Writing at Good Hope Hospital: A Study of Negotiated Discourse in the Workplace
Jennie Parsons Dautermann
- School: Purdue University (0183)
- Degree: Ph.D.
- Date: 1991; pp: 268
- Advisor: Sullivan, Patricia
- Source: DAI-A 52/06, p. 2123, Dec 1991
- Subjects: Language, General (0679); Education, Language And Literature (0279); Speech Communication (0459)
- ProQuest Document Number:
- ISBN:
- UMI Number: AAT 9132442
Abstract:
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Based on a two-year observation of a midwest hospital department of nursing, this study focuses on the
composing processes of a group of head nurses writing regulatory prose. Transcripts of audiotaped
writing sessions, interviews with nurses, field notes and texts were collected in order to
illuminate the writing strategies that appeared in a discourse community which had both
hierarchical power structures and interdependent social subgroups which influenced the work
of composition. Writing in this setting became an act of negotiation among hierarchical forces
and peer influences. Situated on the border between delivery of bedside care and nursing
administration, this collaborative group extended the composition process beyond planning and
drafting to activities such as building community consensus, publishing local texts, and
arranging for future revision. Negotiating among various community subgroups and revising
documents in light of those negotiations were primary activities of the group. The proposed
model of negotiated composition ties socially constructed community discourse to organizational change.
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