Policing ourselves: Defining the boundaries of appropriate discussion in online forums

Computers and Composition 13, 269-291 (1996)

Policing Oursekes: Defining the Boundaries of Appropriate Discussion in Online Forums

JOHNDAN JOHNSON-EILOLA

Purdue University

STUART A. SELBER

Exas Tech University

Arguing that the discourses in which we write also write us, this essay examines some language-related regulating mechanisms that function in online forums supported by wide- area networks (WANs). In particular, it examines one online forum conventionally defined as open, the LISTSERV discussion list TECHWR-L, and considers some positionings and restrictions that both validate and invalidate participants’ conversational topics. This essay broodly considers the question of democracy as it relates to electronic conversations, contending that what often delimits the boundaries of appropriate discussion in online forums includes not just software and hordware features but a wide range of discursive conditions.

democracy discursive control e-mail

electronic networks for interaction (ENFI) LISTSERV lists

online forums technical communication writing instruction

[N]ot all areas of discourse are equally open and penetrable; some are forbidden territory (differentiated and differentiating) while others are virtually open to the winds and stand, without any prior restrictions, open to all. (Foucault, 1972, p. 225)

If all language articulates specific interests, then it would appear that all language is ideological. (Eagleton, 1991, p. 202)

Computers and writing specialists have long felt that online forums somehow liberate students and teachers (as well as other computer users) to speak freely, outside age, ethnicity, gender, and race constraints, as well as other status and physical appearance markers that can keep individual voices from being heard. Research on asynchronous and synchronous conferencing sessions, and on electronic mail and other online en~ronments for collaboration and exchange, commonly considers the ways computer-based technologies might encourage student-centered pedagogies, provide equitable and egalitarian communication spaces, and promote nontraditional learning interactions that transcend the boundaries of typical (and often oppressive) classroom settings and situations (Baym, 1995; Cooper and Selfe, 1990; Faigley, 1990; Flores, 1990; Hiltz, 1994; Lanham, 1994; Spitzer, 1989). On rarer occasions, such research has considered the potentially unproductive and partial shaping of discursive activities by computer hardware and software, finding ideological biases antithetical to sound instructional goals in the design

We thank Steve Doheny-Farina, Jim Porter, Bill Hart-Davidson, and two anonymous reviewers for their t~ughtful comments on this essay.

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be sent to Johndan Jolson-EiIola, Department of English, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907-1356. e-mail: <johndan~o~i.cc.purdue.edu>.

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270 JOHNSON-EILOLA AND SELBER

and daiiy operation of local-area networks (LANs) and human-computer interfaces (Eldred & Hawisher, 1995; Johnson-Eilola, 1995; Regan, 1993; Romano, 1994; Selber, 1995; Selfe & Selfe, 1994; Takayoshi, 1994; Wahlstrom, 1994).

But computers and writing specialists think less often about the inherent limitations of language and words, about how the discourses in which we write also write us. We rarely think about the ways discourses operate not only through opportunity and production, but also-by definition-through restriction and limitation. “We know perfectly well,” Foucault (1972) reminded us, in The Archaelogy of Knu~~Zedge and the Discourse on ~~g~~ge, “that we are not free to say just ~ything, that we cannot simply speak of anything, when we like or where we like; not just anyone, finally, may speak of just anything” (p. 2 16).

Adherence to utopian beliefs in the liberating power of language is an understandable tendency for computers and writing specialists, immersed as we are in the study of words. As people concerned with the complexities of language use, we spend our days considering the immense range of options available to us when we speak and write. Many computers and writing specialists are walking thesauri, mobile rhetorics, able to quickly provide a nearly infinite number of useful language alternatives for any communication context. We sense-perhaps oversensitively-that our language is unlimited. As Foucault (1972) argued, however, we tend to see “infinite resources available for the creation of discourse. . . . [B]ut there are nonetheless principles of constraint and it is probably impossible to appreciate their positive, multiplicatory role without first taking into consideration their restrictive, constraining role” (p. 224).

So, contrary to many discussions about communication exchanges in online forums, this essay considers how we, as network users and members of professional online communities, have come to “police ourselves.” That is, we examine some ways that individuals and groups learn and internalize discourse laws as they operate in online forums and how they learn the consequences of breaking these laws. We explore some regulating mechanisms as they function in one forum conventionally defined as open, the LISTSERV discussion list TECHWR-L (TEC~R-L~VMl.UCC.OKSTATE.EDU). TECHWR-L, which in late 1995 had approximately 2,000 subscribers, is composed of technical communicators in business, industry, and government as well as a smaller but still significant number of teachers and researchers in academic settings.

We are focusing on this list for a number of reasons: It is a list to which we belong, and one from which we’ve gained valuable discussion and information. In addition, the list’s contents are available in public archives dating back to its creation in 1993. We did not choose this list because it is any more or less “policed” than others; we are not trying to ostracize list members or the list owner, who happens to be a generous colleague and friend. So, even though the posts we cite are publicly available, we’ve removed all header information and replaced subscriber names in the bodies of messages with pseudonyms.

Most important, TECHWR-L is a nonacademic list. Although computers and writing specialists have deconstructed and reconstructed classroom discourses with great interest and enthusiasm, we feel that it is critical to more routinely consider nonacademic forums in not only social but also political ways. McLaughlin, Osborne, and Smith (1995), for example, provided an important taxonomy of “reproachable” social behaviors on Usenet news that should be required reading for students, teachers, and practitioners participating in Internet discourse. But such guidelines, though extremely useful, fail to address fundamental questions of power distribution and control that we feel are crucial components of critical literacies of technology. We are not, therefore, advocating that

Policing Ourselves 271

students simply learn to follow certain discourse rules; rather, they should recognize the mechanisms through which these rules operate so that they might negotiate a variety of positions within online forums and possibly enact change. Notably, this project does not attempt to simply remove impediments to free and open discourse. Such structures constitute a crucial part of language games.

DEFINING ISSUES ON TECHWR-L

To begin our analysis, we want to illustrate the tone and form of common messages on TECHWR-L, things included within the boundaries of appropriate discussion for list members. There are some general positionings and restrictions available and at work on this list, some of which clearly exist on other lists and in other online forums. TECHWR- L began in 1993 with the following message from the list owner:

Hello and Welcome to techwr-1

I formed this list to provide a forum for any and all technical writing issues. If anyone has any particular topics to address, just post and start a thread.

As of this morning we have about 90 subscribers, which includes quite a variety of people and backgrounds (according to the network addresses).

Instead of asking for introductions from everyone, I would just suggest that you introduce yourself briefly when you post for the first time.

