Download or read book The Social Construction of Written Communication written by Bennetta A. Rafoth and published by Praeger. This book was released on 1988 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume examines the role of social factors in the nature and development of written communication. Unlike previous works, the volume is dedicated to examining the ways in which written communication affects and is affected by the community of writers and readers who produce and interpret written language. It focuses on the extent to which writing depends upon principles of social context that are posited for language in general. Intended for both researchers and teachers in language, composition, education, and communication, the volume draws together a number of distinguished scholars in linguistics, communication, education, anthropology, and sociology. It offers theoretical and applied perspectives on aspects of written communication that share in the social foundations of language.

Download or read book The Social Construction of Literacy written by Jenny Cook-Gumperz and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-08-17 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Literacy - the ability to produce and interpret written text - has long been viewed as the basis of all school achievement; a measure of success that defines both an 'educated' person, and an educable one. In this volume, a team of leading experts raise questions central to the acquisition of literacy. Why do children with similar classroom experiences show different levels of educational achievement? And why do these differences in literacy, and ultimately employability, persist? By looking critically at the western view of a 'literate' person, the authors present a perspective on literary acquisition, viewing it as a socially constructed skill, whereby children must acquire discourse strategies that are socially 'approved'. This extensively-revised second edition contains an updated introduction and bibliography. This volume will continue to have far-reaching implications for educational theory and practice.

Download or read book Writing Business written by Francesca Bargiela-Chiappini and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-06-11 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Writing Business: Genres, Media and Discourses offers an analysis of the genres and functions of written discourse in the business context, involving a variety of modes of communication. The evolution of new forms of writing is a key focus of this collection and is only partly attributable to the ever increasing application of technology at work. Alongside machine-mediated texts such as electronic mail and computer-generated correspondence, the contextualised analyses of both traditional genres such as facsimiles and direct mailing, and of lesser studied texts such as invitations for bids, contracts, business magazines and ceremonial speeches, reveal a rich complexity in the forms of communication evolved by organisations and the individuals who work within them, in response to the demands of the social, organisational and cultural contexts in which they operate. This rich textual variation is matched by a discussion of a range of methodological approaches to the development of business writing skills, including rhetorical analysis, organisational communication analysis, social constructionism, genre analysis and survey and experimental methods. Using authentic data and benefiting from a fresh, interdisciplinary approach, the volume will be of interest to students and researchers of business communication, Language for Specific Purposes (LSP), English for Specific Purposes (ESP), and sociolinguistics.

Download or read book The Social Construction of Literacy written by Jenny Cook-Gumperz and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-08-17 with total page 3 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Literacy - the ability to produce and interpret written text - has long been viewed as the basis of all school achievement; a measure of success that defines both an 'educated' person, and an educable one. In this volume, a team of leading experts raise questions central to the acquisition of literacy. Why do children with similar classroom experiences show different levels of educational achievement? And why do these differences in literacy, and ultimately employability, persist? By looking critically at the western view of a 'literate' person, the authors present a perspective on literary acquisition, viewing it as a socially constructed skill, whereby children must acquire discourse strategies that are socially 'approved'. This extensively-revised second edition contains an updated introduction and bibliography. This volume will continue to have far-reaching implications for educational theory and practice.

Download or read book Modelling Written Communication written by Deirdre Pratt and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2011-01-19 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers an alternative view to current postmodern approaches to composition. It takes a critical realist stance to arrive at the “essence” of written communication with the aim of informing a practical application: a computerised writing tutor. Following Robert Franck’s seminal work on modelling, a theoretical model of writing was first formulated, consisting of an architecture of functions which constitute the prerequisites for effective communication. Next, an applied model - a composing algorithm with an input option - was developed, showing composing to be a systemic social process with intra- and extra-systemic variation. The algorithm provided the design template for a writing tutor program which models for the learner both the systemic and the socially situated nature of writing. This book establishes composing as a communicative interaction, and shows the essential dynamism of writing, while offering an exemplar of a systems approach to modelling in the social sciences.

Download or read book Composing Social Identity in Written Language written by Donald L. Rubin and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-09-13 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume constitutes a unique contribution to the literature on literacy and culture in several respects. It links together aspects of social variation that have not often been thus juxtaposed: ethnicity/nationality, gender, and participant role relations. The unifying theme of this collection of papers is that all of these factors are aspects of writers' identities -- identities which are simultaneously expressed and constructed in text. The topic of social identity and writing can be approached from a variety of scholarly avenues, including humanistic, critical, and historical perspectives. The papers in the present volume make reference to and contribute to such humanistic perspectives; however, this book lies squarely within the tradition of social science. It draws primarily upon the disciplines of linguistics, discourse analysis, anthropology, social and cognitive psychology, and education studies. The constituent topics of social identity, style, and writing themselves lie at the intersections of several related fields of scholarship. Writing remains of peak interest to educators from many fields, and is still a "hot" topic. The instructional ramifications of the particular issues addressed in this volume are of vital concern to educational systems adjusting to the realities of our multicultural society. This publication, therefore, should attract a substantial and diverse readership of scholars, educators, and policymakers affiliated with many fields including applied linguistics, composition and rhetoric, communication studies, dialect studies, discourse analysis, English composition, English/language arts education, ethnic studies, language behavior, literacy, sociolinguistics, stylistics, women's studies, and writing research and instruction.

