The NAACP put out a travel warning for the state of Missouri in the wake of high profile police killings of unarmed black citizens, the protests in Ferguson, and the disproportionate police engagement with motorists and citizens of color. This threw into question, I suspect in an unprecedented way, whether either organization ought to hold the conference in Kansas City, MO in tandem with CCCC, per usual. The larger national and global political context certainly weighs heavily in an ongoing way and this conference was no exception. ​

The CFP for the conference sent in early October declared:

Drs. Jones and Blake Scott asserted that the fundamental assumption underlying the call was that:

"that technical and professional communication (TPC) is not and never has been impartial or apolitical"

Ultimately this call sought to have session presenters consider

"foreground the multiple ways technical communication participates--and has a long history of participating—in various levels (e.g., local, national, transnational) and contexts (e.g., community-based, civil, governmental, institutional) of political action, including within our field or profession."

Interacting both with this call and the possibility of attending both ATTW and Cs was unexpectedly challenging. I should say that it was not until especially late in the year, perhaps not even until the beginning of the year, that it occurred to me if or whether I had some obligation to not attend. Some scholars expressed a desire not to attend because they felt genuinely anxious about the location. Others considered whether not to attend as a matter of protest.

Of course at no point did I ever feel "unsafe" in either Kansas or Missouri. When I tried to explain to someone (also white) outside my academic orbit the issues surrounding the conferences (namely the delay in determining where they would be), when I got to the part about the travel advisory, they rolled their eyes. As if the fear itself was ridiculous. But again, that was the point. I as a white man do not consider that there are places where I cannot go and feel largely safe and free of discrimination from agents of the state. My citizenship, in a very fundamental way, is never in question.

This disparate experience was further brought home to me when, on the evening after the first day of the conference, I met my fellow early career colleague, Dr. Consuelo Salas*, who had arrived for CCCC and was staying in MO. She took an Uber from KC in MO to the hotel in KS. One of the first thing she said was, "I just saw a man being arrested." Coming out of her hotel, she'd seen a black man on the ground with police holding him down, their knees on his back re-enacting a scene all too familiar to us nationally, a scene that has cost women and men their dignity, their mental well being, their wealth, their lives. A scene that looks less and less benign from a socio-political perspective--and indeed only ever looked like a "benign" exercise of state power to people for whom such exertion of force is benevolence. It "protects" (largely) white property and sense of order and safety. It maintains a sense of "law and order" which is seems always and everywhere to be disproportionately exercised on individuals and communities of color.

My colleague's distress was palpable. Not only because of the moment's intensity, but because as a person of color herself, she does not have the luxury of expecting her existence in predominantly white spaces to be accepted as normal or desirable. Presence, as we learn again and again, is itself a threat. The irrationality of this predominantly white fear cannot really see her. Once again I was reminded that I in my white maleness am having a profoundly different experience than much of the world. And my experience, shaped largely by a kind of tacit, experiential ignorance is an integral part of creating the fear and the threat.

This contrasted sharply with other, predominantly white, colleagues' comments on the "oddness" of the location of the Hilton. What became clear to me is that what made things "odd" for them (and if I am honest me) was that it was in a relatively poor area. Compared to other more classically "conference friendly" spaces like you might find in Orlando, for instance, with a bevy of hotels, restaurants, and loosely related "vacation" type amenities, this was in a relatively nondescript urban area. Clearly not as economically well off as other locations--or at least less interested in sweeping out "undesirable" elements beyond visitors' field of vision.

Having decided to stay in the KS Hilton for the duration of the week, shuttling back and forth for Cs, I ended up in a number of Ubers. Most had no problem picking me up or dropping me off at the location. But one driver, a white male in a moderately nice car, was palpably anxious about dropping me off at the location after 10pm saying that I was "staying in a rough part of town." He made a point to say he would drop me off, go off line, and log back in to pick up passengers once back in MO. Yet at no point did I feel any genuine sense that I was in any real danger due to my location.

Dr. Krista Ratcliffe in her work Rhetorical Listening helped me attend to these kinds of contrasts by suggesting as a matter of practice in discussions of race matters to "lay" these kinds of vignettes "alongside" one another in the interest of learning and framing our engagement.

But what strikes me most was the fact that I never really felt as if not attending was an option precisely because of the expectations of early-career scholars to develop my "research program"--one worthy of a nationally prominent research university. As I posted earlier, I felt like I had to "come out" as a new member of the field, to make--if not a "splash"--at least a mildly positive impression on my colleagues whose evaluation will be crucial to my full acceptance in to the field in the form of tenure. Here my general desire to act in solidarity, to pursue not only scholarly insight but justice in that pursuit and in the application of whatever insight I come upon runs up against the powerful material constraints the system of academia puts on us, itself embedded in the larger economy. This was profoundly discomforting. You see quickly how systemic forces compel even conscientious people to replicate, by inertia if nothing else, the microphysics of "precarity" even as we dispassionately pursue knowledge.

Yet my discomfort is nothing compared to my colleagues' who have the same (really greater) pressure to perform, to "make a splash," to prove, in ways I don't have to, that they "belong" there. All while having to also hold at bay the broader headwinds of white supremacy which challenge them outside the university. 

The precarity of people of color's situation as well as that of graduate students and early career scholars was much more visible to me on this trip than it ever has been before. Several have noted that academia should rethink its "reimbursement culture" which creates very real financial pressure around conferences on early career scholars, scholars from working class backgrounds, scholars whose minority status intersects with working class status, and graduate students across the board.

