Thinking with Keywords: Investigating the Role and Nature of Professionalism Keywords in TPC Enculturation

ABSTRACT

This article examines the role of TPC professionalism keywords on early career scholars’ disciplinary enculturation. The article reports on a collaboration between the article’s authors that explored how the deployment of professionalism keywords in teaching and research created conditions for defining what it might mean to work as a TPC professional. The article offers insights into the challenges keywords pose to forwarding non-normative understandings of professionalism that enable broader inclusion and visibility for TPC stakeholders.

KEYWORDS:

• Professionalism
• expertise
• disciplinarity
• enculturation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/10572252.2024.2340434

Notes

1. We use “our” and “we” to represent our team. Sometimes we slip out of “our” and “we” into first person accountings of individual work. Here is brief biography information about each coauthor: Mark Hannah, PhD, JD and Associate Professor of English; Courtney Caputo, MA student in Writing, Rhetorics, and Literacies (WRL); Laura Cruser, MFA and fulltime writing instructor; Lily Deen, PhD student in WRL; Chris Fluty, PhD student in WRL and fulltime Industry Consultant; Amber Hedquist, PhD student in WRL and fulltime Management Intern in the Office of VP Research Development; Thomas Lane, MA student in WRL and fulltime Industry Consultant; Tristan Rebe, PhD student in Literature and fulltime Program Manager in higher education; Catherine “Katie” Salgado, PhD student in WRL and fulltime Program Manager in higher education; Seher Shah, PhD student in Literature; and Dwi Budidarma Sutrisno, MA student in WRL.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mark A. Hannah

Mark A. Hannah is Associate Professor of English at Arizona State University where he serves as Director of Writing, Rhetorics, and Literacies. He publishes widely on the intersections of law, rhetoric, and expertise in professional communication.

Courtney Caputo

Courtney Caputo is a M.A. student in the Writing, Rhetorics and Literacies graduate program at Arizona State University. Her research focuses on how institutions mediate embodied rhetorical performances. In Fall 2024, she will enroll in ASU’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law.

Lily Deen

Lily Deen is a Ph.D. student in the Writing, Rhetorics and Literacies graduate program at Arizona State University. Her research interests center on rhetoric in popular culture, disciplinary rhetorics, feminist rhetorical practices, and composing with generative AI. She teaches undergraduate courses in technical and professional writing and first-year writing.

Amber Hedquist

Amber Hedquist is a Ph.D. student in the Writing, Rhetorics, and Literacies graduate program at Arizona State University. Her research focuses on how universities engage the public, largely informed by technical and professional communication, genre studies, and rhetorical theory. She currently works for ASU’s Office of Vice President Research and Development and manages the university’s research recruitment platform.

Catherine Salgado

Catherine Salgado is a fellowship advisor and Ph.D. student in the Writing, Rhetorics, and Literacies graduate program at Arizona State University. Her research and teaching focus on community-based writing spaces and storytelling as a means of developing one’s sense of self. She is a former Fulbright recipient to Portugal with a background in Portuguese, Spanish, Applied Linguistics, and Writing Studies.

Seher Shah

Seher Shah is a Ph.D. student in English Literature at Arizona State University. Her research interests include studying places and spaces in 19th century Victorian/Early Modernist Literature. She teaches First-Year Composition and is the Director of L19C Colloquium.

Laura Cruser

Laura Cruser teaches business writing, fiction, and composition at Arizona State University. She holds an M.F.A in creative writing from ASU, and her work has appeared in Arts & Letters, The Greensboro Review, and other publications. Writer, teacher, farmer, and artist, Cruser is passionate about the natural world.

Chris Fluty

Chris Fluty is a Ph.D. student in the Writings, Rhetorics, and Literacies graduate program at Arizona State University. Chris’s research interests focus on concepts of identification. He is an Assistant Vice President at a Fortune 500 Company where he has worked for 16 years and now serves as a consultant for their training program.

Tom Lane

Tom Lane is a M.A. student in Arizona State University’s Writing, Rhetorics and Literacies graduate program. He works for ADP as a small business consultant, and his research interests include the role of rhetoric in community building.

Tristan Rebe

Tristan Rebe is a Ph.D. candidate in English Literature at Arizona State University. His research interests include phenomenology and literature, translation studies, sensology, and writing center studies. He currently serves as a Program Manager for ASU’s Academic Support Network, where he oversees the Writing Center and Graduate Writing Center.

Dwi Budidarma Sutrisno

Dwi Budidarma Sutrisno is a recent M.A. graduate of Arizona State University’s Writing, Rhetorics, and Literacies program. His master’s thesis explores the complexity of Indonesian international students in U.S universities navigating between their L1 Bahasa Indonesian and L2 English in the writing process. His research focuses on Second Language Writing and TESOL. He teaches TOEFL at Khairun University and currently serves as coordinator of Mentari English Academy in Indonesia.