Resources

Reading Strategies

Original tips created by Dr. Mars Hicks.

If you're having trouble keeping up with the reading for this class, here are some tips that may help you read faster and retain more:

  1. Don’t read in a decontextualized, content-driven fashion. Instead, read for argument: What is their argument? How do they support it? Who do they seem to be responding to and why?
  2. Write it [the argument] down. Creative and well-organized note-taking is what enables you to join the discussion more confidently, because no one expects anyone to recall such details on the spot.
  3. Figure out what details are important by seeing if they align, or conflict, with the scholar’s argument.
  4. Be able to formulate your own response to the scholar by using evidence from their text. You don't have to agree with their argument, but you should be able to point to specific parts of the text to show why you do or don't adhere to the author(s).
  5. Again, take notice about how good note-taking is your best practice.
  6. Jot down what your big takeaways were and consider what the author intended as such. This can help you see what you and the author have accomplished.
  7. Reading dense material is a process, and you'll get better at it if you just commit and do the work. Our class discussions are part of the process, which will help you grasp what you read.
  8. Lastly, if you don’t get parts of a text, mark these places and questions. Again, write it down for taking it up in class. Good researchers organize their ideas to facilitate such discussion.

Note: These tips are also useful for reverse-engineering and dissecting successful writing, and for figuring out how to write your own papers.

Project Guidance: Technology Reports

To help you invent your own auto-ethnography project, I provide the following list of reports about contemporary issues surrounding digital technologies. Use them as a means to craft your own project.

  • Angwin, J., Tobin, A., and Varner, M. (2017, Nov. 21). Facebook (still) letting housing advertisers exclude users by race. Propublica [text/html]. Retrieved December 2, 2017, from https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-advertising-discrimination-housing-race-sex-national-origin.
  • Biddle, S. (2017, Dec. 1). Twitter has literally no explanation for why Trump’s Anti-Muslim Tweets are OK. The Intercept_. Retrieved 02 Dec. 2017 from https://theintercept.com/2017/12/01/twitter-trump-anti-muslim-retweets/.
  • Brandom, R. (2017, Dec. 29). Ad targeters are pulling data from your browser’s password manager. The Verge [html/text]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from https://flipboard.com/@flipboard/-ad-targeters-are-pulling-data-from-your/f-1775c6c6f3%2Ftheverge.com.
  • Brown, K. V. (2018, Jan. 16). How DNA Testing Botched My Family’s Heritage, and Probably Yours, Too. Gizmodo [html/text]. Retrieved January 17, 2018, from https://gizmodo.com/how-dna-testing-botched-my-familys-heritage-and-probab-1820932637.
  • Chafkin, M. (2017, Aug. 7). Facebook and Google Algorithms Are the New ‘Useful Idiots.’ Bloomberg.Com. Retrieved 2 Dec. 2017 from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-07/facebook-and-google-algorithms-are-the-new-useful-idiots.
  • Collins, K. (2017, Nov. 27). Google collects Android users’ locations even when location services are disabled [html/text]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from https://qz.com/1131515/google-collects-android-users-locations-even-when-location-services-are-disabled/.
  • Confessore, N. (2018, Jan. 27). The follower factory. The New York Times. Retrieved January 29, 2018 from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/27/technology/social-media-bots.html.
  • Del Barco, M. (2017, Nov. 13). How Kodak’s Shirley Cards Set Photography’s Skin-Tone Standard. NPR.Org. Retrieved from 2 Dec. 2017 https://www.npr.org/2014/11/13/363517842/for-decades-kodak-s-shirley-cards-set-photography-s-skin-tone-standard.
  • Ellenberg, J. (2017, Oct. 6). Opinion | How Computers Turned Gerrymandering Into a Science. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/06/opinion/sunday/computers-gerrymandering-wisconsin.html.
  • Falck, B. (2017, Oct. 24). New Transparency For Ads on Twitter [blog]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from https://blog.twitter.com/official/en_us/topics/product/2017/New-Transparency-For-Ads-on-Twitter.html.
  • Gertz, M. (2018, Jan. 5). I’ve Studied the Trump-Fox Feedback Loop for Months. It’s Crazier Than You Think. Politico [html/text]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from http://politi.co/2Av9v0f.
  • Glaser, A., & Glaser, A. (2017, Aug. 4). Facebook is using an “NRA approach” to defend its creepy facial recognition programs. Slate. Retrieved 2 Dec. 2017 from http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2017/08/04/facebook_is_fighting_biometric_facial_recognition_privacy_laws.html.
  • Green, H. (2017, May 19). Election laws can’t cope with data harvesting – which suits politicians fine [html/text]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from https://theconversation.com/amp/election-laws-cant-cope-with-data-harvesting-which-suits-politicians-fine-78044.
  • Joseph, G. (2017, Nov. 22). Extreme digital vetting of visitors to the U.S. moves forward under a new name. Propublica [Journalism]. Retrieved 2 Dec. 2017, from https://www.propublica.org/article/extreme-digital-vetting-of-visitors-to-the-u-s-moves-forward-under-a-new-name.
  • Kao, J. (23 Nov. 2017). More than a million pro-repeal Net Neutrality comments were likely faked. HackerNoon [text/html]. Retrieved 2 Dec. 2017 from, https://hackernoon.com/more-than-a-million-pro-repeal-net-neutrality-comments-were-likely-faked-e9f0e3ed36a6.
  • Knight, W. (2017, Dec. 13). Google’s Return to China Foretells a Global Race to Deliver AI [html/text]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from https://www.technologyreview.com/s/609772/googles-return-to-china-foretells-a-global-race-to-deliver-ai/amp/.
  • Leora Smith and Kravitz, D. (2017, Dec. 8). Governors and federal agencies are blocking nearly 1,300 accounts on Facebook and Twitter [text/html]. ProPublica. Retrieved December 12, 2017, from https://www.propublica.org/article/governors-and-federal-agencies-are-blocking-accounts-on-facebook-and-twitter.
  • Lomas, N. (28 Apr. 2017). Someone scraped 40,000 Tinder selfies to make a facial dataset for AI experiments [html/text]. TechCrunch. Retrieved December 12, 2017, from http://social.techcrunch.com/2017/04/28/someone-scraped-40000-tinder-selfies-to-make-a-facial-dataset-for-ai-experiments/.
  • Lustgarten, A. (2012, June 21). Injection Wells: The Poison Beneath Us. Propublica [news]. Retrieved January 11, 2018, from https://www.propublica.org/article/injection-wells-the-poison-beneath-us.
  • Marotti, A. (2018, Jan. 17). Google’s art selfies aren’t available in Illinois. Here’s why. Chicago Tribune [html/text]. Retrieved January 17, 2018, from http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-google-art-selfies-20180116-story.html.
  • n/a. (n/a). Download your data [html/text]. Google Takeout Retrieved January 9, 2018, from https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout.
  • O’Beirne, J. (2017, Dec.). Google Maps’s Moat. Justinobeirne.com [personal portfolio]. Retrieved January 6, 2018, from https://www.justinobeirne.com/google-maps-moat.
  • Rogers, K. (2017, Nov. 16). Ignored By Big Telecom, Detroit’s Marginalized Communities Are Building Their Own Internet. Motherboard [html/text]. Retrieved January 9, 2018, from https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/kz3xyz/detroit-mesh-network.
  • Rosenberg, Y. (2017, Dec. 27). Confessions of a Digital Nazi Hunter [html/text]. Retrieved January 5, 2018, from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/27/opinion/digital-nazi-hunter-trump.html.
  • Thorp, J. (13 Jul. 2017). You say data, I say system. HackerNoon [text/html]. Retrieved 2 Dec. 2017 from https://hackernoon.com/you-say-data-i-say-system-54e84aa7a421.
  • Yglesias, M. (6 Nov. 2017). The real fix for gerrymandering is proportional representation. Vox [text/html]. Retrieved 2 Dec. 2017 from https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/policy-and-politics/2017/10/11/16453512/gerrymandering-proportional-representation.

