About Technical Communication
What is technical communication?
According to William Sanborn Pfeiffer, author of Technical Communication: A Practical Approach, technical communication is "a generic term for all written and oral communications done on the job—whether in business, industry, or other professions" (4)1. As he points out, and you may assume too, technical communication is often associated with technology, science, medicine, or other "technical" fields. The Wikipedia entry2 on technical communication defines it as "the process of conveying usable information through writing or speech about a specific domain to an intended audience." Whether or not you think Wikipedia is an appropriate reference, their definition is pretty accurate. Technical communication is hard to define—it's hard to pull all of its aspects into one clear sentence.
The University of Washington's Department of Technical Communication3 has a page with helpful information on technical communication—The Field of TC. According to them, technical communication serves "as the primary communication line between technology and its users, and between scientists and the users of scientific information."
Technical writing is clear, concise, meaningful writing that explains, describes, and instructs. It is writing for the business world and for the workplace.
What will a technical communication degree teach me?
To learn about the requirements for a B.A. in English with Technical Communication Emphasis, please see the English, Foreign Language, and Journalism Department's degrees/courses page. According to the catalog, Missouri Western's Technical Communication degree is supposed to:
[be] designed for students interested in working as technical writers and/or communication specialists in large organizations. Students interested in pursuing graduate and professional degrees (creative writing, composition and rhetoric, law, library science, etc.) are also advised to select this program (p.233).4
A Technical Communications degree will teach you the skills you need to create technical documents of all different types, such as reports, memos, manuals, and instructions. You will also learn appropriate writing styles, desktop publishing skills, and beginning proficiency with a wide variety of programs, such as Adobe InDesign, Dreamweaver, and RoboHelp, and the Microsoft Word and Excel.
What kinds of jobs require or need technical communication skills?
The question may really be, what kind of job doesn't require technical communication skills? As students taking Dr. Adkin's ETC 200 course have probably heard, many people performed technical writing tasks, they just don't call it that. Anyone who has been called upon to write a training manual, a simple set of instructions, a full-length report, or a business webpage is a technical communicator.
According to the national STC website, there are many different professions that fall under the broad category of "technical communication." Technical writers, editors, and translator; web designers; and documentation specialists all use technical communication skills. They are spread out over many different fields, from medicine to oil-drilling.5 And, according to the Society for Technical Communication, there are more than 100,000 technical communicators in the U.S. alone.
What jobs or internships do MWSU students and alumni have?
To give you some real-life examples of technical communicators, we've caught up with some of our alumni and asked them, "What do you do with your technical communication degree?" To see what they've said, click here. To see what English department alumni have done, see the Alumni page.
References
1Pfeiffer, William Sanborn. Technical Communication: A Practical Approach. 6th ed. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2006.
2"Technical communication." Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. 13 November 2007. 19 November 2007. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_communication>
3"The Field of TC." University of Washington. Department of Technical Communication. 19 November 2007. <http://www.uwtc.washington.edu/about/field.php>
4"Department of English, Foreign Languages, and Journalism." Missouri Western State University: Catalog 2006-2007. <http://www.missouriwestern.edu/Catalog/eflj.pdf>
5"What do technical communicators do?" Society for Technical Communication.<http://stc.org/about/press03.asp?ID=1>
