The forums, profession, and discipline of technical communication, 1971-1992

The technical communication profession has grown rapidly in the years 1971-1992. The changing roles and responsibilities in the workplace and in academia have created questions about the goals and identity of technical communication. Technical communication professionals question whether there is the coherence of a discipline or an emerging discipline. They also question what the common body of knowledge and procedures may be that marks technical communication as distinct from other academic and professional activities concerned with the production of text and communication of information.

Stephen Toulmin's Human Understanding provided theoretical support for the study with its definitions oiprofession and discipline and discussion of the forums and transmit that distinguish a field of study. The technical communication forums display the transmit of the problems-solving activities. Six technical communication journals provided text and citations for the study of the technical communication transmit: IEEE Transactions on Professional Communications, Journal of Business and Technical Communication, Journal of Technical Writing and Communication, Technical Communication, Technical Communication Quarterly, and The Technical Writing Teacher. From the journals, 11,976 citations were collected for the representative years 1971, 1980, and 1988-1992. Analysis identified 78 frequently cited texts and 110 representative periodicals for further study. The texts and periodicals yielded observations about the discipline (the concepts and the procedures) and the profession that contribute to an understanding of workplace communication and problem-solving activities of technical communication professionals. Carolyn R. Miller's 1979 College English article, "A Humanistic Rationale for Technical Writing," served as a representative text of the technical communication profession. A rhetorical analysis of the text, intertext, and context surrounding Miller's article completed the study of the transmit of technical communication professionals.