Technology is commonly described in magical terms, not only in advertising but also in journalism and technical communication. This article provides some background on the use of magical language in technical contexts, gives examples of magical discourse in technology advertisements and newsmagazine articles, and proposes a technical communication pedagogy of media analysis. The proposed pedagogy involves students in conducting diagnostic critiques of media texts and affords them the opportunity to examine critically their own unwitting use of magical language in technical discourse.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Baudrillard, Jean. The Consumer Society: Myths and Structures. London: Sage, 1998.
2.
Berlin, James A.Rhetorics, Poetics, and Cultures: Refiguring College English Studies. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English, 1996.
3.
Berlin, James A., and Michael J. Vivion, eds. Cultural Studies in the English Classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton Cook/Heinemann, 1992.
4.
Castells, Manuel. The Rise of the Network Society. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1996.
5.
Castro, Janice. “Just Click to Buy.”Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995: 74-75.
6.
Connor, James. “The Digital Phone: Cultural Complexity, the Fold, and the Hidden in Technology.”Readerly/Writerly Texts6 (1998/99): 51-65.
7.
Cooper, Marilyn M.“The Postmodern Space of Operator's Manuals.”Technical Commu-nication Quarterly5 (1996): 385-410.
8.
Covino, William A.Magic, Rhetoric, and Literacy: An Eccentric History of the Composing Imagination. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995.
9.
Davis, Erik. Techgnosis: Myth, Magic + Mysticism in the Age of Information. New York: Harmony, 1998.
10.
Elmer-Dewitt, Philip. “Welcome to Cyberspace.”Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995: 4-11.
11.
Feenberg, Andrew. Alternative Modernity: The Technical Turn in Philosophy and Social The-ory. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
12.
Greenwald, John. “Battle for Remote Control.”Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995: 69-73.
13.
Guthrie, J. R.“Selling Technology in Technical Advertisements: A Case Study.”Techni-cal Communication42 (1995): 226-230.
14.
Horkheimer, Max, and Theodor W. Adorno. Dialectic of Enlightenment. Trans. John Cumming. New York: Continuum, 1990.
15.
Hughes, Robert. “Take This Revolution... ”Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995: 76-77.
16.
Jhally, SutThe Codes of Advertising: Fetishism and the Political Economy of Meaning in the Consumer Society. New York: Routledge, 1990.
17.
Johnson, Robert R.User-Centered Technology: A Rhetorical Theory for Computers and Other Mundane Artifacts. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998.
18.
Kellner, Douglas. Media Culture: Cultural Studies, Identity and Politics between the Modern and the Postmodern. London: Routledge, 1995.
19.
Klement, Alice M., and Carolyn B. Matalene, eds. Telling Stories, Taking Risks: Journalism Writing at the Century's Edge. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1998.
20.
Mandel, Tom. “Confessions of a Cyberholic.”Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995: 57-57.
21.
Marcuse, Herbert. One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society. Boston: Beacon, 1964.
22.
McCarron, W. E.“Changing the Technical Writing Paradigm.”Journal of Technical Writing and Communication15 (1985): 27-33.Rpt. in Defining Technical Communication. Ed. Dan Jones. Arlington, VA: Society for Technical Communication, 60-63.
23.
McRobbie, Angela. Postmodernism and Popular Culture. New York: Routledge, 1994.
24.
Miller, Greg. “Gap Exists between Net Awareness and Use.”Los Angeles Times7 Oct. 1996. Online. 24 Nov. 1999. http://www.latimes.com.
25.
Morton, Donald, and Mas'ud Zavarzadeh, eds. Theory/Pedagogy/Politics: Texts for Change. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1991.
26.
Negroponte, Nicholas. Being Digital. New York: Knopf, 1995.
27.
Nelkin, Dorothy. Selling Science: How the Press Covers Science and Technology. New York: Freeman, 1995.
28.
Nielsen, Jakob. Users First: Web Usability: Why and How. 14 Sep. 1998. Online. 14 Nov. 1999. http://www.zdnet.com/devhead/stories/articles/0,4413,2137433,00.html.
29.
Paradis, James. “Text and Action: The Operator's Manual in Context and in Court.”Textual Dynamics of the Profession: Historical and Contemporary Studies of Writing in Professional Communities. Ed. Charles Bazerman and James Paradis. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1991. 256-278.
30.
Phillips, Kevin. “Virtual Washington.” Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995: 65, 68-68.
31.
Schriver, Karen A.Dynamics in Document Design: Creating Texts for Readers. New York: John Wiley, 1996.
32.
Selfe, Cynthia L.“Lest We Think the Revolution Is a Revolution: Images of Technology and the Nature of Change.”Passions, Pedagogies, and 21st Century Technologies. Ed. Gail E. Hawisher and Cynthia L. Selfe. Logan: Utah State University Press, 1999. 292-322.
33.
Selfe, Cynthia L.“Technology and Literacy: A Story about the Perils of Not Paying Attention.”College Composition and Communication50 (1999): 411-436.
34.
Welcome to Cyberspace. Spec. issue of Time Spring 1995.
35.
Williamson, Judith. Decoding Advertisements: Ideology and Meaning in Advertising. London: Boyars, 1977.