[text deleted]

In this short welcome message segment, the list owner mobilizes a number of discursive effects, some of which we discuss more fully later in this essay. First, he claims ownership (if not overt control) over the list by assuming the role of greeter. Second, he provides readers with a brief summary of the list’s current number of participants. Third, he invokes (and, therefore, approves) domain addresses as a way of identifying individuals currently participating. Fourth, he articulates some ground rules for TECHWR-L, setting an agenda for when participants should make their presence known. Notably, only individuals who actually contribute material should be officially recognized. This restriction contrasts sharply with the common (but not universal) practice of asking everyone who subscribes to a list-even those who lurk (read only) or rarely post-to offer a brief biography as a way of introducing themselves to other members.

In general, TECHWR-L participants discuss issues of interest to practicing technical communicators, including comparisons of various page layout and word-processing programs, methodologies for creating and testing the usability of technical publications, and the benefits of attending upcoming local and national conferences for professional development. As the tag line on the “Sender” field for each message claims, TECHWR-L is “for all technical communication issues. ” Three typical posts from this list include the following:

Typical Post 1: Job Titles

I’m a technical writer who just signed on with a CD-ROM publishing house. We publish a monthly CD-ROM chock full of Texas case law for 500 lawyers, judges, and legal researchers. Currently we use TMS Innerview system for authoring, but we’re contemplating a switch to Folio’s Views system. One of my first projects is to convert 67,000 cases of legacy data to SGML format.


My bosses do not know what to call me, so I’m taking suggestions. My job is multi- faceted: I am devising and documenting a workflow system that incorporates Microsoft Project and a bar code document control system. My primary job is to spur along the programmers and act as a liaison between them and the management. I have five people for whom I have responsibility: two programmers, a data processor, and a

legal editor.

Technical Writer and Documentation Specialist just don’t seem accurate to describe what I do. What do I put on my business cards?

In this first post, a technical writer working on CD-ROM-based reviews of Texas case law asks questions about the accuracy and comprehensiveness of traditional job titles. This type of definition question has become critical for people in technical communication and is a recurring theme on TECHWR-L, because job titles are often explicitly connected with workplace responsibilities, salaries, and career tracks.

Typical Post 2: Grammar and Usage

>In the real-life example that started this thread:

>“lower” “right” “corner”

>l. lower corner # Yeah, it’s a lower corner

>2. right corner # Yeah, it’s a right corner, too

>3. OK, I don’t have to hyphenate

Yes, but following this logic, you should put a *comma* between lower & right! ;)

“lower, right corner”

IMHO, in this scenario, lower is used to modify “right corner” since there are *two* right corners to every window, an upper and a lower.

This second post includes a short portion of a much longer conversation about the correct punctuation for the phrase “lower right hand corner.” Discussions of grammar and usage as they relate to functional documents and corporate style guides are quite common on TECHWR-L. In fact, a week rarely passes where someone does not query about the use of standard written English in technical communication.

Typical Post 3: Software Applications

Thanks for Help with Canvas.

To everyone who responded so quickly to my plea regarding Canvas, Thank You!

Most of the suggestions had already been tried (and failed); hearing about them was confirmation that I’d been doing the right things.

It was great hearing from those who had similar problems; that was more confirmation that it wasn’t just me.

The hoped for solution hasn’t yet made itself known. I promise that when it does, I’ll pass it on.

Finally, this third post offers appreciation to individuals who helped one subscriber with questions about a common computer-based illustration program. Asking about software features as they support the production of technical communication is also a standard practice on TECHWR-L. In fact, debates regularly occur over the best applications for creating and delivering paper-based and online materials.


BREAKING THE LAW (AND PAYING THE PRICE)

As illustrated by the three previous posts, TECHWR-L participants usually negotiate relatively calm positions within topics conventionally considered to be job related: appropriate titles at work, grammar and usage for technical English, and software applications. On occasion, however, threads develop within such topics that transgress the boundaries of conventional discourse in technical communication settings. In one case, for example, a participant raised questions about drug testing, an important issue for the increasingly large number of technical communicators working in freelance and contract jobs; these positions are often with defense and other government-related companies that enforce drug-testing regulations. As one might expect, the drug testing question quickly spread to issues of privacy, boundaries between private and public life, bureaucracy, drug laws, morality, and other weighty concerns. A few months earlier, another discussion raised gender and race representation issues in technical communication contexts. This discussion quickly expanded into questions of gendered visual representation, sexism, affirmative action, “reverse discrimination” as an oxymoron, and many others.

Here’s a small portion of a much larger exchange about racism and sexism issues among TECHWR-L participants. Although it is unclear exactly how this particular thread began (one participant claimed that someone started a discussion on another list and mistakenly continued it on TECHWR-L), it represents an area of discussion that’s commonly considered “off topic. ”

One Response

I’m in the odd position here of not having gotten the messages that sparked this. Nonetheless, there are a couple of things I want to respond to, particularly the odd assertion that we can learn more about bigotry by talking to the oppressors than to their victims.

What we mostly learn from talking to oppressors is that most of them don’t think much about what they’re doing. The racist who won’t hire people with the wrong skin color isn’t thinking about the poor shacks they’ll have to live in if they can’t find jobs. He’s thinking, maybe, that they’re “not like us” and will be less comfortable for him to work with. Or she’s remembering some stereotype or lie that she heard, and not even looking at the real human being in front of her. Yes, it is worth being aware of the banality of evil--but once we have noted that, it is more important to listen to the victims, to see how they are being harmed, and be motivated to do something about it. Someone said that the hard part was finding Nazis to testify. But there’s plenty of Nazi writing and testimony available, produced all through the years that they ruled Germany. Did we read_Mein Kampf_, or listen to propaganda radio, and realize how horrible it was? For the most part, no--because the Nazis painted the picture they wanted seen. If you want to know what Nazism was really like, you read the memoirs of the concentration camp survivors, or the Diary of Anne Frank.

[text deleted]

A Second Response

Janet, consider sexism from a behavioral view. If we focus only on the result, and not on the cause, we will not understand the cause very well. I want to suggest that the behavior, not the result be the focus of examination.

I am suggesting that sexism (a concept) is the result of numerous, small acts committed by men and women (behaviors), and that to provide an opportunity to


change, each man and woman must see what he or she did to contribute. Arguably, it is not the victim who has the problem, it is the victimizer.

My thesis is that more can be gained from examining the motivations and actions of sexists (those who behave in a sexist manner) than from the objects of the behavior, though of course part of that examination must be a dispassionate look at “what really happened. ” Did I contribute to the continuation of the behavior by my own actions or inactions? Am I sexist in my behavior?

My emphasis (and it is an -emphasis-, not a substitute for a multidisciplinary approach) is that it may be less productive to concentrate on the experience of the victim than on the behavior of the oppressor.

[text deleted]

A Third Response

I have been reading and thinking. I feel that people should be recognized as people. Accept the fact that they are different in color and move on. What I would really like to know is are there any African American male tech writers out there. I am one. Actually I am a graduate student from Southwest University and am studying to become a technical writer. The reason why I ask this is because I also happen to be a commissioned officer ARMOR, in the National Guard. By being an officer and a soldier, I have many African American soldiers (both officer and NCO) to look up to, admire, and be inspired by. It sure would be nice if I had this same satisfaction in my field of endeavor.

