The rhetoric of risk : technical documentation in hazardous environments

Contents List of Figures xiii Editor's Introduction xvii Introduction: The Rhetoric of Risk 1 Rhetorical Invention in the Context of Risk 3 Finding Out the Available Means of Persuasion 1 Integrating Stakeholder Knowledge in Expert Judgments About Risk 11 Bridging the Boundaries Between Risk and Rhetoric 14 The Cycle of Technical Documentation in Large Regulatory Industries 17 The Framework of the Book 18 Acknowledgments 21 I The Problem of Technical Documentation in Hazardous Environments 25 1 Regulating Hazardous Environments: The Problem of Documentation 27 Pyro-Technics: Regulating an Explosive Environment 34 The Problem of Standardizing Experience 37 The Problem of Wording 43 The Problem of Regulatory Revision and Review 47 vii viii CONTENTS The Difficulties of Compliance 50 The Tension Between Strict Enforcement and Day-to-Day Compliance 51 The Problem of Complying "In Time" 55 The Costs and Benefits of a Well-Regulated Environment 57 The Problem of Documentation 58 The Problem of Timely and Adequate Documentation 59 The Problem of Unwarrantable Failure 61 The Nature of Technical Documentation in Hazardous Environments 64 2 Moments of Transformation: The Cycle of Technical Documentation in Large Regulatory Industries 6.5 The Need for a Rhetorical Framework 67 The Cycle of Technical Documentation in Large Regulatory Industries 72 Six Critical Moments of Transformation 75 A Collaborative Notion of Expertise 78 The Rhetorical Force of Documents Within the Cycle 85 The Material Consequences of Manipulating Risk on Paper 87 Shifting the Focus of Institutional Attention 88 The Consequences of Managing Risk on Paper 90 The Rhetorical Transformation of Experience 91 The Rhetorical Transformation of Experience in Accident Investigations 92 The Re transformation of Experience in Training 93 The Uncertainty of Knowledge in Large Regulatory Industries 97 3 Acknowledging Uncertainty: Rethinking Rhetoric in a Hazardous Environment 99 Uncertainty at the Highest Level of Exigence: Imminent Danger 103 The Dynamic Uncertainty of Hazardous Environments 107 The Variability and Unreliability of Human Performance 110 The Uncertainty of Premium Data 112 Uncertainty in Social Structure ami Organization 116 The Rhetorical Incompleteness of a Single Viewpoint 122 II Moments of Transformation 127 4 Reconstructing Experience: The Rhetorical Interface Between Agencies and Experience 129 The Structure of Situated Knowledge in Hazardous Worksites 133 The Literal and Figurative Structure of Work in Hazardous Worksites 133 The Vocabulary of Situated Viewpoints 135 The Rhetorical Uncertainty of Documentation in Hazardous Worksites 136 CONTENTS Documenting Local Experience: Kenny Blake's Narrative 138 Constructing the Agency's Perspective: Outby the Disaster HO Mapping Embodied Positions 142 Reconstructing Time 143 Categorizing Rhetorical Positions 144 Reconstructing the Collective Experience of Risk 145 Constructing Collective Agreement 147 Drawing on Previous Experience 148 Evaluating the Outcome 150 The Potential for Multiple Viewpoints 152 Learning From Experience: Enlarging the Agency's Perspective in Training and Instruction 154 The Problem of Anomalous Behavior: Rethinking Instruction as Hierarchical Procedure 156 Constructing the Proper Perspective: MSHA Reconstructs Miners' Experience 159 The British Miner's Perspective: Free to Speculate, Miners Can Articulate Gaps in the Agency's Construction of Experience 163 FATALGRAMS in U.S. Training: Encouraged to Speculate, Miners Retrans/orm the Agency's Limited Perspective 166 The Welsh Miner's Perspective: Faced With Complexity, Individuals Can Manage a Surprising Number of Diverse Perspectives 175 Revisiting a Feminist Perspective: Can Rhetoric Accommodate Multiple Perspectives? 