5.24 Reading Response

Texts:
Winsor, Genre Activity Systems Engr
Panke & Gaiser, Head Clouds Social Tag  

Winsor brings up activity theory as a way to address the issue of the simultaneous existence of pattern and contingency, saying that it offers us the ability to see how text and context are mutually influential and that it allows is to see that lack of unity is normal in an activity system (200). What I found interesting about this article was not this point, but the part where she outlined some of the similarities and definitions between genre theory and activity theory. I had previously been a little hazy on this delineation, but I feel that Winsor helped make this a little clearer.

Genre theory sees genre as a “typified rhetorical response to a typified social situation” (201). Similarly, activity theory sees generic texts as tools that “hold activity systems together by giving them a regular form and a sense of permanence” (201). However, while similar in this manner, there are ways that activity theory breaks off from genre theory. While genre theory sees that shaping influences are one-directional, from only social context to the text, activity theory reconceptualizes the relationship between text and context and doesn’t see context as a container for in which text is produced (201). Instead, all of the elements in an activity system (subjects, tools, objects, etc.) are mutually constitutive and always changing. While genre theory focuses on repetition and continuity, activity theory sees that tensions and discontinuities are normal in a system (201). This is because “complex organizations almost always encompass several subsidiary activity systems with different interests” (201). Looking at it this way, Winsor argues, makes it easier to see that pattern and contingency clearly can coexist (201).

This helps illustrate to me that activity theory is much more malleable of an idea and able to encompass and explain more. Our systems and networks that we participate in can become so complex; we need something this flexible to look at them through in any hopes of understanding them.

In their article on social tagging, Panke and Gaiser describe it as a tool for organizing personal and shared knowledge (318). Their study found that people have highly individualized ways of tagging and also pursued it for very different goals (342). Panke and Gaiser identify several different kinds of taggers: ego taggers, everyday archivers, broadcasters, and team players (342). This kind of applies to how Winsor looks at systems as bring very complex and in flux – which is why it applies to activity theory. It also applies to genre theory, as stated directly by the authors – but I will get to this in a minute.

First, there are two sides to the debate on social tagging though. Critics argue that the quality of keywords is doubtful and user-generated keywords will only add to the already vast amount of data on the Internet (320). However, supporters point out that sorting patterns generated by users demonstrate that classification is a construction, emphasizing that ordering information is a form of social practice (320). So then, tagging may serve as a solution to exemplify the breadth of our knowledge and the variety of elements it contains (321).

So then, what I really found interesting in this article that connects it directly to class is how Panke and Gaiser connect social tagging to genre theory. According to them, “genre theory can provide a fruitful framework for understanding the emergence of free-indexing terms” in regards to social tagging (324). They see genres as “dynamic forms that mediate between the unique features of individual contexts and the features that recur across contexts” and thus are embedded in our communicative activities (324). They see using genres as ‘‘situated cognition’’ - embracing form and content, addressing rhetorical appropriateness; simultaneously constituting and reproducing social structures; and signaling norms, epistemology, ideology, and social ontology (324). How this relates to social tagging is that tagging activities could help us understand how we build tagging vocabularies and how tagging may serve as a “genre aggregator” that may “bind artifacts belonging to different types of genres or multiple genres together”(325). Furthermore, because differentiating between genres and technologies can be difficult, “tagging vocabulary can provide interesting material to investigate which traits and qualities of a given artifact constitute the genre”(346).  Another connection they make between social tagging and genre theory is the interplay of different genres. Looking at genres allows us to see how they interconnect to mediate specific activities (346). Panke and Gaiser argue that “tagging can be a way for us to visualize these interconnections, handle them in a self-organized manner, and thus create a productive information environment for ourselves and potentially for others” (346).

I think that it is interesting to look at social tagging in this way – as a way to illustrate genre theory. We had originally read this article last semester in Dr. Ding’s ENGL 856 class and had connected it to workplace communication. When reading it at that time, I saw social tagging as more of a strategic communication tool that was really beneficial for drawing in people and connecting them. This is probably thanks to my interest and background in PR. Reading it now in this class, I find it interesting to take a different perspective on it and see it in regards to genre theory as Panke and Gaiser illustrate briefly.