So let us not debate over what we can learn from whom, but what and where are the positives out there. We all need that. Learn to recognize people as people. Accept the color differences and accept and enjoy the fact that the man upstairs does not see black and white.

Most importantly, don’t read into every situation as a black/white or man/woman thing. Tension breeds chaos. Chaos breeds destruction. Destruction breeds nothing for destruction is the final blow.

If anyone can help me in my dilemma I would greatly appreciate it. If you especially know of any African American technical writers (either male or female) in the Southwest University area, I would very much like to hear from you.

A Fourth Response

>Learn to recognize people as people. Accept the color differences and accept >and enjoy the fact that the man upstairs does not see black and white.

Raymond.. . What makes you think She’s a man? (Sorry, couldn’t resist.)

I agree with your point about showing basic respect for others, and with your cautionary note about placing too much emphasis on variables of race and gender. It’s dangerous methodologically to assume that all situations are reducible to gender or race distinctions. On the other hand, gender and race ARE significant features of identity-and one criterion of respect for others IS to respect their differences. I don’t think we should ignore or obliterate difference, I think it has to be accepted and addressed.

And, by the way, I think this issue is highly relevant to technical communication, though the field in general has not yet taken up the issue in a way that makes the connection clear.

These discussions closely resemble the debates that computers and writing specialists frequently encourage their students to engage in online (see Cooper & Selfe, 1990;


Romano, 1994). And here we witnessed a large number of workplace professionals deep in discussion over social and political dimensions of technical communication in many contexts. At first, these conversations seemed to represent a productive way for practicing technical communicators to discuss important but often undiscussed ideological issues. Furthermore, the electronic forum’s openness appeared, at least for some participants, to provide a relatively safe environment in which they could voice frustrations and concerns that they could hardly raise in their own office settings.

Quickly, however, some discourse-related regulating mechanisms became apparent. After a number of replies to TECHWR-L asking participants to “stick to technical communication issues,” to “stay on task,” and to “get down to business” (one subscriber asked, “When did this stop being TECHWR-L and start being ETHICS/RACISM/EVIL- L?“), the list owner posted a message summarizing complaints from subscribers and announcing his new policy for “off-topic” posts (notably, this message does not contain comments from participants in favor of debating broader topics):

Long but important message follows. Please read.

Debbie Wright said:

> My primary reasons for subscribing are to see what is going on >in the field, learn from others, and help others. From some of the Xomments I have read and some of the debates that occur here, it >seems to me that some of you subscribe because you like to debate or >you’re bored. I’m not here to make a judgment call about Xubscribing for these reasons, but I will say, you make it hard for >some of us. My department head subscribes to this list. Many of >your supervisors probably also subscribe. If these unrelated debates >continue, are we going to convince people that this list isn’t worth >subscribing to? If so, how many people will leave? How many have Bleft? When people leave they take information with them that might >help you or me. Please try to discuss issues related to technical >communication. Please stop the bashing, name calling, and unrelated >debating. Let’s try to help each other learn new things and deal >with the frustrations of this field and our jobs. > Thanks, Debbie ([email protected])

I agree completely with Debbie’s comments. Her reasons for subscribing are very similar to the reasons I created. this list, and reflect what I see the purpose of this list to be.

I can add that quite a few people have recently left the list, and I can assume that the increasingly high signal-to-noise ratio had something to do with it. In a couple of cases, I know that from personal E-mail.

Please do think about Debbie’s comments and try to keep focused on the purpose of the list. Additionally.

Robert Humphries said:

>Like others, I get major grief at work for the number of mail messages I Xeceive. (This list is the culprit.) I can’t find the time in the day to >sort through them, so many remain on the system for some time, whether Xhey’re “junk mail” or not. Should we vote to create another list for those >who want to take turns on the soapbox so the rest of us can get down to Bbusiness efficiently? ;)


1 do not want to encourage anyone to sign off the list or to take technical writing issues elsewhere, but if anyone would like some pointers to more appropriate forums for drug testing, politics, personal liberties, or other topics, I will be delighted to help out.

Let’s please keep it to technical communication!

As one might expect, after such interventions, “off-topic” posts declined sharply, at least for a while.

TRUTH AND TRUTH DOMAINS

Quite separate from the heated debates over particular topics such as drug testing, racism and sexism, and personal liberties was the evolving metadiscussion about whether certain topics were even appropriate for TECHWR-L. General prohibitions on hazardous topics are an immensely powerful and effective way to avert dangerous discussions, those that question fundamental assumptions about world-views. Foucault (1972) explained, for example, how Gregor Mendel’s foundational work in genetics and heredity was studiously ignored for many years-not out of simple oversight or ignorance, but through the regulation of valid topics by the botany and biology disciplines. Today, we can recognize Mendel’s genetic laws as valid, but in 19th-century biology and botany, Mendel may have spoken the truth, but he did not speak duns le vrai, “within the true” (p. 224).

In similar ways, what is often debated in online forums such as TECHWR-L is not whether participants speak the truth, but whether their speech is within the true of that specific discourse. These truth realms are defined not only by participants and list owners, but also by a wide range of rhetorical, social, and institutional conditions. Arguments for the economy of topics on TECHWR-L, for example, often revolve around efficiency issues: Off-topic messages waste time, or they may convince an employee’s superior, if she or he sees the messages, that TECHWR-L is a waste of the employee’s time. Off-topic messages also waste financial and other resources, because Internet connections for creating and circulating messages represent significant investments for corporations in general and technical communications groups in particular.

Such efficiency-based arguments in technical communication forums (electronic or otherwise) are not surprising given certain historical and social facts. As a discipline, for example, technical communication has always concerned itself with direct expressions of ideas, concise uses of language, and clear transmissions of messages.l And, certainly, at least some concerns over economy are valid and widely shared. How many computers and writing specialists have looked at electronic networks for interaction (ENFI) transcripts from online class sessions and thought-at least fleetingly--that, “We only have an hour; I wish these students would stay on task!” But, at the same time that TECHWR-L participants use efficiency arguments to validate their regulation of topics, the list supports discussions about the best places for barbecue in the South, a flurry of messages reminiscing about the Firesign Theater, considerations of the sometimes cryptic meaning

‘For discussions of some ethical problems associated with this position, see Slack, Miller, and Doak (1993), Katz (1992), and Ornatowski (1992).


of people’s signature blocks, and lists of humorous business names. It is relatively rare for such less controversial (but still off topic) messages to become the topic of explicit police actions. Rather, people tend to complain when participants raise topics that potentially rupture relatively stable hegemonic relations-racism, sexism, civil rights-topics that should be discussed within the context of technical communication, but not without making some difficult admissions about our current culture and the cultural capital of many practicing professionals.2

During the racism and sexism thread, most participants seemed unwilling to make even modest connections between this topic and technical communication. Instead, racism and sexism issues were primarily viewed as extraneous, and those contributing to this thread were sometimes labeled in negative ways:

I subscribed to this list because I wanted to learn a little more about my field. If this irrelevant discussion continues much longer I may be forced to pursue my engineering degree once again. This pointless and tasteless discussion of “oh, woe is me” attitudes simply doesn’t belong here.