​I wonder too if we ought to re-think "conference culture" itself from the ground up. Beginning with the experience of the most precarious among us. 

This particular point only intensified for me as I attended Cs. But I'll reflect on that separately.

[*Consuelo was kind enough to read a draft of this post and gave permission to be named and for her story to be included.]

Having returned from two conferences, I'm almost back in the swing of things. Conferencing is challenging. That they were held over my institution's spring break certainly didn't help. But I've had some time to think about the experience of both ATTW 2018 in Kansas City, KS and CCCC 2018 in Kansas City, MO several weeks ago. This is part 1 of my ATTW reflections. Part 2 should be up soon. I'll also have thoughts on CCCC up soon.

The context of both conferences, I think, is worth mentioning. Both for me personally and more broadly. Personally, I've only previously attended both conferences as a grad student. Here, fresh off a completed PhD and a tenure-track appointment--both coming fairly quickly on the heels of one another and the latter, to be honest, a bit unexpectedly quickly--made being at these academic professional conferences a very different experience. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous. I went feeling like a bit of goofy professional debutante trying not to embarrass myself before my scholarly community.

​I really shouldn't have been anxious. As an organization, ATTW is growing but still small enough to foster a familial intimacy. And I think it sets itself apart by being a welcoming group. Senior scholars were incredibly generous with their time and insight. I got to sit and chat for nearly an hour with Dr. Huatong Sun who figured prominently in the development of my own research. I was grateful for her willingness to make the time. It confirmed that ATTW will be a scholarly "home" for me in the future.

It was exciting to see presentations from scholars doing excellent work in the field. Drs. Stacy Pigg and Ben Lauren presented on work they are doing to help prepare students to think about narrative and technical writing as they may be called upon to work with organizations  intervening in local, entrepreneurial, social justice work and care.

My colleague Dr. Rachel Wolford presented with several of her graduate students, Darin Williams, Terry Smith, and Michelle Cowan. Rachel's work using "story maps" to raise awareness of water sustainability on the Llano Escatado (the enormous plateau in west Texas) was especially engaging. Terry is doing very interesting work with students trying to utilize synchronous chat tools in face-to-face classes. This enables students to engage in ways in ways more comfortable for them. Michelle talked about UX and design issues in industry--the importance of bringing in designers early and testing interfaces frequently to provide solid customer service. Darin talked about the difficulty of serving as a professional risk assessment consultant in differing fields and the role of varying field's standards in trying to help professionals think about risk and danger in their work.

At another session I was also fascinated by work Dr. Sara Read is doing thinking through an issue I am wrestling with--the ethical considerations surrounding using Actor-Network Theory (of a Latourian bent, especially) to study socio-technical networks. Her work studying super computers and the way in which those responsible for it communicate its value, given an increasingly fiscally austere political environment was very thought-provoking.

Drake Gossi talked about his very interesting work helping youth in a detention center "assemble" an author in a very fraught physical and social environment as they try to learn and use literature to engage the world.

Dr. Lily Campbell's work using ANT and genre to study cultural issues in medical training environments was fascinating and I look forward to seeing where her research takes her.

I missed a couple of presentations that I regret not being at (Dr. Godwin Agboka's and Dr. Kari Campeau's presentations especially). But so it goes...

I tried to live tweet a number of sessions. This practice is very interesting to me. It's a good way, I think, to help people who couldn't be at some sessions still get a sense of what's going on at other panels. It is an exhausting, exceptionally challenging composition practice, one I need to hone a bit. But also a fun exercise that kept me engaged with presenters.

I also had the chance to present my own research, the first time I've gotten to publicly talk about actual data I collected (as opposed to futzing with theory as I waited for my proposal to be approved or research site to be finalized). I was able to sit on a panel with several very smart graduate students Sidouane Patcha Lum, Eduardo Nevarez, and Keshab Acharya. Two of them (Sidouane and Eduardo) are from my alma mater, UTEP. It was fun to see the work they all are doing and the challenging thoughts they are thinking about technical communication and educating the next generation of technical communicators.

I will have some other thoughts on the larger context of ATTW's location and questions that both suffused the panels (especially the plenary panel) and my own experience. It was markedly distinct from CCCC in ways I certainly need to wrestle with. But I'll come back to that later.

Conferencing continues. I'll hopefully have reflections up re: ATTW 2018 soon. But there is no rest for the wicked and the righteous don't need it as my grandmother would say, so I'm in the middle of CCCC 2018. Day one had a great set of sessions, lots of thought provoking moments both from session leaders and session attendees. But also, reflecting on the material conditions of the conference itself has challenged me in a variety of ways. I hope to  have those reflections up soon as well.

I'm presenting today at 2:00pm (I.36--note, if you're at the conference, it's back up at the Marriott, not the convention center). If you don't want to make the hike back up the hill or find yourself bonking out late into conference day 2, I'm linking to my presentation text and PowerPoint here:

After an epic (EPIC!) sprint through DFW (Gate B9 to C19 for those of you who know the airport), I made my connecting flight and successfully arrived in Kansas City, KS for ATTW 2018! 

I am excited to be presenting during Session B (B6, Tuesday at 2pm in the Quindaro room for those attending). Below are links to my presentation text and slideshow. If you have any issues or want to contact me about the presentation, feel free to email me at [email protected].

I look forward to seeing you at the conference!

​Beau Pihlaja ATTW 2018 Presentation Text (Word.docx)

Beau Pihlaja ATTW 2018 Presentation*

(*Apologies, but the PowerPoint here is not yet optimized for accessibility. I hope to have a link to the the document with alt text, etc. soon.)