Scientific and Technical Communication is a major textbook that represents a new focus area in communication studies. It integrates multidisciplinary perspectives on the relations among rhetoric, science, technology, and public policymaking to the process and product of technical communication. The text is inspired by science and technology studies (STS), a field emerging from the history, sociology, and philosophy of science and technology–which also has roots in economics, political theory, and rhetoric. Reformulating the issues raised by STS within the context of technical communication, Scientific and Technical Communication is composed of three highly integrated parts. Part I provides a summary, critique, and alternative to recent theoretical perspectives developed in the rhetoric of science and the sociology of scientific knowledge. Part II applies these critical alternatives to the traditional practices of scientific and technical communication and shows how these new practices can be applied to the communication that is vital in forming national and local science and technology policy.
This hands-on, introductory textbook will supply students and professionals in the areas of scientific and technical communication, rhetoric, and media studies with broad-based and applicable knowledge in this area.
Table of Content
PART ONE: THE RHETORIC
Scientific and Technical Communication in Context
Reading Scientific and Technical Texts
Writing Scientific and Technical Texts
Understanding Audiences
Language, Persuasion, and Argument
Participation and Policy
PART TWO: THE READER
Putting People Back into the Business of Science – Steve Fuller
Constituting a National Forum for Setting the Research Agenda
Textual Technologies – Geoff Cooper
New Literary Forms and Reflexivity
Science and Communication – William Keith
Beyond Form and Content
Migrating across Disciplinary Boundaries – Dale L Sullivan
The Case of David Raup′s and John Sepkoski′s Periodicity Papers
Challenging High-Tech War – Sujatha Raman
Surgical Strike or Collateral Damage?
Restructuring Demand for Scientific Expertise – Sheila Tobias, Daryl Chubin and Kevin Aylesworth
About the author
James H. Collier is Associate Professor of Science, Technology, and Society at Virginia Tech. He is the Series Founder and Editor of “Collective Studies in Knowledge and Society” published by Rowman and Littlefield International; the Founder and Editor of the Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective (SERRC; https://social-epistemology.com/); and the Founder and Editor of the “Project for Reimagining Inquiry” as part of the journal Social Epistemology. He served as Executive Editor of Social Epistemology from 2009 to 2018. In 2015, he edited The Future of Social Epistemology: A Collective Vision in launching the Rowman & Littlefield book series. An extended essay “Social Epistemology for the One and the Many” (2018) for the SERRC examines fault lines in approaches to critical social epistemology.
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