A few participants attempted to make more explicit connections between sexism and racism and technical communication practices. In the following long post, one subscriber made compelling arguments about why participants on TECHWR-L should concern themselves with diversity issues:

Several people have expressed concern that this is an inappropriate place to be discussing racism and sexism. While, admittedly, some of the discussion has been fruitless, I’d like to offer a different perspective.

Diversification of the workforce-that is, bringing in women, men, African Americans, Caucasians, Asians, ethnic minorities, gays, straights, and the like is considered by human resource specialists to be one of the most compelling issues facing the American workforce. While companies are laying off in the tens of thousands today and are expected to do so for the next two to three years, workforce experts expect a huge shortage of labor in the U.S. workforce in the next few years and the gaps will be filled by groups other than the assumed workforce majority: white males.

Strife and prejudice are an unfortunate byproduct of differences; synergy and collaboration are fortunate benefits. If we can’t discuss the former, how can we achieve the latter?

And those of you who don’t think this is an important issue, consider these points:

l How many of you advocate the team approach to product development? If you do, then you have to address differences head on because differences don’t only exist on demographic levels, they also exist on professional levels. Programmers tend to put down technical writers who, in turn, put down their editors. . . Wait till the programmer

2We are sympathetic to the often marginalized positions of many practicing technical communicators in workplace settings. We might even partially connect these individuals’ relatively low status with their obsession over staying “on topic.” Because technical communication jobs are often more contingent than those in

computer science and engineering, technical communicators may strive to appear more productive and business oriented. In many corporations, it is reasonable to discuss a wide range of uncontroversial issues unrelated to

work (such as the best restaurant for barbecue), but political discussions of a controversial nature are often

taboo. One participant, who eventually unsubscribed from the list, was so frustrated by the limited scope of

discussion on TECHWR-L that he asked the following question: “Are we essentially entrenched in defensive

positions, constantly trying to prove how valuable we are, suffering from low self-esteem from feeling ‘less than’

our engineering peers, that we bicker constantly over trivial questions while criticizing others for doing that very

thing, and then attack those who try to address bigger issues. ?”


is female, the tech writer is from India, the tester is Asian, the marketing person is African American--you’ve just added a dimension of tension to an already known conflict. But if we can [sic] openly discuss our feelings and differences, how can we expect to get past the conflict and benefit from the synergy?

l We now write for diverse audiences, some within our nations, some international. (NOTE-I didn’t say within the U.S. Many of our readers live outside the U.S.) If we don’t learn to be sensitive to the needs of this diverse audience, our efforts to communicate will fail. For example, how can a Japanese person appreciate an example of a social security number when Social Security numbers are uniquely American? By the same token, how can healthcare examples used in Western European and Canadian publications be adapted to American publications, where we have no national healthcare (only a debate)?

These were relatively easy examples. Let’s tackle something more challenging. How do we expect women customers to react to a sales brochure that has a sexy female draped across a computer? Many will be offended by the overtly sexist image. How can we expect African American and Asian customers to feel when all the people in our photographs are Caucasian?

I find it compelling that so many technical communicators want to avoid discussion so basic and elemental to the communication process: dealing with diverse audiences. This is the stuff of rhetoric and, as I hope most of you know, rhetoric is the basic stuff of technical communication.

I recognize that racism and sexism aren’t pleasant subjects to discuss. The spelling of e-mail (I guess my preference is showing) and exchanging tips on FrameMaker demand much less of us. But if the world had ten spellings of e-mail, it probably would be no worse off. Unresolved conflicts among people, however, don’t benefit anyone.

But even when racism and sexism issues are framed within such traditional advice about

analyzing a rhetorical situation (audience and purpose), finding productive ways of

collaborating, and increasing workplace productivity, on TECHWR-L these difficult issues are often attributed not to social and political forces, but to differing disciplinary visions about appropriate ways of working. In responding to the previous long post, one participant simultaneously mobilizes her rank of professional (a tactic we discuss in the next section) and remaps diversity issues as professional choices, reducing the social and ethical considerations existing in technical communication contexts:

You need to get out in the working world. This situation has existed for a few years and we don’t seem to have problems with the identity of the person-or even consider it in the team environment. The problem is with the differences in professional opinion, which is

where it should be.

On occasion, and usually with less controversial issues, TECHWR-L discussion topics shift the boundaries of truth domains to include new areas, although such occurrences seem relatively rare. For example, following a comment criticizing a recent technical communication conference for not including enough “real technical writers” (straying into related disciplines such as business writing), list participants offered justifications for expanding our professional definitions:

Well, I say HURRAY for the diversity of backgrounds and perspectives “NOT REAL” technical writers bring to the field. Also there are many of us, I feel, who don’t fit the standard “real” profile.


I write user guides, job descriptions, edit papers, edit theses, write articles, used to edit a computer center newsletter, offer training classes, answer user questions, write and design brochures and flyers, etc. It’s a real technical garnish here and a day doesn’t go by that I feel traditional. I come from a science background and certainly appreciate those with English backgrounds as I appreciate the different perspectives they bring to an issue.

Ah, I vote we blast the caste system into outer space.

ADDITIONAL REGULATION AND CONTROL MECHANISMS

There are some additional ways participants and discourses construct differing positions with varying degrees and types of power. Although we only discuss a few regulation and control mechanisms here, these might suggest possible avenues for further consideration. In addition to regulations dealing with appropriate topics and behaviors, discourses operate in the following ways:

. assertion of control over the conversation (including control over the technology of conversation),

. recognition of a contributor’s institution and their relative status within that

institution, and . negation of another contributor’s position (often accomplished with the simple yet

effective tactic of ignoring offending messages).

List Ownership and Ethos-Based Arguments One popular method for structuring power relations is for contributors to cite their own qualifications or those of other contributors. TECHWR-L’s list owner, for example, consciously identifies his own authority and also authorizes other voices with which he agrees by including their posts in his own messages. We’ve elided text from the earlier warning message about “off-topic” posts to highlight some rhetorical structures of inclusion:

Long but important message follows. Please read.

Debbie Wright said: > My primary reasons for subscribing are to see what is going on

[...I

> Thanks, Debby ([email protected])

I agree completely with Debby’s comments.

[...I

Additionally.

Robert Humphries said: > Like others, I get major grief at work for the number of mail messages I receive. (This list is the culprit.)

[...I

[email protected]

TECHWR-L List owner

280 JOHNSON-EILOLA AND SELEIER

Institutional Affiliation and Rank Participants also use standard e-mail address identifiers (domain and subdomain names) to validate their status or call into question the status of other participants. Depending on the discourse, the identifier <so-and-so>@bellcore.com can position one contributor quite differently than another with the address <so-and-so>@purdue.edu or Qo-and- so>@aol.com.3 Power levels are notable even within single institutions with multiple

machines.

