Author: Ethan Dempsey Lay

Mina (2019) proposes that a critical theory of technology in writing instruction must supply a framework within which users work and function, demonstrating that technology is always value-laden as well as context-bound. These ideas are supported by my research, which theorizes the critical use of blogwork in first-year composition. Because my students write on blogs, individual student writing samples as well as larger semester-length corpora can be examined. Blogs become small-world networks for students as they read and write to each other, beginning with the course blogroll, which functions as a means of unifying a class. Students investigate the rhetorical…