Examines self-help medical literature in 19th-century Canada. Shows that while authors repeatedly called for "plain" language in contrast to mysterious terminology employed by medical practitioners, comparison of their style with that of medical textbook authors reveals few real differences. Concludes that the posture adopted by Canadian…

Uses central ideas from Roland Barthes's essays on connotative semiotics as a rationale for directing students in technical and professional writing classes to develop the critical reflex to analyze and then make judgments about the values implied by connotative systems. (SR)

Discusses categories of document testing, importance of reader-based testing, measures in usability testing, and issues in implementing document testing. (SR)

Describes how master's students in professional writing researched technical writing in specific workplace cultures. Discusses students' constructs for understanding their own writerly selves and constructs that emerged for the interpretations of themselves and others. States that teaching technical authorship means addressing such issues as…

Suggests that continuity between composition and business/technical communication allows students to move more readily from one course to the next, while clarifying for them that writing is primarily a system of options based on analyses of situations, readers, obstacles, and goals. Explains the value of connections in pedagogy and research…

Identifies both text-based and reader-based characteristics that make health education material difficult for patients to understand. Finds that technical words, complex sentences, and unusual phrases increase the difficulty of comprehension, as does information that contradicts readers' common sense notions. (RS)

Summarizes the results of searches of two databases containing abstracts of doctoral dissertations in technical communication. Analyzes those studies, offers suggestions for future research, lists institutions conducting doctoral research, identifies researchers' methods, and summarizes the topics they examine. (SR)

Describes a technical writing assignment in which students write two different papers on the same topic--one directed toward a lay or executive audience, and the other toward an operator or technician audience. (SR)

Argues that technical writers who develop broader writing skills prove to be more valuable to their employers during periods of economic downturn. Offers an overview of the basic skills needed to write marketing, advertising, and public relations documents. (PRA)

Gives a case history of how one writing group devised a way to deal with the problem of author-created noun strings and long, indecipherable unit modifiers, satisfying both internal and external clients. Describes the development of an in-house usage guide. (PRA)

Describes a process for evaluating technical writing students who are working in groups. Discusses task sheets, progress reports, evaluation forms, and the final individual evaluation. (PRA)

Shows that organizational metaphors have a significant effect on the way writers think about readers and compose written reports. (SR)

Describes how an analysis of Ontario Hydro's conversion of 20,000 pages of paper manuals to online documentation established the scope of the project, provided a set of design criteria, and recommended the use of Standard Generalized Markup Language to create the new documentation and the purchase of the "Dinatext" program to produce it.…

Offers a case history of the development of the Silicon Graphics "IRIS InSight" system, a system for viewing on-line documentation using Standard Generalized Markup Language. Notes that SGML's explicit encoding of structure and separation of structure and presentation make possible structure-based search, alternative structural views of…

Explains that structured authoring systems designed for the creation of generically encoded reusable information have context-sensitive application of markup, markup suppression, queing and automated formatting, structural navigation, and self-validation features. Maintains that they are a real alternative to conventional publishing systems. (SR)