heuristic

James Porter (1998) defined rhetorical heuristics as “guidelines or strategies useful to ethical decision making in [particular] situations” (p. 18). I designed a heuristic because, unlike a taxonomy, it acts as a loose framework that imparts direction while steering clear of unyielding rules (Selber, 2004). Rather than focusing on any one aspect of a name, the heuristic below (Table 5) encourages a deeper consideration of a name’s historical, pedagogical, metaphorical, pragmatic, economic, social, cultural, political, and material dimensions in conjunction.

Table 5: Heuristic for Choosing Names for Wireless Places Dedicated to Writing Instruction

Criteria Questions
Historical criteria
  • What is the origin of the name? Are these origins inimical to or supportive of the goals of writing instruction?
Pedagogical criteria
  • Is the name inimical to or supportive of the goals of writing instruction?
Metaphorical criteria
  • Does the metaphor call attention to itself? Is it “dead”?
  • What assumptions or conventions undergird the metaphor?
  • Which groups use the metaphor? Which groups do not?
Pragmatic
criteria
  • Will officially renaming the place inhibit access to the place? [1]
  • If re/naming the place officially is not possible, are there other avenues for circulating a new, unofficial name for the site? [2]
Economic criteria
  • What are the costs associated with renaming the place officially? Unofficially? Will signage need to be replaced? Websites updates?
Social/cultural criteria
  • What contemporary connotations does the name carry? Local connotations? Secondary meanings? How will this baggage affect students’ perceptions of the place? Instructors’ perceptions? Administrators’ perceptions? What about those working on the same campus but outside of English studies?
  • Does the name dis/empower [3] some groups? Is this dis/empowerment based on race? Class? Sexuality? Gender? Age?
Political criteria
  • Which groups/individuals/disciplines does the name align the place with? Could the adoption of the name be perceived as a step towards severing alliances with some groups/individuals/ disciplines?
Material
criteria
  • Do the material conditions [4] of the place support the adoption of the name? If not, can the place be easily adjusted to support the name?

 

[1] At Michigan State, for example, the labels “microcomputer lab,” “computer lab,” and “technology classroom” are important distinctions that determine which departments have priority when scheduling class meetings within these places (Grabill).

[2] As my data suggests, multiple names for the same settings are not uncommon and will likely continue to flourish. Circulating unofficial names via programmatic websites, newsletters, and so on, is one tactic for supplanting established names.

[3] The powerless, as categorized by Iris Marion Young (1990), are those “over whom power is exercised without their exercising it; [those] situated so that they must take orders and rarely have the right to give them…The powerless have little or no work autonomy, exercise little creativity or judgment in their work, have no technical expertise or authority, express themselves awkwardly, especially in public or bureaucratic settings, and do not command respect” (pp. 56-57). By distinguishing between forms of oppression, as Sullivan and Porter (1997) advocated, one may avoid sliding “into the fallacy of calling all institutional actions oppressive, or all uses of the computer” (p. 120).

[4] Architecture and interior design

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