Writing in Multiple Contexts: Vygotskian CHAT Meets the Phenomenology of Genre

Abstract

<p>Texts largely structure the activity of the modern world and--a forteriori--the post-modern world, with its reliance on hypertextual networks. But they do so always in contexts—often in multiple contexts. Texts are given life through activity, through use in context(s). And to study them without studying their contexts (as has often been the case) is to separate writing from its very being. Yet the problem of theorizing context and contexts, plural—and of operationalizing the theory in empirical research--is one of the thorniest but most important in writing studies. Sociocultural theories of literacy emphasizing the role of context and contexts have been developed in the last 25 years in North American writing research and applied in a number of fields: primarily organizational (business, technical, and scientific) communication and education (Russell, 1997b; Bazerman & Russell, 2003).</p>