This thesis explores how metaphors can humanize a technical document and more effectively facilitate user comprehension. The frequent use of metaphor in technical communication reminds us that the discipline is highly creative and rhetorical. Theory demonstrates that a technical text involves interpretation and subjectivity during both its creation by the technical communicator and its application by the user. If employed carefully and skillfully, metaphor can be a powerful tool to ensure users' needs are met during this process. The primary goal of technical communication is to convey information to an audience as clearly and efficiently as possible. Because of the often complex nature of technical content, users are likely to feel alienated, overwhelmed, or simply uninterested if the information presented seems exceedingly unfamiliar or complicated. If users experience any of these reactions, they are inclined to abandon the document, automatically rendering it unsuccessful. I identify metaphor as a means to curtail such an occurrence. Using examples from a variety of technical communication genres, I illustrate how metaphors can humanize a technical document by establishing a strong link between the document and its users.

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This research examines the communication styles of five different generations: the Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y, and the Millennials. The study investigates how current events influence the attitudes of each generation. It explores workplace trends, the effects of new communication platforms, and the evolution of technology. The purpose of the study is to identify the unique approach to communication of each of these groups. The objective is to help organizations create a more efficient working environment by embracing the diverse qualities of the different generations. The study finds that Generation X, Generation Y, and the Millennials prefer to correspond via online forms of communication such as email and social networking sites while the Traditionalist and Baby Boomer generations typically prefer to in• person correspondence. Additionally, the study finds that the people of Generation X prefer to work individually while Baby Boomers, Generation Y, and the Millennials thrive in team environments. It concludes that organizations should strive to accommodate the different generations by assigning them to tasks that focus on their strengths.

This paper investigates the most effective ways of handling cultural differences in the Japanese-to-English game localization process. The thesis advocates for applying the Skopos theory of translation to game localization; analyzes how topics such as social issues, humor, fan translation, transcreation, and censorship have been handled in the past; and explores how international players react to developers' localization choices. It also includes interviews with three Japanese-to-English translators who have worked with major Japanese game companies to gain insight into how the industry operates today. Through the deconstruction of different aspects of Japanese-to-English localization, this analysis aims to help the game industry better fine-tune Japanese media to Western audiences while still sharing valuable aspects of Japanese culture. The thesis concludes that if Japanese game companies work to improve the localization process by considering more diverse international perspectives, hiring native speakers as translators, and approaching the English script as a creative endeavor in itself, they will be able to both broaden the minds of their global audiences and more effectively capitalize on the worldwide fervor for Japanese video games.

<p dir="ltr">I'm most interested in the aspects of self-confession and focusing on the small moments of life. My project will be about piecing together small moments that together tell a larger narrative.</p>

The subject of this study is engineers’ activities, writing and texts in their profession and education. Fieldwork for the study was conducted in three professional workplaces and a major technical university (called Tekniska Institutet in the study). The aim of the study is to explore what kind of writing the engineers are supposed to handle and practice, situated in their professional environment, and to compare this with the writing practices and texts engineering students are prepared for in their higher education. The theoretical framework is a sociocultural approach inspired by Lave &amp; Wenger (1991), Wenger (1998), Wertsch (1998) and Engeström (1987). The theoretical concepts of activity systems, mediational means or cultural tools and trajectory of practice are applied, partly on a linguistic level, to the writing and the work that engineers carry out in their professional community and the university. The engineers in the study write every day in their profession, in different roles, something they are not quite prepared for in their higher education. The study examines whether there are cultural tools that are typical for engineers and their work. One central construction is the list, which can be seen as a cultural tool on both a cognitive and a social or communicative level: the study shows that the list is used both to structure or construct content and to instruct readers, for example, or show them how a soft ware system or a computer programme is structured. The list is also used within the education community, in teachers’ instructions and course material as well as in the students’ texts, such as lab reports and different types of essays.

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<p>This dissertation details one of the first lines of inquiry into the rhetorical strategies used in scientific data analysis. The study primarily concerns the relationships between data work and knowledge making in the analysis of so-called “big data,” and how rhetoric and technical communication theories might inform those relationships. Hinging on five months embedded at a national science laboratory, this study uses ethnographic methods to detail the ways in which data analysis is neither purely data-driven and objective, nor purely situated in a local context or problem. Rather, data work requires both analytical processes and artful <i>techne</i> embedded in ongoing reflective praxis. As purely analytic, data work focuses on mathematical treatments, step by step procedures and rote formulas. As <i>techne</i>, data work requires interpretation. Rhetorical data analysis is not the opposite of data-driven work. Instead, rhetorical <i>techne</i> stands as the midpoint between the extremes of purely data-driven and purely context-driven analysis. Based on three cases that compare the practices of data novices, seasoned experts, and interdisciplinary teams, I argue that the ways in which scientists go about their data cleaning, collaboration, and analysis change based on their levels of expertise and the problem at hand. A number of principles that outline how data analysis is a form of rhetorical inscription are also defined, including the ways data dictionaries, model building and the construction of proxies intimately link scientific insights with language. The set of principles detailed in this dissertation are key areas that should be considered in both data science education and professional and technical writing curricula. Therefore, the project should be of particular interest to instructors and administrators in both Technical Writing and Data Science programs, as well as well as critical data studies scholars.</p>