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The Tenth Anniversary Issue

 

As always, we present readers with a delightful selection of webtexts in this issue. But, of course, this issue is more special than others, simply by its being our tenth year of publication. For Cheryl and Beth, it is a momentous occasion to be taking over the daily operations, and a kairotic moment, indeed, for Douglas and James to become senior editors taking on the Kairos-related projects they’ve thought about for years. The more important point, however, is where Kairos is, how it got here, and what it is to become. It feels odd to point out, for instance, that while Kairos wasn’t the first online journal in the rhet/comp field, it is the most longstanding journal, having published consistently since 1996, with at least one issue per year, and usually two, sometimes three, a year. But we don’t have to relay our history here because our Topoi authors do that for us, from several perspectives.

Topoi abstracts

We start off with Douglas Eyman, who has crafted a history of Kairos in his webtext, “The Arrow and the Loom,” from his perspective as a long-time editorial staff member. Douglas has been editor of multiple sections of the journal over the years and writes, in this definitive webtext, about how the journal has changed since its first year. In addition, he includes an update of his Issue 5.1 Logging On column, “Does Anybody Read Kairos?” webtext in which he provides readership numbers of the journal based on an examination of server data. Readers will be pleased to know that our average monthly readership has increased from almost 10,000 in 1999 to nearly 45,000 in 2006! We encourage readers to start with Douglas’ “Arrow and Loom” webtext as a foundation for the other webtexts in this issue that also touch on the journal’s history, each from a unique perspective.

In “Kairotically Speaking: Kairos and the Power of Identity,” Tracy Bridgeford builds on Manuel Castells’ definition of a “project identity” to argue that Kairos’ history perfectly situates it to help academics interrupt the seemingly autonomous nature of the tenure system. She describes how authors can take advantage of Kairos’ mission and, thus, its identity, to publish innovative scholarly webtexts—webtexts, she argues, that are designed with interfaces requiring interpretation and that complicate the transparent interfaces of standard, print-centric tenure binders. Drawing on Manuel Castells, Bridgeford notes that by pushing the boundaries of webtext publication, Kairos and its authors can “dismantle” the autonomous technology of the tenure system. Her webtext ends with a call for production of more innovative and technologically sophisticated webtexts.

Jim Kalmbach, in “Reading the Archives: Ten Years on Nonlinear (Kairos) History,” takes up a portion of Tracy’s argument, in identifying (and sorting) all of the uses of hypertextual navigation and design that Kairos’ webtext authors have used in the last 10 years. By all, we DO mean all. Jim has examined every webtext Kairos has published and provided what he calls a “slice” of Kairos’ archives, presenting his findings by categorizing authors’ use of hypertext into eight methods (e.g., linear, looping, exploratory, sequential, menu, timeline, etc.). In counting the number of webtexts that fall into each category, he makes the argument that Kairos is still fairly print-based and linear in what it publishes, which is all at once eye-opening, humbling, and not surprising (especially in light of Tracy’s argument regarding the autonomous technology of tenure). Jim, like Tracy, calls for more innovation in what authors submit – a call that we editors highly endorse and hope that, in some ways, the new Inventio section and mentorship possibilities (see note on the half-day workshop, at bottom) will help us fulfill.

Regarding mentorship and Kairos’ role in professionalizing graduate students, Leah Cassorla writes about her own professionalization as part of the Kairos staff and the possibilities that working with a journal brings to graduate students. Leah has been an assistant editor with Kairos for four years (first as a CoverWeb AE and now assisting Cheryl and Beth with the whole journal). Her text, “Kairos and Graduate Student Professionalization: Intersections and Parallels,” narrates her entrance into the technorhetorical discourse community, facilitated by her staff position, and also includes interviews with other, one-time graduate-student staff and editorial board members discussing the impact that Kairos has on professionalizing the field. We invite readers to learn from Leah’s text and encourage others to find similar professional development opportunities for themselves and/or the grad students they know and mentor, including becoming a part of Kairos’ readership, author pool, and staff.