In a recent exchange on a usability testing list, one contributor with a .com domain type critiqued another person’s position with a .edu domain type as ivory tower, launching a mild flame about the usefulness of strict definitions for validity measures in field work: “I don’t know what planet you’re from, (‘Look! Up in the sky! It’s academic man!‘), but. . . ” A similar example comes from the Usenet Newsgroup comp.sys.powerpc:

>]>Sorry for wasting YOUR bandwidth. >Sigh. I know that Mac owners are not this rude and inconsiderate, but people like this one perpetuate the

>myth.

They’re not, this post perpetuated the myth in my mind that all AOLers are complete idiots. .

:-)for the humour impaired. (I should have put one in my last post, I know. . )

This message’s context relates to a debate over netiquette (network etiquette), but what’s interesting here is the negative reference to “AOLers.” AOL stands for “America

Online,” a popular commercial service that recently added Internet access for its users (who are all given Internet addresses in the form <username>@aol.com). Undoubtedly, whole volumes could be written about the flames and discussions surrounding America Online’s gateway entrance to the Internet.

A number of AOL users evidenced linguistic and technological patterns that set them apart from self-recognized Internet experts, including posting messages to “inappropriate” lists and typing in all caps as opposed to mixed case.4 But these faux pus are not uncommon for the countless new users entering the Internet daily from places besides AOL. The tag aol.com, however, makes American Online users easily identifiable. For some Internet users, the mere presence of a .aol domain type on Usenet News posts functions like a sign saying, “Kick me! I’m a clueless newbie!”

More recently on TECHWR-L, a university instructor required students in a technical communication class to post list messages to involve them in professional-level discourse. As one might expect, many students asked questions that some list members (perhaps

%-mail addresses are composed of multiple parts, with the individual user’s identification followed by the @

symbol and then the name of the computer that processes the user’s mail at the Internet gateway. The conventions

of naming these computers (called domains) defines the extensions .com as company (a private corporation),

.edu as educational site, and .org as nonprofit organization.

4’Qping in all caps is viewed by expert users as either evidence of obsolete technology-old terminals were

limited to uppercase-or sheer oafishness, like delivering a conference paper by shouting at the top of your

lungs. It is also viewed as an abnormality or unnatural trait, as Alison Regan (1993) has explained in her

discussion of classroom network conversations.


justifiably) saw as unprofessional; moreover, the instructor did not prepare them well for

their online participation-many messages were posted all at once, and one student even posted a sexist comment (for which he later apologized). Many professional members of the list were not very tolerant of these activities. After the students removed themselves (with prodding) from TECHWR-L, the list owner explained the difficulties of managing a high-volume list. In a portion of the message, the list owner mobilizes his status as a professional technical communicator in relation to the academic world (even though he claims sympathy toward the professional development of technical communication students):

Yes, we had a bad experience this week with a technical communication faculty member who wasn’t as well informed as he might have been. Oh, well. I’d imagine that his embarrassment is ample “punishment” for his assignment. So the students didn’t behave as they might have. Oh, well. I’ll have a couple of extra questions the next time a resume from this university crosses my desk. Not a big deal either.

Finally, the positioning nature of user identifications is also often carried across a number of hierarchies: Students are sometimes given accounts on special machines with the identifier student included in the machine’s domain name (much in the same way that domain names can signal hierarchical position in the pairs corporate/academic or Internet/America Online). Internet users at community colleges (faculty, students, and staff) face similar institutionalized subordinations because their user identifications frequently contain not the .edu suffix typical of universities but a .cc suffix (standing for community colleges), which may act to mask their interests in discussions in ways that they have to actively combat. Lynn Pfannkuche, in a post to ACW-L (Alliance for Computers and Writing list), attempted to make her own interest in academic debates about computing clear by both explaining the .cc suffix and adding the e-mail address from another account that did contain the .edu suffix. At the end of her message, she appended the following explanation:

BTW, my domain is not an edu, but cc indicates community college.

****************

Lynn Pfannkuche Instructor of English

Lincoln Land Community College Springfield, Illinois 62793

[email protected]

[email protected]

*******x********

Likewise, users in different geographical locations are given suffixes to denote their country of origin, although some users in the United States are not given any particular suffix, perpetuating the notion that our culture is default and neutral. (Interestingly, Internet users at community college sites are sometimes given .us suffixes, as Lynn Pfannkuche’s address shows.) Even if computer users in other countries did see user identifications from people in the United States as having a .us domain type, most people in the United States would see their own user identifications as neutral and those of people from other countries as indicating Other. On systems that assign users identifications based on arcane number and letter combinations, people in high places of power- often technical staff who maintain and control computing systems or administrators who approve computing budgets-are often provided personalized user identifications that distinguish them from typical users with identifications like jx45lmon.


Silence By ignoring e-mail messages, list members can discourage individuals from participating or promoting particular agendas. This tactic often works well. In a presentation at the 1994 Conference on College Composition and Communication, Geoff Sire recounted one student’s efforts to engage his classmates in online discussions about Malcolm X’s anger. For the most part, this student’s impassioned questions were ignored by his peers. In fact, toward the end of one effort to persuade classmates to respond to his questions and comments, this student’s post evolved into fevered, all-cap pleas:

DID ANYONE FEEL THAT THE TRUTH IS BEING TOLD. BECAUSE MOST OF US I BET WON’T SPEAK WHAT’S ON THEIR MIND.

This student, speaking outside the true, remained largely unheard by his classmates. On TECHWR-L, one participant overtly suggested the silent treatment as one way of responding to off-topic posts:

Lot’s of people are talking about list topics getting out of hand. Of course, each complaint fuels reactions ad infinitum. Seems the best way to end a topic is not to respond to it, n’est ce pas??

This strategy, of course, has the possible added benefit of reducing the large number of messages often generated by individuals complaining about the wasted bandwidth of off- topic posts.

WHAT IS DEMOCRACY?

The struggle over what gets included in the public agenda is itself a struggle for justice and freedom. (Benhabib, 1992, p. 94)

The debate on TECHWR-L over appropriate topics intrigues us for two key reasons, which we discuss at greater length in the final section of this essay. First, there seems to be a strong relationship between a topic’s inappropriateness and its questioning of traditional power relations in workplace settings (the few exceptions are humorously noted in the signature block in the following). The second reason, related to the first, involves the way discursive activities on this list seem to regulate themselves: The participants, more or less democratically, have agreed on what counts as appropriate discussion in this online forum. As one participant humorously notes in her signature block,

In this establishment, we DO NOT DISCUSS race, religion, politics, what color of suit would be most likely to impress the brain-dead fast-track yuppie “professional” type conducting an interview, politically correct gender-neutral pronoun agreement, single-clicking versus double-clicking mouse events, shallow comparisons of printed versus displayed text, or nutrition.

