1he Lmergence of lnformaLlon 1echnology and lL's Cenres

2/10/2014
The Emergence of
Information Technology
and Its Genres

A Career in Information Technology



!"#$%&'( *+, -./$0'1 2%+(3 45.6'&7.#+ %8 9'5#&01 :1%&.(0
age 2 of "#$ %&$'($)*$ +, -),+'&./0+) "$*#)+1+(2 .)3 -/45 6$)'$5

The Emergence of Information
Technology and Its Genres
A Career in Information Technology
-./$0'1 2%+(3 45.6'&7.#+ %8 9'5#&01 :1%&.(0
Abstract
The Association of Computing Machinery has many publications about the
emergence and evolution of IT. I decided to use two articles from their primary
publication Communications of the ACM and two journals of research conducted
by contributors to ACM. The Communications of the ACM is a monthly
publication with many articles and journals that consider the integration of IT
into the evolution of society. I analyzed The Profession of IT: Computings
Paradigm and The Profession of IT: Who Are We Now?. The second journal I
analyzed is from the publication The DATA BASE for Advances in Information
System and journal is A Framework of the Use of Certifications by Hiring
Personnel in IT Hiring Decisions. The third article, The Emergence of an IT
Profession, is an article that takes the opinions of five different individuals in
the IT community. The three different publications all have different ways of
structuring their journals, but this paper will primarily be mirroring the structure
of Communications of the ACM.
As I investigate these articles and the reciprocal relationships they have, I will
be asking why the authors choose to portray their publication the way they do. I
will be investigating how the two different sets of publications are in a primary
discourse community but specified into subgroups to contribute to different
participants. As I go through these articles, I will be analyzing them through the
lens of Bawarshi, language use in a group is a form of social behavior, that
discourse is a means of maintaining and extending the groups knowledge and of
initiating new members into the group, and that discourse is epistemic or
constitutive of the groups knowledge. (Devitt, Bawarshi and Reiff) Bawarshi is
simply stating that writing is more than just interaction between individuals. The

age 3 of "#$ %&$'($)*$ +, -),+'&./0+) "$*#)+1+(2 .)3 -/45 6$)'$5
social interaction of writing is holding onto the history and educating individuals
upon the history. This is vital to the discourse communities reputation and
progression.
Who Participates?
The Association of Computer Machinery is the worlds largest educational and
scientific computing society, delivers resources that advance computing as a
science and a profession. ACM provides the computing fields premier Digital
Library and serves its members and the computing profession with leading-edge
publications, conferences, and career resources. (Association for Computing
Machinery) This discourse community invites anyone who is looking into
computing as a profession, those interested in learning more about the
computing world, the research conducted in computing, the impact it has on
society and its evolution, and the emergence of computational integration. After
researching the subscribers to the Communications of the ACM, the publication
consists primarily of men. Although, the publication may not have many primary
women authors, women make up over 1 million of the 3,816,000 jobs in the
computing field. (National Center for Women and Information Technology) The
demographic that is most interesting to me is that just 3% of the U.S. computing
workforce is African-American women, 4% is Asian Women, and 1% Latino
women. This shows how the community is not that attractive to minority groups.
The demographics will progress attracting more and more minorities as the field
becomes larger and is more well known.
About
In order to analyze the genre of this discourse community, we must learn about
the community itself. The ACM sets the precedence for most of the IT community
and its education. Its vast amount of articles, its Digital Library founded in
1947, and its publications ranging from the analysis of IT as a profession to the
inner-workings of the newest computing power. It incorporates the progression
of a community that invites anyone who wants to learn more about IT. (Denning
and Frailey, The Profession of IT: Who Are We -
Now?) As computing has advanced, ACM leaders
realized the computing field had matured to the
point where members were becoming interested in
ACM support for their professional activities.
(Denning and Frailey, The Profession of IT: Who
Are We - Now?) This is due to the integration of
age 4 of "#$ %&$'($)*$ +, -),+'&./0+) "$*#)+1+(2 .)3 -/45 6$)'$5
computing into the business and professional world. As society has progressed,
computing has become a central part. Many individuals dont realize how much
computing is used. Yes, the use of computers, phones, and TVs are probably
ones first thoughts, but there is much more; digital clocks, the circuit board that
runs your security system at home, a projector that can have multiple devices
connected to it at once, your car, hotel keys and locks, etc. The community
analyzes all of this and then publicizes how society is integrating computing into
it at an extremely rapid pace. The publications of the ACM do a fantastic job at
giving individuals of the community a Calendar of Events that gives the
opportunity to get involved and learn more about what is going on.

