Jack Selzer and the Engineer

Jack Selzer wanted to better understand how people write rhetorically, meaning he wanted to know how people such as engineers and how they write not necessarily what they write. When teachers and other instructors try to teach people how to write professionally, most of the time they can not explain efficiently. So, Jack studied somebody who was an engineer who wrote professionally everyday without trying or having a writers background. He also wanted to learn how engineers and other scientists planned, arranged, reivesed, and wrote.

What I thought was most intereresting about Jack's research was, how precise and accurate the engineer wrote his proposals. The engineer would brainstorm and brainstorm and then write one draft that was nearly perfect. A typical professional writer has many revised drafts before its final product. The engineer was on target, because he would resarch what his client wanted so when it came time to writing he did not have to revise. Selzer, noticed that the engineer had specific "rules" as to how he writes and develops his assignments. Such as, keeping the paragraphs short, using easy to read text, and making it very organzied with a beginning, middle, and end. Selzer, knew the engineer was accuarte and correct in his writing skills because he had tape recoreded his ideas and thoughts. He also interviewed the engineer's co-workers and re-read the engineer's old documents. Selzer finally had these follow up interviews with the engineer to ask why he did the things he did.