So is TECHWR-L a democratic and open list? We think so, as much as any online (or face-to-face) forum can claim to have such qualities. But what do we mean by democratic? This question is crucial because the term so frequently implies a vague but


unexamined (and often contradictory) vision espousing equal rights for all citizens in a community. This “freedom” to participate is, in fact, one often-cited benefit of

computer-based forums in general and of lists like TECHWR-L in particular: Everyone has a voice. The generally agreed to prohibitions on certain topics are viewed by most participants as a sign of civilization: Our lives are too complicated and the voices so many that we must agree to avoid discussing certain topics because they are too complex or do not relate to the task at hand.

And, in many ways, such views are understandable. Heated discussions over controversial topics rarely generate anything more than additional heat. So in constructing what Seyla Benhabib called a “liberal” or “legalistic” model of discussion space, TECHWR-L participants attempt to bracket out discussions so polarizing that warring factions cannot even agree on basic principles. Simply put, such discussions rarely help participants reach new understandings; instead, they function agonistically, allowing individuals the freedom to speak but not hear. Guidelines, both implicit and explicit, on TECHWR-L help clarify the boundaries of appropriate discourse.

At the same time, as Benhabib (1992) pointed out, the liberal and legalistic model of discussion space tends to submerge some important topics that a community should discuss. The liberal and legalistic model “conceives of political relations all too often narrowly along the model of juridicial ones” (p. 99). As one might expect, such restrictions almost always automatically ban discussions of inequality and exploitation that question current power structures. At many cultural points, both historically and currently, racism and sexism issues, for example, have involved fundamental disagree- ments that cannot be easily resolved without resorting to prescribed agendas (which would then ban these topics as too difficult for public debate).

From our perspective, a community disempowers itself by failing to struggle with its broader, sociopolitical issues. TECHWR-L and other professional lists are often read by employees on company time and with company equipment, but dealing with politically sensitive topics is often viewed by employers as an inefficient resource use. Thus, even leaving aside cases in which employers dictate, in a top-down fashion, what activities are appropriate for the workplace, we would be careful in labeling such workplaces “open forums”-and TECHWR-L, as with many other Internet discussion lists, presents itself as just one such forum. In effect, TECHWR-L’s ban on controversial topics provides a disciplinary justification for dismissing these issues from technical communication in general-something we view as a dangerous rhetorical move. Because the list spans both the concrete workplace and the discipline, there are (at least) two broad types of subject positions (often held by the same individual): the workplace model position, wherein corporate employees seek to improve technical efficiency and work quality in immediate, measurable ways, and the disciplinary model position, wherein technical communication professionals are concerned with disciplinary issues that may or may not be easily and immediately translatable into benefits for a specific employer. But, in this case, when TECHWR-L discussion modulates topics according to the workplace model rather than the disciplinary model, professional development becomes marginalized (except when it is transformed into concrete employer benefits, a translation that can enact fundamental changes in the discussion).

To the liberal and legalistic and agonistic models, Benhabib (1992) posed a variant on Habermas’s discursive space. One benefit of this model, briefly put, is that it does not attempt to set prior restraints on what topics can be discussed in public space. At the same time, the discursive model does not suggest an anarchistic free-for-all. Rather than


attempting to begin with a list of appropriate topics, the discursive model concentrates on the processes of deciding what topics are appropriate for certain communities. The general discussion of appropriate topics suggests a starting point for this discussion-that is, the fact that a topic is mentioned at all suggests at least partial openings for discussion. But the conversation about topics rarely reaches into a metadiscussion about processes for TECHWR-L topic discussion. Such metadiscussion, in fact, is categorized by the list owner as an out-of-bounds topic in one of many messages about the issue:

I personally don’t see anything at all wrong with humor on the list or with occasional and brief digressions. I do, however, -strongly- object to:

*any kind of personal attacks

*metadiscussion of digressions

*“me, too” messages which don’t add to the discussion

and finally the always popular & oxymoronic irrelevant digressions. Digressing from color preferences when editing to who makes the best pens and why is, IMHO, relevant. The social conscience of the manufacturer is straying a little too far.

Where Benhabib’s work thins is in applying these cases to particulars. For example, Benhabib (1992) wrote, agreeing with Habermas, that as part of the discursive process, forums should multiply until every participant’s concerns can find a space for discussion. (This, in fact, was the official response to off-topic posts on TECHWR-L.)

What concerns us-and other computers and writing specialists-about this stance is that it tends to move public discussions of controversial topics outside of the very groups that should be concerned with them. As James Porter (in press) pointed out, Benhabib and Habermas both idealize the discursive model in a way that may replicate the problems of the legalistic and liberal model: In this forum, these topics are safe. Other topics must find their own forum. The Internet’s growth, in fact, has made this tendency a distinct possibility. As Porter suggested, communities should involve themselves in continuous metadiscussion of their conversations.

A rhetorical ethics is a praxis occupying the position on the border. It inquires in a nomadic fashion, but recognizes that at some level at some point practical judgment is necessary (Aristotle, Lyotard): the ability to inquire and then to act in the manner

necessary. We might consider this position on the border of the circle as the position of postmodern commitment (as opposed to the kind of postmodern irony which, in its extreme forms, can lack the capacity for decision and choice). (p. 512)

This position is, as Porter himself argued, also an idealization-these are not instant solutions but a range of stances and procedures that, when adopted, may help construct a more ethical space for citizens in general and members of professional communities in particular. Porter offered two related sets of heuristics for writers, one procedural, the other relational. In a writer’s relations to readers, Porter argued, the writer must respect the differences within or among audiences, care for audiences as specific (rather than generalized) people, and avoid oppressing or harming those people. From a procedural standpoint, in determining how and what to write, the writer must consult dialogically with a number of sources (as a way of determining the relations discussed before) and


must strive to situate their writings at local and particular levels to suit the communities in which the discussion is taking place.5

These heuristics provide a starting point that communities might use in debating the appropriateness of topics. In the drug-testing debate, for example, participants frequently either declaimed their position in the classical sense of an orator delivering his message to the listening masses or moved quickly into universal rules about the appropriateness of topics for TECHWR-L. Such discussions are rarely constructive; participants deal primarily with their own contexts by resorting to one of the two models Benhabib (1992) critiqued: agonistic free-for-alls of personal presence or the invocation of liberal and legalistic rule sets that exist apart from discussion.

But, like many electronic forums, metadiscussion about topic selection processes is

mostly absent (that is, discussion about how we choose valid topics rather than simply listing what topics are valid). As one list member argued, off-topic posts should be addressed critically rather than merely dismissively, with both posters and readers interested in the ways topics might be connected to technical communication.

>Either we limit ourselves to topics that are professionally useful for some of us, or we >accept the fact that public policy discussions will expand rapidly to more basic issues >about the purpose of government and the defensibility of one position or another.