Download or read book The Psychology of Writing written by Ronald T. Kellogg and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1999-08-05 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The human ability to render meaning through symbolic media such as art, dance, music, and speech defines, in many ways, the uniqueness of our species. One symbolic medium in particular--written expression--has aroused increasing interest among researchers across disciplines, in areas as diverse as the humanities, education, and the social sciences because it offers a fascinating window into the processes underlying the creation and enunciation of symbolic representation. In The Psychology of Writing, cognitive psychologist Ronald T. Kellogg reviews and integrates the fast-growing, multidisciplinary field of composition research, a field that seeks to understand how people formulate and express their thoughts with the symbols of written text. By examining the production of written text, the book fills a large gap in cognitive psychology, which until now has focused on speech production, comprehension, and reading, while virtually ignoring how people write. Throughout, the author masterfully examines the many critical factors that come together during the writing process--including writer personality, work schedules, method of composing, and knowledge. In providing an important new theoretical framework that enables readers from a wide range of backgrounds to navigate the extensive composition literature, the author drives home the profound significance of meaning-making as a defining feature of human cognition. Kellogg not only draws from the work of leading composition scholars, but quotes insights into the writing process proffered by some of the most gifted practitioners of the writing craft--including E.M. Forster, John Updike, and Samuel Johnson. Engaging and lively, The Psychology of Writing is the perfect introduction to the subject for students, researchers, journalists, and interested general readers.

Download or read book Sociomedia written by Edward Barrett and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 1992 with total page 842 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Barrett's opening essay further explores his original and thought-provoking application of social construction theories of knowledge to the development and analysis of multimedia systems. Some of the chapters that follow look at the effectiveness of particular multimedia systems across the curriculum, from medicine, sociology, and management to language learning, writing, literature, and intergenerational studies. Other chapters examine the implied pedagogy within these systems, or the effects of using multimedia and hypermedia in the classroom.

Download or read book Teaching Composition Around the Pacific Rim written by Mark Newell Brock and published by Multilingual Matters. This book was released on 1992 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Considers both political and pedagogical issues related to the teaching of English composition to Asian/Pacific students. The possible consequences of imposing Western rhetoric are analyzed, and use of current approaches to the teaching of composition are examined in the context of the Pacific Rim.

Download or read book The Social Construction of Reality written by Peter L. Berger and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2011-04-26 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A watershed event in the field of sociology, this text introduced “a major breakthrough in the sociology of knowledge and sociological theory generally” (George Simpson, American Sociological Review). In this seminal book, Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann examine how knowledge forms and how it is preserved and altered within a society. Unlike earlier theorists and philosophers, Berger and Luckmann go beyond intellectual history and focus on commonsense, everyday knowledge—the proverbs, morals, values, and beliefs shared among ordinary people. When first published in 1966, this systematic, theoretical treatise introduced the term social construction,effectively creating a new thought and transforming Western philosophy.

Download or read book The Structure of Written Communication written by Martin Nystrand and published by Brill Academic Pub. This book was released on 1986 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book transcends current research on writing by relating written text to the cognitive and social processes that create and change it. It includes key features such as: reciprocity as a principle of discourse; language development as socialization; context, explicitness, genre, topic, and comment as concepts in discourse analysis; and writing and reading as social processes.

Download or read book Landmark Essays on Writing Across the Curriculum written by Charles Bazerman and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-11-25 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rhetoric, as a general teaching -- while preaching locality of action and guidelines for handling that locality -- has tended from the beginning to serve as a universality. It has offered a generalized techne with only limited categories, appropriate for all discursive situations, at least for those that were not excluded from the realm of rhetoric. Nonetheless, from its beginnings, rhetoric limited its interests to certain activity fields such as law, government, religion, and most important, the educators of leaders in these activity fields. This collection presents landmarks showing where the Writing-Across-the-Curriculum (WAC) and Writing in the Disciplines (WID) movements have gone. They have opened up a number of prospects that were impossible to see when rhetoric and composition confined their gaze to relatively few discursive activities. This suggests that the rhetorical landscape is becoming more complex and interesting, as well as more responsive to life in the complex, differentiated societies that have emerged in the last few centuries. This volume will reveal to scholars and researchers a range of possibilities for the study of disciplinary discourse and its teaching, and suggest to them new prospects for the future -- and for the better.

Download or read book Towards Knowledge in Writing written by Jill Fitzgerald and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reviews the shifting conceptions of writing and revision, noting the ways in which views of knowledge and knowing shape teaching and research. Fitzgerald, as a reading and writing researcher, recognizes that how we revise is shaped by how we read and respond to our unfolding texts. She argues that how we write and read is ultimately shaped by how we know-that is, how we seek to make sense of the world. How and why do we revise when we write? How do we differ in the extent or level of revisions due to differences in our purpose, mode of writing, perceptions of audience, or phase of development of our writing? What motivates us to revise-a need to clarify our expression, to rethink or alter our ideas, to influence our reader in certain ways, or to fulfill our own purposes? These questions have always intrigued composition theo rists and researchers; however, it is only in the past 15 years that researchers have seriously and systematically sought answers to these questions.

