and observation terms, or of assertions using theoretical terms explicitly defined by reference to the observation terms. (Carolyn R, Miller, 1979, 612)

The new scientists wanted words to approximate mathematical symbols. Such symbols were to possess no virtue in them but stand for quantities and relationships. Nothing was to exist between the mind and its true object; rhetorical devices were not to be an obstruction between observation and description. (Merrill D. Whitburn, 1978, 152)

Miller’s “Writing is Rhetorical” Theory

Walter J. Ong is one of the theorists disagreeing with the positivists. He says “all writing is essentially rhetorical.” (Ong in Coney, 1987, 324) Coney also thinks technical communication is rhetorical. She sharply points out that rhetorical devices should not complicate understanding. Instead, it should communicate ideas effectively for modern audiences, if used properly. She thinks that the appropriateness of a style or several styles is determined “more by the immediate situation that by abstract standard of correctness.” Kuhn was also one of the first theorists to argue that science is rhetorical, and so is technical communication in his paradigm theory, which I discussed in the last section.

But none of them criticizes positivism as harshly as Carolyn R. Miller. In “A Humanistic Rationale for Technical Writing”, Miller argues they “presupposes a mechanistic and materialistic reality” which does not exist. (1979, 612) She argues that reality is only the widest agreement among people in the community. She used a new epistemology as the supporting evidence of her point of view. This epistemology -- understanding science as “argument [that] asks for assent, for an act of will on the part of the audience” (1979, 616) -- proves that science is directly concerned with human constructions. “Science is, through and through, a rhetorical endeavor.” (1979, 616) Good technical writing is “rather than the revelation of absolute reality, a persuasive version of experience.”

Miller’s theory, like positivism, has also invoked much criticism. I personally hesitate to define science as what most people believe in. Science is not truth. Science is discovery. So writing is not the observation of truth. It is the observation and description of the process of discovery. Of course not everything discovered is true. So everything written is what different communities of people believe to be true rather than truth itself. Miller did not have to deny the existence of truth to prove that.

Moore’s “Communication is Instructional” Theory

In light of all the debates, Patrick Moore found a middle way. Moore: “Technical communication aims to allow the mind to oppose the coercion of reality, not to “submit to the reality”. He argues that technical communication is actually instrumental discourse. Instrumental discourse refers to “those utterances that are supposed to achieve their purpose directly, as they stand, without the need to produce any additional ‘reasons’ or ‘supporting arguments’. ” (Moore, 103) He supported his argument by comparing the meanings of rhetoric and instructional discourse. He does not agree with the theorists, such as Bazerman and Miller, that technical communication is persuasive, or rhetorical. He argues:

“Technical communication may be both rhetorical and instrumental. However, when the purpose of technical communication is rigorously instrumental – to govern, guide, control and help people execute physical actions – technical writers work hard to make their language unambiguous, unemotional and strictly denotative. When technical writers use language instrumentally (as in the design of a human/computer interface), they are more cautious about limiting the interpretations and overtones of their words. But when the purpose of a technical communication is rhetorical (as in a proposal of technical sales document), writers can use language with more connotations, emotional associations, and potential ambiguity.” (Moore, 108)

He also emphasizes the concept of standardization. He agrees with the concept of interpretive community. He thinks “developing and applying standards contributes to the process of belonging to a community.” (Moore, 109) Moore’s theory of technical writing being instructional originated from the concept that people read to do. So by avoiding rhetorical, or emotional, ways of writing, people are more likely to decode the information intended for them. This is a general judgment without taking the potential readers into consideration. Although he agrees with the idea of interpretive community, it seems he actually holds a positivist point of view. 

Conclusion

From my brief introductions to different theories above, you may have drawn the same conclusion with me, which is: each theory has its value in some fields and circumstances. Our job, as a technical communicator today, is not to pick which theory is correct and follow it in every piece of documentation we produce, but to choose the relevant concepts of each theory to apply for each circumstance.

Technical communicators find themselves agreeing with different theories at different times. This is because the appearance, acceptance and rejection of theories are closely related to social environment. When technical communication became a topic that demanded much research and attention decades ago as a result of the booming of demands for manuals and other technical documents, the main form of technical communication was linear written text. The theorists were faced with the challenges of adopting communication theories that applied for oral presentation to written presentation. As the needs for software help documentation grew rapidly, it forced theorists to develop theories for nonlinear readers. Today, with the audio and video technology and the Internet, technical communicators have wider choices of forms. To use diversified forms of presenting information to meet the diversified needs of diversified discourse communities is the new challenge of this age. This diversification requires us to study and use technical communication theories selectively and adaptively, which means to adopt one or multiple theories that apply in each project.