Yes, but on the other hand, the broader politics of a more general issue often lend a great deal of insight into the particulars of a given exigency. For example, the clumsiness of using “them, they, their” as a singular pronoun to avoid male bias in the language. Or how an individual might avoid the appearance of personal responsibility or liability by reporting events in the passive voice (those darn doctors again. . .).

I don’t think we have to accept that “public policy discussions will expand rapidly.” Not at all. But we should be prepared to ask how a particular political or policy discussion relates to a particular in our work. And be prepared to take criticism if we don’t.

This type of post, however, has been relatively rare on TECHWR-L (although a handful of such posts, including the list owner’s post, also appeared after the technical writing class entered the list, as discussed before). As many people have discovered, the liberal and legalistic model appears more immediately applicable to difficult cases- difficult cases are quickly erased, moved out of local discourses. From a functionalist perspective, the liberal and legalistic stance is more technically efficient.

The most difficult problem of the liberal and legalistic model as a response to the agonistic model in forums such as TECHWR-L (and numerous other “professional” lists) is that it serves to decontextualize communities; in Porter’s terms, writers fail to deal with concrete individuals or to localize their discussions in particular instances, with two notable exceptions relating to message volume. Participants complain either that off-topic

51n preparing the final draft of this essay, we attempted to consult dialogically with TECHWR-L members. We posted an e-mail message to the list, asking members to describe what they consider to be off-topic posts and

why. We also made a draft of our paper available via the World Wide Web, so that list members could read our

full argument and engage the discussion on a more substantial level; this strategy was suggested by Sullivan and

Porter (in press). Unfortunately, we received only four e-mail messages and five hits on our World Wide Web

site. We consider this lack of interest to be one additional example of how discursive factors on TECHWR-L regulate discussions of off-topic posts.


posts waste their time or that, because participants read their mail at work, off-topic posts are an inefficient use of their employer’s resources. However, though the second issue is relevant, the first seems less defensible given the degree of somewhat frivolous posts the list often tolerates (such as the best place for barbecue or humorous business names).

The relevance of the second issue-use of employer’s resources-highlights the degree to which the liberal and legalistic model serves to marginalize those already marginalized. As mentioned before, in their useful list of “reproachable conduct on Usenet,” McLaughlin et al. (1995) outlined seven broad areas of inappropriate social conduct, including incorrect or novice uses of the technology and violation of network conventions. Although these issues are certainly important for new Internet users to consider (we urge instructors to cover this material in their classes), they concentrate on functional issues that are relatively easy to learn. What such taxonomies submerge is the ways that communities develop apparently innocuous rules, such as “failure to observe group traditions as to appropriate message topics” (McLaughlin et al., 1995, p. 97), and the effects of those rules on participants. Rather than just learning to follow such rules, participants should learn to think critically and carefully about the politics of those rules, to understand not only when they might be disobeyed, with what consequences, and for what reasons, but also proceedings through which such rules are changed.

Although McLaughin et al. (1995) made no claims about providing value judgments or ethical behaviors, those questions are crucial ones, especially for computers and writing specialists concerned with power structures. Online discussions as a whole encourage pluralism, but of an insulated and decontextualized sort: Issues that might upset power structures within a particular discourse are often written out of that discourse (and, the logic goes, find their own true discourse eleswhere). TECHWR-L defines the discipline 3f technical writing in its own terms and brackets out areas strongly connected to the discipline-for example, gender and racial representation in the discipline and in :echnical communication artifacts. Submerging these issues homogenizes community members into what Benhabib (1992, pp. 166-167) called a “generalized” other, without gender or race, immune to the inequalities of sexism or racism (the “neutrality” of this generalized other typically adopts-without admitting to it-the dominant class’s characteristics-white, male, Western). From an institutional standpoint, these sanctions are useful because they prohibit low-power employees from questioning the mechanisms of unequal power and oppression.

To reopen these spaces for discussion, participants in a community must be willing to question not only the list of appropriate and inappropriate topics, but also the very processes through which topics are defined as appropriate and inappropriate; the second set of questions typically involves deeply held assumptions about power, truth, and social relationships. As Sullivan and Porter (in press) argued, this stance involves the sometimes difficult move away from foundations and toward postmodern ethics: “Postmodern ethics critiques traditional ethical systems because they have usually obscured difference and disagreement in the effort to establish community truths or to develop foundational principles of justice” (p. 126). Such traditional efforts often operate to fragment, silence, and disperse members rather than bring them closer together. In other words, sometimes solidarity and community are achieved at the cost of erasing or excising “problematic” persons or topics.

We must recognize that regulating mechanisms used within online communities shape not only those communities’ discourses but also who is and is not part of them, in effect equating self-selected groups with egalitarian forums. Nancy K. Baym (1993, for


example, in discussing the Usenet News group rec.alt.talk.soaps, concluded that “the

norms that develop. . . are directly related to the purposes of the group. It is to meet the needs of the community, needs both given and emergent, that standards of behavior and methods of sanctioning inappropriate behavior develop” (p. 161).

What is missed in Baym’s perception of regulating mechanisms is the self-selected nature of online communities: Norms operate successfully precisely because those who do not obey the goals and operations of the regulating behaviors are forced out of the communities. As the examples in this essay illustrate, participants in communities exercise a number of regulating mechanisms that not only sanction inappropriate behavior but also attempt to shift misbehaving participants to other communities, either to the TECHWR-SOAPBOX list jokingly alluded to by one member, or to the very real TECHWR-L OFF TOPIC list:

Techwhirlers:

In an effort to reduce the stress-load off topic posts have caused Eric, (and also because I want to continue to receive off-topic postings), I have opened an AOL account at: Off [email protected]. I will forward all messages at this address to any techwhirler who requests to be added to the mail forwarding list. At this time, I see no reason to have any rules, other than those of common courtesy, governing the use of this list. My only is that when you ask to be included in, or removed from, the address list, you include the word, “address,” in the subject line. I will probably forward all the day’s mail at around 1290 am Pacific Time.

Good luck,

Sign-up at: Off [email protected] Yes! There is indeed a space between “Off” and “Topic” in the address.

Over the history of TECHWR-L, mechanisms for posting to the list have become increasingly restrictive (though still not private). At various points, posting options on the list have shifted from the initial open posting to the list to setting the default on messages to “reply to writer” from “reply to list”6 to restricted posting from list members only. Although these shifts may be necessitated in many circumstances (the move to restricted status, the list owner explained, was encouraged by the recent rash of spurn [mass mailed] posts that many lists have received), they have been made not as the result of public discussion about the contents of the list, but largely as “managerial” decisions made by the list owner. These changes were frequently made without (or even against) public discussions on the list-the very type of process-based metadiscussion that we feel is crucial to engaging in self-critical discussions of democracy. As Karen Kuralt (1994) pointed out in an analysis of TECHWR-L discussion, in the change to “reply to writer,” the list owner’s post announcing the change was followed by 35 messages expressing agreement or disagreement on the issue. This discussion-raising useful issues about access, topics, and time constraints for participants-took place after the change rather than prior to it. And, as one participant pointed out, the change was never really open to debate in the first place:

6When readers use the “Reply” key in their e-mail program, the “To:” field is filled in with the address of

the individual who wrote the message rather than with the address for the list as a whole.


