Six Critical Moments of Transformation

Training and instruction (Document F) returns us to local sites where specific details of operation must be communicated to workers and management in new-miner training sessions, daily work orders, and annual refresher training. Workers need specific instruction in how to follow a roof control plan, how to install roof support, and how to maintain and monitor ventilation. Much of this instruction takes place on the job where novices learn as they work alongside experienced miners. 

Ideally, investigations are thorough, data is complete and up-to-date, policy is wise and astute, instructions are well-written, training is persuasive, and individuals have adequate evidence to assess and manage conditions in local sites. But not all knowledge passes seamlessly into writing at critical moments in the cycle. 

Hazardous environments are poorly understtK)d and difficult to manage, even with the best technologies. Workers and management face production pressures that frequently invite disaster. Even under the best circumstances, compliance is difficult and complex. Within the Cycle, no single document can include all of the information that individuals would need to provide a 100% certain level of safety underground. Each document is ultimately the product of many rhetorical actions that may be so naturalized that writers no longer see these acts as rhetorical choices. If we attempt to build a theory of rhetorical practice based solely on our analysis of mitten documentation at any moment in the Cycle, we may miss the important rhetorical work that takes place at critical moments of transformation within the Cycle. 

The Cycle allows us to identify six critical moments of transformation  

when oral testimony and embodied experience are captured in writing  

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This framework enables us to identify Six Critical Moments of Rhetorical Transformation in large regulatory industries. At these moments, writers must extract information that is presented in one rhetorical modality (oral testimony, for example) and literally change the form so that the information can be re-represented for a different audience (1) when oral testimony and embodied experience are captured in writing (2) when the information in accident reports is re-represented in statistical records (3) when statistical accounts are re-represented as arguments for particular policies (4) when policies and standards are transformed into procedures (5) when written procedures are transformed into training and (6) when training is re-represented to workers at local sites. (Chapter 2 describes the cycle in detail.)... 

Chapter 2 describes the cycle of technical documentation within large regulatory agencies. This framework allows us to identify Six Critical Moments of Rhetorical Transformation when knowledge in one modality (oral... 

This framework allows us to identify six critical moments of rhetorical transformation within the Cycle. At these moments, writers extract informa-... 

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