Download or read book Writing and Identity written by Roz Ivani? and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1998 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Writing is not just about conveying 'content' but also about the representation of self. (One of the reasons people find writing difficult is that they do not feel comfortable with the 'me' they are portraying in their writing. Academic writing in particular often poses a conflict of identity for students in higher education, because the 'self' which is inscribed in academic discourse feels alien to them.)The main claim of this book is that writing is an act of identity in which people align themselves with socio-culturally shaped subject positions, and thereby play their part in reproducing or challenging dominant practices and discourses, and the values, beliefs and interests which they embody. The first part of the book reviews recent understandings of social identity, of the discoursal construction of identity, of literacy and identity, and of issues of identity in research on academic writing. The main part of the book is based on a collaborative research project about writing and identity with mature-age students, providing: - a case study of one writer's dilemmas over the presentation of self;- a discussion of the way in which writers' life histories shape their presentation of self in writing;- an interview-based study of issues of ownership, and of accommodation and resistance to conventions for the presentation of self;- linguistic analysis of the ways in which multiple, often contradictory, interests, values, beliefs and practices are inscribed in discourse conventions, which set up a range of possibilities for self-hood for writers.The book ends with implications of the study for research on writing and identity, and for the learning and teaching of academic writing.The book will be of interest to students and researchers in the fields of social identity, literacy, discourse analysis, rhetoric and composition studies, and to all those concerned to understand what is involved in academic writing in order to provide wider access to higher education.

Download or read book Beginning Writers in the Zone of Proximal Development written by Elizabeth Petrick-Steward and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-10-12 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do young children bridge the gap between "writing" a story with pictures and writing with words? How children learn to use written words to tell a story is a topic important to both cognitive development and early literacy instruction. Using the theoretical framework developed by Vygotsky, the behavior of a group of prekindergarten children as they author two consecutive pieces of writing is analyzed. The children tell their stories at first with spoken words and pictures. As they discuss their work-in-progress in public conferences, they discover how to build on and combine existing skills to produce a new skill -- telling stories with written words. Current descriptive and theoretical perspectives on beginning writing are presented in this volume, with a particular focus on Vygotsky's concept of the zone of proximal development, a period of sensitivity in which learning advances. The proposed mechanism of change is verbal mediation -- talk among peers and teachers as they discuss work-in-progress -- which moves the children through the zone of proximal development. An open, whole-language approach to literacy instruction makes the classroom in this book an ideal arena in which to observe verbal mediation in operation. Children are free to question, criticize and argue; and in the process they collectively advance their developing ability to use written language. The work is unique in that the rich and comprehensive data record is reproduced in its entirety. More than 400 illustrations of the children's products -- two "books" apiece, pictured before and after the children's revisions -- are included, along with transcripts of the conferences about each of the pages, permitting direct observation of the effects of verbal mediation. This dynamic study documents change during a period of time when specific learning is occurring, and provides strong support for the value and power of Vygotsky's theoretical framework.

Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of Language and Professional Communication written by Vijay Bhatia and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-02-24 with total page 613 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Routledge Handbook of Language and Professional Communication provides a broad coverage of the key areas where language and professional communication intersect and gives a comprehensive account of the field. The four main sections of the Handbook cover: Approaches to Professional Communication Practice Acquisition of Professional Competence Views from the Professions This invaluable reference book incorporates not only an historical view of the field, but also looks to possible future developments. Contributions from international scholars and practitioners, focusing on specific issues, explore the major approaches to professional communication and bring into focus recent research. This is the first handbook of language and professional communication to account for both pedagogic and practitioner perspectives and as such is an essential reference for postgraduate students and those researching and working in the areas of applied linguistics and professional communication.

Download or read book Writing and the Writer written by Frank Smith and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-11-05 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Exploring the relationship between the writer and what he/she happens to be writing, this text by one of the foremost scholars in the field of literacy and cognition is a unique and original examination of writing--as a craft and as a cognitive activity. The book is concerned with the physical activity of writing, the way the nervous system recruits the muscles to move the pen or manipulate the typewriter. It considers the necessary disciplines of writing, such as knowledge of the conventions of grammar, spelling, and punctuation. In particular, there is a concern with how the skills underlying all these aspects of writing are learned and orchestrated. This second edition includes many new insights from the author's significant experience and from recent research, providing a framework for thinking about the act of writing in both theoretical and practical ways. A completely new chapter on computers and writing is included, as well as more about the role of reading in learning to write, about learning to write at all ages, and about such controversial issues as whether and how genre theory should be taught. Written in nontechnical language, this text will continue to be accessible and stimulating to a wide range of readers concerned with writing, literacy, thinking, and education. Furthermore, it has an educational orientation, therefore proving relevant and useful to anyone who teaches about writing or endeavors to teach writing.