One way that Kairos is hoping to be a leader and mentor, but that is also a complication for the staff as we solicit more media-rich scholarship, is in traversing copyright issues. Martine Rife takes up the copyright issue in her webtext, “Why Kairos Matters to Writing: A Reflection on its Intellectual Property Conversation and Developing Law During the Last Ten Years.” In providing an overview of copyright law pertinent to writing studies--including cases such as Napster, Grokster, and Aimster--Martine draws on her legal expertise to argue that the Kairos community is suited to become a leader in discussing and, therefore, impacting new copyright law. She points out, for instance, that Fair Use has never legally been defined, a matter that could upset what Kairos may publish. In addition, Martine offers other points of contention in copyright law that writing instructors should be aware of, if not also teach, when working in digital environments. We invite you to read her easy-to-understand explanations of the impact case law has on writing studies; she makes a compelling case for those of us less interested in the fine details of copyright to take action.

 

More in this issue

Readers can also find interviews with past and current staff and editorial board members in the Interviews section, adeptly put together by Brad Lucas and Peg Strain, Interviews Co-Editors.  These interviews highlight the history of the journal as well as future directions for specific sections, as described by current section editors including Reviews.

In addition, in the Praxis section, readers will find a full description of how that section will be changing, starting in the spring issue, to be more practical and useful for our digital classroom teaching needs.  Joyce Walker and Colleen Reilly discuss their implementation of a wiki, which will contain short, tool-based narratives (of software, hardware, etc.) that are searchable and editable by readers. The Praxis section will also continue to solicit longer researched-based narratives of specific tool-use in the classroom, with each issue containing a different tool theme. Look to their section for specifics about these changes and about upcoming themes that you can submit to.

Finally, in this issue, the Communication Editors Anthony Atkins and Erin Karper outline in the CommLink column what’s in store for readers when the journal is redesigned next spring. They discuss what some of the new interactive elements of the journal will be (including RSS feeds, tagging and citation notification of webtexts, reader comment areas, a remediated version of the Kairos Meet the Author series, and others). Tony and Erin will be Kairos’ readers’ best friends for keeping them up-to-date on scholarly events in the journal and our field.

 

Other items of note

Tenth Anniversary Logo Contest
One of the Kairos events from this last year included a logo contest for the 10th anniversary issue. We received many submissions, and the staff, in a blind vote, chose Tracy Bridgeford’s logo, which appears on the front page and elsewhere in this issue. We wanted to thank Tracy for her wonderful and winning submission, which aptly reflects the journal’s identity for our anniversary. It is serendipitous—kairotic, in fact—that Tracy also has a webtext in this issue discussing Kairos’ identity. In addition, we owe a big thanks to Rich Rice for arranging the award for the logo contest—Tracy won free registration to the Computers and Writing conference and workshops in Lubbock this past May. You can see Tracy’s along with several of the other submission designs and artist statements in our logo design showcase. Although we hope to continue the logo contest in future years, we’ll have to see how the logo, which in the past indicated the themed CoverWeb section, will be used in the upcoming redesign (since the CoverWeb no longer exists).

C&W 2007 Webtext Submissions
Thinking ahead to the spring issue, the Computers & Writing 2006 issue of Kairos will be published in January, and we already have submissions in review for that issue. However, the editors would like to encourage readers to begin thinking about C&W 2007—submitting proposals to the onsite and online conferences. Presentations at either conference can be turned into webtexts and submitted to the next C&W issue. Those webtexts will be due on/around July 1, 2007, which happens fairly quickly after the onsite conference is over. Authors might consider beginning work on a webtext that also becomes a conference presentation, so you’ll be ahead of any submission deadlines! Check out the C&W Online conference call, the theme of which is technoculture. The onsite conference call has just been released, but you can also check out a video trailer for C&W 2007 that Jeff Rice, onsite co-host, made about the city of Detroit, where Wayne State University and the site of the next C&W conference is.

Kairos Author-Mentoring Workshops
In addition to thinking about webtexts, the editors would like to let you know about some Kairos items in the works for the onsite conference. We are working with Jeff Rice to host an innovative scholarship display (similar to what C&W 2005 Stanford had) that also includes a half-day workshop (or two back-to-back conference sessions) where authors can get feedback about composing or revising in-progress webtexts. There will be plenty of Kairos staff and board members on hand to guide authors as much as possible in the f2f environment while showcasing, on close-by computers, some of the innovative work that Kairos authors have already done, or that we’d like to see done. Stay tuned for more information on the workshops. If you’d like to see us host similar workshops/displays at other conferences, let us know—we’re just beginning to implement this kind of hands-on outreach and your input would be useful.

Overview

Kairos 11.1

Vol. 11 Iss. 1 Fall 2006