Busting the Myth of the Communication Metaphor

Traces the linguistic, rhetorical, historical, cultural, and economic origins of our most basic beliefs and practices for successful technical writing to initiate a reckoning about who they serve and who they harm.

Busting the Myth of the Communication Metaphor is a transdisciplinary approach to making visible and explaining the multiple origins of why our most basic beliefs about what makes scientific and technical writing successful are wrong, ineffective, and harmful. These tacitly held beliefs and practices, collectively called the Communication Metaphor, stand in as symbolic for a messier, more reality-based understanding of how writing and communication works. By starting from conventional statements made by scientists, technical professionals, and standard textbooks that "successful technical writing is short and to the point, with the facts only, no opinions," the book traces the histories and structures of the multiple elements of the Communication Metaphor. The text synthesizes survey results, multiple strands of scholarship, personal experience, and original illustrations into a powerful argument for imagining a more just approach to scientific and technical writing.

"Busting the Myth of the Communication Metaphor brings into sharp focus the various critiques of technical communication that scholars have had over the years, but with a lot more oomph. Read is clearly grappling with the field's role in (dis)organizing society, people, relations, allocating services, etc. and how facing up to that role can compel the field to do differently." — Josephine Walwema, Coordinator, Technical and Professional Communication, University of Washington

"An excellent contribution to what is a new and very important aspect to our teaching and scholarly lives. This manuscript stuck with me and had me considering the ways I perpetuate in my own teaching the problems she discusses." — Carla Kungl, Shippensburg University

"From the very start, this book challenges the reader to basically rethink everything we know about how writing works. Read argues that the 'Communication Metaphor' has invisibly shaped how we teach and understand writing, and maybe most importantly, she shows how our fundamental beliefs in how communication works are actively harmful to marginalized communities. The book is both an excellent analysis of the unexamined metaphorical language we use to talk about writing and an excellent historical account of how our basic beliefs have been conditioned by centuries of choices about 'proper writing.' The book is insightful, provocative, and an engaging page-turner with a strong voice and big, bold arguments. I hope it becomes required reading in our field." — Jordan Frith, Clemson University