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Jo Mackiewicz, Associate Chair for Faculty Development in the Department of English at Iowa State University, recently published a book, Welding Technical Communication: Teaching and Learning Embodied Knowledge.

Mackiewicz notes, “I’m graduating with my diploma in welding, a degree I started in 2018 and finished by taking night classes at DMACC Ankeny. My welding degree is part of my research on communication in skilled-trades. My book Welding Technical Communication: Teaching and Learning Embodied Knowledge was published this month by SUNY Press.”

The book explores the teaching and learning of welding through two narratives. The personal narrative relates Mackiewicz’s experience as a woman learning how to weld. The academic narrative draws upon scaffolded learning theory to examine how four welding teachers’ verbal and nonverbal communication—their tutoring strategies and their gestures—facilitated students’ embodied knowledge and enculturation into a community of practice. This book fills a gap in technical communication research: We do not fully understand how teachers’ pedagogical technical communication scaffolds students’ learning within the skilled trades. Novel in its approach and coverage, Welding Technical Communication will interest researchers in technical communication and technical education.

You can find out more about the book at the Suny Press website.