Rhetoric & STS Journals

h/t Dr. Kelly Pender
  • Argumentation and Advocacy
  • Argumentation
  • Technical Communication Quarterly
  • Journal of Business and Technical Communication
  • Written Communication
  • Quarterly Journal of Speech
  • Rhetoric Society Quarterly
  • Rhetoric and Public Affairs
  • Social Epistemology
  • POROI
  • Science Communication
  • College Composition and Communication
  • College English
  • Rhetoric Review
  • Philosophy and Rhetoric
  • Western Journal of Communication
  • Southern Communication Journal

STS and Content-Area Specific Journals

  • Social Study of Science
  • Science, Technology, and Human Values
  • Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly
  • Public Understanding of Science
  • Science and Public Policy
  • Environmental Science and Policy
  • Environmental Communication
  • Journal of Medical Humanities
  • Policy Sciences
  • Social Studies of Medicine
  • BioSocieties
  • Social Studies of Medicine

Special Issues on the Rhetoric of Science and Technology

  • Configurations 11.2: ethos in science
  • Discourse Studies 5.2: popularization of science in media
  • Journal of Business and Technical Communication 15: Prospects for research in scientific and technical communication
  • POROI 9.1: the future of RSTM scholarship
  • Rhetorica 9.4: three articles on rhetoric of science
  • Rhetorica 7.1: rhetoric of science in historical contexts
  • Science, Technology, and Human Values 4.1: The field of RST
  • Social Text 46/47: the “science wars”—a special issue that the text at the center of the Sokal hoax, as well as discussions of postmodern approaches to science
  • The Southern Communication Journal 58.4: Gaonkar’s critique of RST and responses to it
  • Technical Communication Quarterly 14.3: overview of RST and its importance
  • Technical Communication Quarterly 12.3: visual rhetoric in science
  • Written Communication 21.1: rhetoric of popular science