2008 by Derek Van Ittersum. Some Rights Reserved Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 license REASSEMBLING WRITING TECHNOLOGIES: HISTORICAL AND SITUATED STUDIES OF RHETORICAL ACTIVITY BY DEREK VAN ITTERSUM B.A., Drake University, 2001 M.A., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2003 DISSERTATION Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English with a concentration in Writing Studies in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2008 Urbana, Illinois Doctoral Committee: Professor Gail E. Hawisher, Chair Associate Professor Paul Prior Associate Professor Peter Mortensen Professor Bertram C. Bruce ii Abstract Writers have responded to new media technologies of writing and communicating by refashioning existing literate practices for computers and developing new computing practices. Combining historical research on hypertextual, collaborative writing environments from the 1960s with situated studies of current writers adopting software to support memory and invention, my dissertation examines the reflexive processes through which material technologies, literate practices, and literate ideologies are shaped. Prompted by the rapid proliferation of computer technologies and their disruption of existing practices, many writing researchers have focused on the materiality of writing; however, a comprehensive framework that links materiality, ideologies, and practices has remained elusive. In this dissertation, I argue that a combination of theories of mediated activity and actor-network theory offers a productive way to understand, and intervene in, emergent uses of writing technologies. This dissertation begins with the early history of personal computers for writing. Although Douglas Engelbart’s NLS computer from the late 1960s has influenced modern hardware and software design in some ways, its writing software was less well received. Comparing Engelbart’s ideas about writing with composition research, especially early writing process theory, I argue that writing research has much to gain from engaging with complex models of digital writing that foreground embodied rhetorical work, such as the one developed alongside the NLS. Later chapters present the results of several years’ worth of interviews with writers regarding their use of new writing software. Like the users of Engelbart’s NLS, iii they describe frustration with complex interfaces and disruptions to their writing practices. This dissertation uses moments of disruption to examine the processes through which new forms of writing emerge and technologies are altered or abandoned. A key goal of this dissertation is to provide thick descriptions of how writers’ goals are realized, frustrated, and reshaped through their engagement with technologies. By creating a clearer picture of the history and modern deployment of the artifacts, practices, and ideologies available to writers, my dissertation proposes a more strategic, rhetorical view of computing that may aid writers, teachers, and designers as they navigate the interface between digital technologies and the demands of rhetorical situations. iv For my parents, who made it possible v Acknowledgements Although I am the sole author listed on the title page to this dissertation, I have benefitted from the assistance of others in more ways than I can list here. First and foremost, I would like to thank my advisor, Gail Hawisher, who has provided timely advice and unflagging encouragement throughout my time at Illinois. She embodies the ideal qualities of a mentor and friend, striving to use her own gifts of curiosity and generosity to bring out the best in others. I am also grateful to her for introducing me to a wonderful community of scholars and friends in computers and writing. My committee members have also provided much support and encouragement. From Paul Prior I have learned to ask bigger questions than I thought possible, and to see my work within a larger research agenda. Peter Mortensen has helped me in all of my varied roles as graduate student and teaching assistant, and demonstrates that it is possible to excel as a researcher, teacher, and administrator, simultaneously. Chip Bruce has supported my work both at home and abroad, and helped me to make crucial connections to important ideas. Beyond my committee, Cathy Prendergast and Debbie Hawhee provided important challenges to nascent ideas, and my work is better for their efforts. I am especially appreciative of Teresa Bertram in the Center for Writing Studies. Often the first person I would see in the English Building, she always lightened my day with a laugh and a story. Her generosity made this project, and countless others, easier to manage than I deserved. vi The many writers who agreed to participate in my study deserve more thanks than I can offer here. Their willingness to share their experiences, messy desktops and all, made this project possible. My fellow students and friends at Illinois have made this project, and my graduate career, sustainable and enjoyable. Adam, Allan, Amanda, David, Kim, Laura, Luke, Nicole, and Pat were there from the beginning, and I owe much to their camaraderie; especially to Allan and Kim who gently nudged me out of writer’s block. Thanks, as well, to Kevin for his encouragement, Jody for being an excellent sounding board, Janine for continuing to send good ideas my way, Amy for providing useful perspective, and Kory for hashing out ideas about teaching and theory. Thanks especially to Patrick for his careful reading of numerous drafts and his generous friendship. I am also grateful for the many teachers I had prior to Illinois, without whom I could not have ended up here. My time with Bruce Horner, Min Lu, Thom Swiss, Elizabeth Robertson, and Jody Swilky still inspires me to learn and teach. Jan Nagy and Doug Hoover made teaching seem effortless and rewarding, before I even considered taking on such a role. Lastly, of course, my family deserves the most thanks for continuing to help me through everything. Their certainty that I would succeed made it easier for me to believe the same thing. And most of all, my deepest thanks to Wendy, who makes it all worthwhile. vii Table of Contents Chapter 1: Reassembling Computer-Mediated Literate Activity..............................................................1 Chapter 2: Augmenting Literacy: Introducing Writing To Computers...................................................32 Chapter 3: Computing Attachments: Engelbart’s Controversial Writing Technology...........................95 Chapter 4: Disrupting Writing: Tracing the Usefulness of New Writing Technologies......................185 Chapter 5: A Techne of Computing: Facilitating the Adoption of New Writing Technologies...........237 Conclusion:...........................................................................................................................284 Works Cited:.........................................................................................................................294 Author’s Biography..............................................................................................................314 1 Chapter 1 Reassembling Computer-Mediated Literate Activity Confronted with lost data, inexplicable formatting issues, indecipherable icons, and mixed interface metaphors, writers using computers may look back nostalgically at the tools of earlier times, judging them to be easier or at least more straightforward in their function. Troubles with technology, however, have faced writers throughout history. Keyboards, at least, keep fingers ink-free and require less maintenance than a quill pen, which needed much more delicate carving than a modern pencil and had to be sharpened up to sixty times a day (Tenner, 2003, p. 188). Steel pens, although doing away with the need to sharpen a point, actually became corroded by the ink used in them (Tenner, 2003, p. 190). Computer technologies may provide the most immediate frustration for writers, but they represent just the latest examples in a long history of exasperation. Seeking relief from problems with their tools, writers yearn for a medium that provides “a more immediate or authentic experience,” as Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin (1999) argue, which ironically leads writers “to become aware of the new medium as a medium” (p. 19). Bolter and Grusin identify this oscillation between immediacy and hypermediacy as a defining feature of the history of media. With immediacy, the mediating aspects of the medium fade into invisibility—as in virtual reality, which does away with the graphical user interface and even the distance between the user and the monitor in an attempt at uber-realism. With hypermediacy, the interfaces multiply in the foreground rather than recede out of view—as with cable news shows and their text tickers, picture-in-picture graphics, and studios containing several video screens. Word processors 2 allowed writers to bypass white-out and penciled-in arrows for more immediate editing on the screen (although countless handbooks and teachers, this one included, continue to advise writers to print their texts for editing and proofreading). With the proliferation of hypertext in the late 1980s and early 1990s, however, word processors were criticized by some as too linear, too much like print, while hypertext software afforded more natural ways of representing thoughts—non-linear and associative (Landow, 1997; Nelson, 1983).1