- Email: [email protected]
A Handy User’s Guide to Computers and Composition
Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
A Handy User’s Guide to Computers and Composition John Scenters-Zapico∗ University of Texas at El Paso, El Paso, TX 79968, USA
Abstract This article is a visual essay that uses images of hands and computers to articulate the physical experience and ephemeral quality mediating between the physical act of keyboarding and the process of communication as we live with our computers. © 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Communication; Computers and composition; Images; Visual essay
1. Introduction “A handy user’s guide to computers and composition” attempts to capture what I could never articulate in words alone. The actual creation came to me in bits and pieces, scraps of experiential imagery. They kept returning to me time and time again, until finally I began taking pictures of hands in different poses. I settled for these basic images with a white background because they seem to float, ready to play the castanets or create at the keyboard. In essence, they have an ephemeral quality that seems to mediate between the physical act of typing and the process we call communication. The hands I imagine are a soul we all identify with as we live with our computers, and in the classroom we see hands struggling to make meaning of their worlds. Hands are a constant. The ideas on each hand I believe serve as enthymemes for readers, who will see each hand’s message and its relation to the ideas in the same frame, and in turn to the other frames and their ideas. The unstated assumptions that the hands share with us are all elliptical stories that serve to launch new stories, uniting us personally and professionally.
∗
Email address: [email protected] (J. Scenters-Zapico).
8755-4615/02/$ – see front matter © 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved. PII: S 8 7 5 5 - 4 6 1 5 ( 0 2 ) 0 0 0 7 6 - 2
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J. Scenters-Zapico / Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
J. Scenters-Zapico / Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
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6
J. Scenters-Zapico / Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
John Scenters-Zapico teaches graduate courses in computers and writing as well as bilingual (Spanish and English) technical writing and business communication at the University of Texas at El Paso. With David Shontz, he developed The Journal Place, an interactive, online writing environment, and is developing a rhetoric to accompany it. He is writing an essay on the evolution of The Journal Place from handwritten experimental journals to the current electronic journalizing environments used in departments from English and Education to Engineering and Pharmacy. His email address is.
A Handy User’s Guide to Computers and Composition John Scenters-Zapico∗ University of Texas at El Paso, El Paso, TX 79968, USA
Abstract This article is a visual essay that uses images of hands and computers to articulate the physical experience and ephemeral quality mediating between the physical act of keyboarding and the process of communication as we live with our computers. © 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Communication; Computers and composition; Images; Visual essay
1. Introduction “A handy user’s guide to computers and composition” attempts to capture what I could never articulate in words alone. The actual creation came to me in bits and pieces, scraps of experiential imagery. They kept returning to me time and time again, until finally I began taking pictures of hands in different poses. I settled for these basic images with a white background because they seem to float, ready to play the castanets or create at the keyboard. In essence, they have an ephemeral quality that seems to mediate between the physical act of typing and the process we call communication. The hands I imagine are a soul we all identify with as we live with our computers, and in the classroom we see hands struggling to make meaning of their worlds. Hands are a constant. The ideas on each hand I believe serve as enthymemes for readers, who will see each hand’s message and its relation to the ideas in the same frame, and in turn to the other frames and their ideas. The unstated assumptions that the hands share with us are all elliptical stories that serve to launch new stories, uniting us personally and professionally.
∗
Email address: [email protected] (J. Scenters-Zapico).
8755-4615/02/$ – see front matter © 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved. PII: S 8 7 5 5 - 4 6 1 5 ( 0 2 ) 0 0 0 7 6 - 2
4
J. Scenters-Zapico / Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
J. Scenters-Zapico / Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
5
6
J. Scenters-Zapico / Computers and Composition 19 (2002) 3–6
John Scenters-Zapico teaches graduate courses in computers and writing as well as bilingual (Spanish and English) technical writing and business communication at the University of Texas at El Paso. With David Shontz, he developed The Journal Place, an interactive, online writing environment, and is developing a rhetoric to accompany it. He is writing an essay on the evolution of The Journal Place from handwritten experimental journals to the current electronic journalizing environments used in departments from English and Education to Engineering and Pharmacy. His email address is