When a Production Worker is Technically a Writer: Using Craft and Rhetorical Knowledge in a Manufacturing Environment

Abstract

Although rhetoricians have studied the discourse practices of engineers, little is known about the production workers who must assemble engineering knowledge into functional products. This case study examines what happens when a production worker tried to improve manufacturing documentation, and how her success depended upon both her craft knowledge and the rhetorical skills she attributes to a Writing Across the Curriculum program she experienced in college.

… although the goal of engineering may be to produce useful objects, engineers do not construct such objects themselves. Rather, they aim to generate knowledge that will allow such objects to be built [1, p. 5].