Extricating “Technical” from Technical and Professional Writing

February 8th, 2016 

By: Jordyn Bollinger

The term “technical” has weighed down the field of Technical and Professional Writing for some time now—the reason, it often leaves a sour and rigid taste in people’s mouths. Some think technical writing has to do with writing about technology, where the professional is confined to writing manual after manual. Professionals in the field agree that technical doesn’t give the field a clear and accurate representation of what a person working in the field does. Technical writing to the people in the field is more than writing about technology. For the following hiring position, it’s important to justify and clarify what the field of technical and professional writing has to offer. I will give existential advice from my own experience as well as reference other professional voices that speak to this issue. By the end of this post, I hope to extricate any negative connotations attached to the term. In moving from Technical and Professional Writing to just Professional Writing, the average Joe will have an easier time accepting the profession as a competitive and valuable service.

            When I first heard about the field, I had no inclination of what it meant. Some said, “Oh, it’s just a lot of grant and formal writing.” They were right; however, within those pieces of writing comes skills in formatting, style, and content. According to David Dobrin, a trained Technical Writer, clarifies the definition of technical in technical writing. He proposes the argument that the term is too precise, and therefore limits people’s interpretation of it. While technical writing may be about ‘a subject in the pure sciences, in which the writer informs the reader through an objective presentation of facts,’ it is also about the art and rhetoric of such presentation (3). Technical writers know that writing both for generic audiences and specific audiences is required—therefore, the style and format of the content of their piece must be both clear and persuasive to the audience being addressed. Take Aristotle’s Five Cannon’s of Rhetoric for example. A technical writer must be able to provide invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery in their pieces. Professionals like Carolyn Miller agree:

Being practical suggests a certain attitude or mode of learning that relies on rules proved through use rather than on theory, history, experience, or general appreciation. Practical rhetoric therefore seems to concern the instrumental aspect of discourse—its potential for getting things done…[The Greeks] emphasized that rhetoric was an art (1)

 While Aristotle’s system was designed for public speaking (general audiences), that does not limit specific audiences either. I’ll give an example. In a recent class at Pittsburg State University, I had to construct a letter from Toyota (the company I hypothetically worked for) to a manufacturing company in Japan. The letter needed to persuade the Japanese CEO that they could trust our business. The opening lines were “It is bright and sunny here in Utah. The weather is beautiful and the flowers are blossoming nicely.” To several business persons in the U.S., this sort of opening line would seem frivolous and a waste of time. However, in cultures like Japan, this kind of talk is considered prudent to the beginning stages of the business deal. With this knowledge, I was able to persuade them as a technical writer with style, format, and correct content.

            The movement to extricate and potentially free technical from Technical and Professional Writing stems from the harsh misconceptions it has received over the years. The title Professional Writing will encompass everything it means to be a writer—yes, we write manuals about specific content, and yes, our “presentation of facts” are objective. However, Professional Writing is an art that encompasses rhetoric at its core.  Whatever content, subject, or audience we write for, we do so with intricate precision and acknowledgement of rhetoric. Without such, we wouldn’t be Professional Writers.

References

Dobrin, David N. "What's Technical about Technical Writing?" New Essays in Technical and Scientific Communication: Research, Theory, Practice (1983): 107-23. Web. Jan.-Feb. 2016.

Miller, Carolyn R. "A Humanistic Rationale for Technical Writing." College English 40.6 (1979): 610. Web. 6 Feb. 2016. "What's Practical about Technical Writing" p. 61-70