Writing Project #3: The Role of Identity and Authority in Professional Discourse Communities
CONTEXT:
In every discourse community, there are norms
... [Show More] about what can be talked about, what gets assumed, and how one can talk about different things. These norms, or expectations, shape a discourse community. There are also likely to be some guidelines—formal or informal—regarding who gets to join the discourse community and who has authority within it.
PURPOSE:
This assignment asks you to analyze and identify insights Wardle and Katz present on the role identity and authority play in professional workplace communities, and then synthesize sources to present implications of these notions to your audience.
From Wardle, we read that “...learning to write in new communities entails more than learning discrete sets of skills or improving cognitive abilities. It is a process of involvement in communities, of identifying with certain groups, or choosing certain practices over others; a process strongly influenced by power relationships--a process...bound up tightly with identity, authority, and experience” (para. 37).
From Katz, we are introduced to strategies newcomers may utilize to gain different types of authority (personal, situational, social) in the workplace. And, as Katz’s article suggests, gaining these different types of authority plays an integral role in the ways that our written/oral communication is received by workplace audiences.
In light of these observations, in this last writing project, I’d like you to:
Identify, articulate, and/or explain three to four claims regarding the potential role identity and authority play in communications pulled from any of the texts written by Wardle, Katz, Gee, Swales, Johns, Casanave, McCarthy, Penrose and Geisler, and/or Thonney.
Explain how your work experience complements, challenges, and/or supports the three to four claims mentioned above.
AUDIENCE:
You will be writing to knowledgeable scholars of workplace communication: those who have years of experience researching and writing about workplace writing practices. In light of this knowledgeable audience, you will not simply report on what has already been written but look to expand on existing scholarship given your unique “emerging scholarly” perspective.
GENRE:
You will present your insights and observations within a 5-6 page report, using a format commonly used to share research in academic journals. This article should be double-spaced, using a 12-point font in Times New Roman, Arial, or Calibri, and one-inch margins. Though you do not need to use the exact headings provided below, in fact, you may find more fitting headings useful, you do need to include all of the following sections:
Introductory Section--Why are you doing this research?
In this section, you need to make the following moves (Refer back to Swales’ CARS article):
Move 1: Establish a Territory (you can do this by doing the following steps)
Claiming Centrality and
Reviewing Previous Research (readings from modules 1 & 2)
Move 2: Establishing a Niche (you can do this by doing any one of the following steps)
Counterclaiming
Indicating a Gap
Question Raising
Continuing a Tradition
Move 3: Occupying a Niche (you can do this by doing one of the following steps)
Outlining the purpose or
Announcing present research
Methods--Where/How you are doing the study?
Most scholarly articles include a Methods section. This section provides readers with details on how/where the research was conducted.
Options:
Current workplace
Past workplace
Future workplace (requires interview)
Whichever site you use, identify any (as many) of the following: company/organization (pseudonym), description, size, location. If you choose to interview, include employee (pseudonym), job title, years with company, job duties/responsibilities.
Note whether data collected was from personal experience, observation, and/or interview.
Discussion Section--What have you discovered?
In this section, you need to:
Explain how your experience/observations/interview within any of the above-mentioned sites, might help us understand workplace communication in a new or more nuanced light. You can do this by:
Discussing how your research from any of the workplace sites complement/support existing research
Discussing how your research from any of the workplace sites challenge/question existing research
Discussing how your research from any of the workplace sites extend/move existing research forward [Show Less]