As far as I can recall, I don’t think the issue of this change was up to vote. Wasn’t the list owner just announcing the change? I keep reading messages that say “I vote for. . ” I have to laugh, it just sounds so American! Funny how we assume everything is up to everybody.

Indeed, the list owner did not participate in the discussion following the change. This is not to say that the list owner does not have ethical responsibilities to the list; rather, these responsibilities must be carefully considered and navigated. As Porter (in press) highlighted in a discussion of the responsibilities facing managers of discussion lists:

Again, the issue should not be reduced to this kind of either-or false dilemma: If the list owner does not estabiish authority (i.e., create and enforce strict rules), then the list participants will endlessly debate what the rules should be and chaos will result. Certainly the way LISTSERV operations work the list owner has every right to set up a list as she sees fit. She has power, but with that power comes the onus of obligation and responsibility to list participants. The problem of course for listowners or for writing teachers who sponsor electronic conferences is addressing the dilemmas that can arise. . . between competing interest groups, or between individuals and the majority.

This issue highlights the heart of a situation that has long plagued societies that consider themselves democratic: Shifts in what counts as a vote, who gets to vote, and on what topics can they vote have acted to mask the concerns of women and minorities throughout history.

If the Internet is to do more than replicate current power structures, then teachers, students, and workplace professionals must look critically not merely at what we talk about and how we talk about it, but also at how it was that we reached these decisions in the first place and if we might change them. The explosion of Internet discussion groups appears to offer an appropriate forum for nearly any topic. But the logic of this particular articulation of democracy- a sort of postmodern fragmentation-may act to spread

people further apart rather than bring them closer together. Instead of engaging in important debates over potentially explosive topics, participants are encouraged to take dangerous talk to places where its power might be silently absorbed. Without another outlet-another list-people might attempt to work through critical issues like drug testing or gender representation in a public, more general forum like TECHWR-L.

However, this inclusion should not operate as an absorption of difference and the formation of an apparent unity: Such movements invariably mask oppression. Iris Marion Young (1990), in Justice and the Politics of Difference, argued that there are five distinct “faces of oppression”: exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperial- ism, and violence (pp. 39-65). Although physical violence is impossible in online discussions, the four other faces occur in different phases of most lists, including TECHWR-L, from time to time, In order for inappropriate topics to enter into the dominant discourse (which sees itself as neutral and universal), they must be measured according to the standards of the dominant discourse: In effect, this means that inappropriate topics must become sanitized or admit their inappropriateness, thereby rendering them safe and relatively powerless (Young, pp. 58-59). Topics that remain dangerous (refusing to submerge their difference into homogeneity) are marginalized, shunted off to specialized, insulated lists where participants are often extremists engaged in unproductive flame wars or group whinefests. As Porter (in press) pointed out, the discursive approach is not merely (or even primarily) about first amendment rights, allowing everyone to say whatever they want in whatever forum: Such a position is


increasingly used as a justification for intimidation through “hatespeech.” The heuristics offered by Porter are instead directed toward a procedural process of ethical discourse.

In terms of pedagogy, teachers and students must learn to understand both the mechanisms through which power is exercised and when that power operates op- pressively-and, furthermore, how to rearticulate oppressive relations of power into egalitarian ones. These three tactics are of progressively increasing difficulty. In this essay, we have admittedly limited ourselves to the first issue, identifying power relations. The second issue relies on the notion that power is, as Foucault argued, everywhere and cannot be simply avoided. Unequal power relations do not, therefore, necessarily equate with oppression; rather, oppression is more closely related to the limitations on actions and speech that can sometimes result from unequal power, whether or not those actions are intentional on the part of the dominant group (Young, 1990, pp. 41-42).

Consider, for example, student-teacher relations, which typically grant more power to teachers than students. But teachers can still use their own positions to benefit students, to increase rather than limit their students’ options, encouraging students to question pat answers and to look critically at difficult situations (or even situations that seem, on the surface, too simple). To an important degree, power relations on TECHWR-L work this way, as experts in some areas (who often possess more disciplinary or institutional power because of their experience and knowledge) attempt to teach the less powerful about ways to function more efficiently. And there is certainly cause for the concern that “political” topics will endanger list members who read their e-mail as a workplace function. But in either context, classroom or e-mail list, discursive rules tend toward oppression when lower-power participants are denied the opportunity to voice concerns, to ask questions about topics, especially those related to institutional power relations. (We say “tend toward” here because such situations cannot and should not be prejudged.)

The more difficult issue, then, is the third one, which asks how participants might change oppressive situations. There are no easy answers, but we believe that the first two concerns we’ve addressed provide the foundation for such changes. As conversations develop over time, our students promise to take increasingly more important roles in those forums. This is not an answer-if there were easy answers, we would not be writing this article-but they are suggestions about paths we might consider.

If we-not just as teachers, but as citizens in general-are not able to arrive at workable processes for public discourses that do not marginalize or remove interested participants from the debate through overt or implicit means, we might realize less a global village and more a great dispersal. In a strikingly literal way, the numerous online communities emerging for almost any topic play out Foucault’s assertion that discourses write authors, not vice versa. As computers and writing specialists, we should critically survey the mechanics of discourse regulations in online forums, teach ourselves and our students to think as carefully about what is not being said as about what is being said, and work to provide centripetal as well as centrifugal force in the discourses and online communities in which we are engaged.

Johndan Johnson-Eilola is an assistant professor in the Rhetoric and Composition Program at Purdue University where he teaches courses in computer documentation, professional writing, and theories of computers and writing. His work in computers, communication, and culture has appeared in edited collections and in IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, Journal of Advanced Composition, Writing on the Edge,


Computers and Composition, Collegiate Microcomputer, and Technical Communication.

His book on the politics of hypertext genres, Nostalgic Angels: Rearticulating Hypertext Writing, will be published in 1997 by Ablex. His e-mail address is <[email protected]. purdue.edu>.

Stuart A. Selber is an assistant professor in the Technical Communication and Rhetoric Program at Texas Tech University where he teaches courses in computers and technical communication, professional writing, and rhetorics of the Internet. His work in computers and technical communication has appeared in edited collections and in IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, Technical Communication Quarterly, and Technical Communication. His 1994 article “Beyond Skill Building: Challenges Facing Technical Communication Teachers in the Computer Age” was awarded Best Article on Methods of Teaching by the NCTE Awards Committee for Excellence in Technical and Scientific Communication. Selber chairs the College Composition and Communication Committee on Technical Communication, is Associate Editor for Communication Technology for IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, and is book review editor for Technical Communication Quarterly. His e-mail address is <[email protected]>

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Documents

Policing ourselves: Defining the boundaries of appropriate discussion in online forums