Entering the Conversation

I came away from Salter's Global Politics.. with a sense that there's been a general shift in HESC science towards increased public involvement, specifically in the area of government funding of HESC research, and through a heavier reliance on bioethics committees to enable compromises between the 'actors' of our bioscience model. Good news, indeed, especially if these ethics committees are inclined to act as conscientious, accountable intermediaries between the public and the other actors.

Last night I decided to stop researching and start organizing this paper. It's dawning on me that, much like recording an album, there comes a point in the writing/research process when you have to say enough- it's time to move on to the next stage. I wanted to use this last reflection as a warm up, to explore some solid writing techniques that we've witnessed this term. Now that we've finished Promising Genomics and we prepare to "enter the conversation" via our projects, it seems appropriate to take a closer look at Fortun's style and strategies. But first, here's a snippet from the intro of Graff & Birkenstein's They Say, I Say:

"Accomplished writers routinely rely on a stock of established moves that are crucial for communicating sophisticated ideas. What makes writers masters of their trade is not only their ability to express interesting thoughts, but their mastery of an inventory of basic moves that they probably picked up by reading a wide range of other accomplished writers" (1).

Fortun certainly comes to mind as someone who, to paraphrase the above minigraph, 'makes it look easy.' What are his stylistic and rhetorical techniques, his basic moves? Over the course of our readings, I observed that Fortun:

-often takes his time getting to the heart of his arguments. At the beginning of the book, this technique tested my patience somewhat, though I came to appreciate the depth of understanding the strategy affords as we continued reading.

-offers up a variety of evidence to support his claims- sometimes truckloads of it. When Fortun did employ an "overkill" strategy, he seemed to have made the choice consciously, as a way of emphasizing the strength of his position. I appreciated these moves, and rarely if ever felt that he was overstating things.

-writes as though speaking. He strikes a good balance between knowing when to make his presence felt, and when to back himself off to let the facts do the work.

-plays skillfully yet freely with language, and by doing so creates new ideas, ways of thinking, and frames.

-doesn't shy away from academic speak when it's necessary, nor does he hesitate to use what I assume to be his own colloquial language. Often, these divergent voices could be found entwined in the same paragraph, or even the same sentence: an unsettling, thought-provoking effect.

-organizes his chapters and arguments in a methodical, straightforward, transparent way. It's ironic that the concept of the chiasma and its related morphological thisxthat construction, so challenging to grasp at the beginning of Promising, serve as convenient way to title chapters, by indexing the main topics at play.

Time to start reading and highlighting....