178 Warrants for Judgment: The Textual Representation of Embodied Sensory Experience 181 The Problem of Roof Support in U.S. and British Mines 185 The Nature of Warrants Grounded in Experience 189 Embodied Sensory Experience (Pit Sense) 189 Engineering Experience 191 Scientific Knowledge 191 The Effect of Warrants on Risk Decisions and Risk Outcomes 193 The Rhetorical Incompleteness of Written Instructions and Procedures 199 The Rhetorical Incompleteness of Written Instructions 200 The Interdependence of Scientific Knowledge and Local Experience 203 The Rhetorical Presence of Tacit Knowledge 204 The Textual Dynamics of Disaster 207 The Limits of Science in the Context of Risk 210 Implications for Rhetorical Theory 213 x CONTENTS III Documenting Experience 217 7 Embodied Experience: Representing Risk in Speech and Gesture 219 Hand and Mind: What Gestures Reveal About Thought 224 The Role of Gesture in Speakers' Representations of Risk 227 Mimetic and Analytic Viewpoints 228 Multiple-Viewpoint Representations 230 Mimetic Viewpoints in Miners' Representations of Risk 232 Analytic Viewpoints in Miners' Representations of Risk 238 Simultaneous Viewpoints in Miners' Representations of Risk 243 Missing Viewpoints in Miners' Representations of Risk 244 Sequential Viewpoints in Miners' Representations of Risk 249 Interpreting Miners' Representations of Risk: The Problem of Audience 252 Appendix A: Characterizing Viewpoints in Miners' Representations of Risk 254 8 Manual Communication: The Negotiation of Meaning Embodied in Gesture 256 The Effect of Viewpoint in Miners' Representations of Risk 259 Viewpoint Redefines the Relationship Between Speaker and Audience 260 Viewpoint Shapes Semantic Content 262 Viewpoint Helps Speakers Elaborate the Meanings Conveyed in Speech 266 Viewpoints Help Miners Integrate Theory and Practice 268 Viewpoint Transforms a Speaker's Understanding of Experience 271 The Role of Gesture in the Rhetorical Construction of Meaning 212 Miners Use Gesture to Interpret Gesture 273 Speakers Use Gesture to Amplify Component Features and Concepts 274 Gestures Influence the Production of New Meanings in Gesture 276 Miners Use Gestures Rhetorically in Collaborative Interactions 279 Speakers Use Gesture to Explore Meanings Embodied in Gesture 279 Speakers Use Gesture as Queries to Invite Response 279 Speakers Co-Construct Knowledge in Gesture 280 Implications for Writers 281 IV Transforming Experience 285 9 Capturing Experience: The Moment of Transformation 287 Controversy and Uncertainty Following the Southmountain Disaster 292 Legal Uncertainties Cloud Agency Investigations 294 Preventing Self-Incrimination 294 Unraveling Institutional Authority and Liability 295 CONTENTS xi Locating Responsible Agents 296 Corroborating Factual Findings 299 Uncertainties in the Process of Rhetorical Transformation 300 Differences in Vocabulary Reflect More Fundamental Differences in the Relationship to Risk 301 Differences in Language Reflect Underlying Differences in the Ways That Miners and Investigators Warrant Judgments About Risk 303 The Transcripts Indicate That Miners Gesture, but Interviewers Do Not Employ Conventions of Coding That Would Allow Us to See What Individuals Express With Their Hands 307 Two-Dimensional Maps Cannot Represent the Spatial and Temporal Complexity That Is Possible When Speakers Coordinate Speech and Gesture 311 The Complete and Forthright Testimony of Witnesses 317 10 Conclusion: The Last Canary? 320 The Function of Written Documentation in Hazardous Environments 324 Towards a Better Understanding of Workplace Discourse 328 Industrial Strength Documentation in an Electronic Culture 330 Expert Systems Are Constructed on a Foundation of (Frequently Unarticulated) Tacit Knowledge 330 The Uncertainties in New Technologies Are Less Visible, but the Problem Is a Question of Scale, Not Kind 332 The Move Off Shore Has Relocated Many of the Problems of Transformation to a More Difficult Rhetorical Context 333 Electronic Commerce Has Not Entirely Eliminated the Problems of Industrial Labor, Even Within Its Own Institutions 333 Implications for a Theory of Rhetoric 334 References 336 Author Index 357 Subject Index 361