Marilyn M. Cooper says technical writing is a “social activity”. It is true. In the present age, technical writers often need to work collaboratively. Technical communicators cannot shut themselves in a house for three months like a short story writer. They have to learn to interact with each other, with professional from other fields in the same organization, and with readers.  They begin this interaction by interacting with each other, as Lay’s reader analysis model pointed out. They will have brainstorm sessions to gather ideas, lay basic rules and set up goals. Basic rules may decide the formats of documentation, and whether the documentation will adopt plain style or rhetorical style, and so on. These rules, which are crucial to the success of the project, should only be made after carefully analysis.  Technical communicators should analyze reader characteristic – such as their profession, their purpose of reading the potential document; their reading habits – such as whether they read linearly or nonlinearly; their interpretive community – such as the knowledge background of people who belong to this community; what they have learned from their previous experience in reading similar documents and in what patterns they tend to read. After gathering all the information, the team should have a general guideline and be able to start developing the documentation. The writing process is not isolated, either. As we learn from the theories in discourse communities, writers’ discourse community and readers discourse community are highly active both international and interdependently. They should constant exchange ideas with one another and other teams of the same organization. They should bring readers who match their user profile in to test  the parts of the documents that are finished at an early stage to see whether their assumptions are correct and whether reader satisfaction is achieved. The feedback from the readers will constantly change their strategy of writing. This highly interactive process does not end after the documentation is completed. They should continue to gather user feedback for future upgrade of the documents.

Reader analysis and discourse community theories also teach us the traditional concept of only one manual for one software or equipment is no longer effective. Companies often develop more than one version of documentation. For example, Adobe PhotoShop has a “getting started” tutorial for the beginner users, showing them how to start and what to do step by step linearly. They also offer a nonlinear user manual for advanced users who want to learn particular advanced techniques for a task they need to perform. This is because they acknowledge that their audiences come from both “dummy users” and “power user” interpretive communities. For advanced users who wish to read to learn advanced techniques rather than read to do a particular task. The teaching material for them is called “classroom in a book”.  In the near future, we may see the same documentation in written forms for people who hate to read on computers; in online help form for audiences who read with a question; in an audio form for handicapped audiences who cannot read; and in a video form for audiences who learn better from a visible lecturer. Having more than one version of documentation may lead to extra cost. This cost can often be justified because people tend to call technical support much less often when they can find answers themselves. Companies save on keeping minimum numbers of technical support staff. People are more likely to purchase their products if they come with user-friendly documentation.  Of course, multiple versions are not always necessary. Audience analysis models provided by the theorists mentioned above help companies and writers make decisions like that. Even when multiple versions are needed, companies may have to prioritize and develop only those forms for readers from larger interpretive communities to keep the cost under control.

I believe, as technical communicators, comprehensive knowledge of reader analysis theories, discourse communities theories and style theories help us adapt to the diverse needs of diverse audiences and diverse technologies. By learning the theories, it gives us a choice of tools to gather and present information, to persuade the audiences more effectively. 

Works Cited

Orwell, George: Political and the English Language. 1946

:Shannon, Claude E. and Warren Weaver: The Mathematical Theory of Communication The University of Illinois Press: Urbaxa, 1949

Kuhn, Thomas S.: The structure of Science Revolution. 1962

Ong, S.J.: The Writer’s Audience Is Always a Fiction. 1975

Whitburn, Merrill D. et al.: The Plain Style in Technical and Scientific Writing. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication 8 (1978): 349-58

Miller, Carolyn R.: A Humanistic Rationale for Technical Writing. 1979

Coney, Mary B.: Contemporary Views of Audience: A Rhetorical Perspective. 1987

                                                Technical Communication Theory: An overview. 1997

Cooper, Marilyn M. and Michael Holzman, Writing as Social Action. 1989

Zappen, James P.: The Discourse Community In Scientific and Technical Communication: Institutional and Social Views. 1989

Fish, Stanley: Doing What Comes Naturally. 1989

Cooper, Marilyn M.: Writing as Social Action. 1989

Goodwin, David: Emplotting The Reader: Motivation And Technical Documentation. 1991

Redish, Janice C.: Understanding Readers. 1993

Moore, Patrick: Instrumental Discourse Is as Humanistic as Rhetoric. 1996

Collier, James H. and David M. Toomey: Scientific and Technical Communication: Theory, Practice, and Policy. Sage Publications, 1997

Killingsworth, Jimmie M. and Jacqueline S. Palmer: Information In Action: A Guide to Technical Communication. Published by Allyn & Bacon, 1999

Lay, Mary M. et al: Technical Communication. (Second Edition) Published by McGraw-Hill Companies. 2000

Andrews, Debrorah: Technical Communication In The Global Community (Second Edition). 1998 by Prentice-Hall, Inc. Upper Saddle River, NJ 2001