Genre within the Community
The community exercises many similarities within its publications. The use of a
modern looking text, the colorful and inviting diagrams, and the use of the color
blue gives the publications an intriguing feel. Although, the more in-depth
research publications like The Emergence of an IT Profession and A
Framework of the Use of Certifications by Hiring Personnel in IT hiring
Decisions have a very concise and distinct feel, they are interesting to those who
want to learn more about a certain branch of IT. They use black text and different
font size for the publications, but no color. This facilitates the scientific and
research approach instead of making it inviting to new members of the
community. If one is reading these
publications then they are their for a
purpose and want to learn about that
certain subgroup of IT, not to learn more
about the community as a whole. They get
their point across without the extra fluff.
The main publication of the ACM,
Communications of the ACM has the
color and diagrams to make IT more
interesting to those outside of the
community. IT can be very dull and
complex to those who dont understand it,
which is one reason ACM publicizes their
main magazine the way they do. Naturally,
the human eye is attracted to color and
pictures rather than black letters and
minimal diagrams on a page. The
age 3 of "#$ %&$'($)*$ +, -),+'&./0+) "$*#)+1+(2 .)3 -/45 6$)'$5
diagrams used are simply data points or comparisons. The ACM uses the idea of
color and diagrams to attract those outside of the community to become involved
in it.
The many publications of the ACM (over 15 of them) all have their own purpose.
One might say that this is confusing and the distinction between them is difficult,
but that is the reason for their main publication. Its like a family tree that starts
at the top and then leads into other publications depending on an individuals
interests and line of work. One may find that they are interested more so in
Computers in Entertainment than eLearn: Education and Technology in
Perspective. Each publication has their differences that are framed around their
target of computing, but all have a central purpose: To educate, evolve, and
analyze the use of computing in society.
Taking a deeper look at Communications of the ACM, the use of the diagrams
help to give the reader a better picture of the comparisons made and analyses
made by the author. The authors do this to make it less complex for the reader to
understand, especially for someone who is being introduced to the community.
The use of the diagrams also expresses how important the data and analyses are
within the community. These articles within Communications of the ACM are
not that long; 4-5 pages on average. This is because they are very complex and in
depth and they dont want to lose the reader.
The Sources
The Communications of the ACM publication uses an integrated structure for
their references. As seen in the structure of my references, it resembles the same
format the publication uses. The sources of the main publication
Communications of the ACM are for the most part from their other
publications. This main publication is like the parent publication to the others as
I spoke about before. It leads the reader into their other publications depending
on their interests and career path. The ACM created their library in 1947 that is
called The Digital Library. This library is full of articles, publications from now
and past, journals by the ACM and contributors to the community, as well as
reports and summaries produced from the many conferences conducted within
the community.


age 6 of "#$ %&$'($)*$ +, -),+'&./0+) "$*#)+1+(2 .)3 -/45 6$)'$5



Conclusion
The ACM is an amazing compilation of
articles, journals, publications, reports,
conference proceedings, and opinionated
discussions on the progression and
evolution of computing. Their inviting
publications and arrangement of texts
makes the community much more appealing
to new participant. Their expansion and
dedication to attracting all sorts of
demographics is seen through their push to
educate as many as possible. Beginning in
1947 when their Digital Library started, to
now with their many publications that
attract more and more to their community
with the progression of computing in
society, the ACM gives anyone the ability to
learn about how far computing has come.
The career path of Information Technology
is very open, with many sub paths
depending on ones interests and strong
points. This gives many individuals the
ability to find an enjoyable, challenging
career that progresses computing within
society. The idea that computers are the
future becomes more true everyday.



"#$#%#&'#(
AssoclaLlon for CompuLlng
Machlnery. AssoclaLlon for
CompuLlng Machlnery. 2014. 10
lebruary 2014 <www.acm.org>.
uennlng, eLer !. and uennls !.
lralley. "1he rofesslon of l1: Who
Are We - now?" CommunlcaLlons of
Lhe ACM 34.8 (2011).
uennlng, eLer !. and eLer A.
lreeman. "1he rofesslon of l1:
CompuLlng's aradlgm."
CommunlcaLlons of Lhe ACM 32.12
(2009): 28-30.
uevlLL, Amy !., Anls 8awarshl and
Mary !o 8elff. "MaLerlallLy and
Cenre ln Lhe SLudy of ulscourse
CommunlLles." College Lngllsh 63.3
(2003): 341-338.
LksLrom, !oseph, eL al. "1he
Lmergence of an l1 "rofesslon"."
8esearch ln lnformaLlon
1echnology. new ?ork: AssoclaLlon
of CompuLer Machlnery, 2013. 29-
30.
Punslnger, ScoLL u., Mlchael Alan
SmlLh and Susan !. WlnLer. "A
lramework of Lhe use of
CerLlflcaLlons of Plrlng ersonnel ln
l1 Plrlng ueclslons." 1he uA1A 8ASL
for Advances ln lnformaLlon
SysLems 42.1 (2011): 9-28.
naLlonal CenLer for Women and
lnformaLlon 1echnology. uld ?ou
know: uemographlcs on Women ln
lnformaLlon 1echnology. 2013.
lebruary 2014
<hLLp://www.ncwlL.org/blog/dld-
you-know-demographlcs-Lechnlcal-
women>.