Keywords

1 Introduction

The digitalization of writing has not only distributed writing activity across space but also across time, making writing processes more complex. The digitalization of the writing process highlights the adaptability and flow of writing activity, where each step can take place at any point in time and can occur independently or in relation to other actions within a variety of digital spaces. Because many of these activities now happen in new and developing platforms and tools, like those discussed in this book, processes are more accessible to both researchers and writers, increasing opportunities for research and innovation in the writing process. Though writing processes can be difficult to map, both researchers and writers can better reflect on writing activity as the use of digital tools becomes more ubiquitous throughout all the processes of writing.

In writing studies, process has always been shaped by the available writing technology and the historical and cultural contexts in which they exist and interact. How we think about process is often informed by not only shifts in technologies, but also in cultural movements. For example, the idea of a single writing process emerged from the industrialization of manufacturing and influenced all aspects of education, not just writing (Gee et al., 1996; Henry, 2006; Slack et al., 1993). The technologies available to researchers and scholars will ultimately shape how we construct the various activities and processes involved in writing. One goal of this book is to clarify these contexts to better understand writing processes, how they are changing, and how we can better reflect on how they function in complex writing situations.

This chapter will explore how researchers and writers can conceptualize writing processes in the digital age. To do so, the chapter will review primary approaches to thinking about writing activity and then look at how these processes are visible throughout the technologies discussed in this book. Both researchers and instructors will need to think about the ways these shifts alter how writers conceptualize and adapt writing activities as they become more distributed and complex.

2 Traditional Views of Writing Processes

Since its inception in the mid-twentieth century, writing studies has used the idea of writing processes to develop both research and teaching. The shift from final products to developing the skills and abilities required to produce texts revolutionized how we research and teach writing in academic contexts (Anson, 2014). Writing became no longer defined as a final product, but as a series of activities that take place in specific spaces and environments. Since the emergence of the process paradigm, scholars have viewed writing activity through various lenses, which are always historically situated and influenced by technologies.

Understanding the digitalization of writing means understanding how new technologies influence the way we frame the activities around the production of text. Since this paradigm shift, writing activity has often been understood as not only sequences, but also a collection of choices and social interaction.

Process paradigms

Theoretical focus

Dominant technology

Sequenced steps

• Final product

• Linear connections

• Editing & Polishing

Analog

Collection of choices/cognitive or mental models

• Revision

• Recursivity

• Reflection

Word Processing

Social activity

• Collaboration

• Audience interaction

• Participation

Web 2.0

Workflow

• Networked ecologies

• Activity theory

• Distributed tools

SaaS, CMS 3.0

Many of these concepts find their way into the newer approaches to writing processes in the digital age, even as we adapt to new technologies. The next few sections will detail these approaches and how they fit into the digitalization of writing.

2.1 A Sequential Set of Steps

The most basic view of writing sees process as a set of sequential or interrelated steps that lead to a final product, usually by an individual writer. These processes have been typically broken into six stages: planning or prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, reflecting, and publishing or sharing. How we explain these activities is often determined by the tools and spaces we use to make them happen (Bernhardt, 2013; Porter, 2002). For example, writing on paper or with a typewriter emphasizes the linear nature of writing, both as the generation of text and in the organization of ideas. This sequential view of the writing process emerged in the early twentieth century with the increased use of mass-production models in factories and schools. This model became the predominant definition of process during the 1960s and 1970s, when writing processes in schools and universities became an alternative to product-based writing instruction. Much of writing studies research into process is centered around researchers and teachers examining them as more dynamic and interconnected as new technologies become integrated into our writing.

Early on in the process movement, scholars cast writing as a sequential set of steps meant to help writers better develop their thoughts and rhetorical awareness. For example, Corbett (1999) organized the writing process around the canons of rhetoric to emphasize audience and purpose. Rohman (1965) conceptualized various stages in order to highlight writing activity underemphasized in research and teaching (like pre-writing). How writers plan and organize ideas became a key moment of intervention where teachers could improve student learning and thinking, while researchers could better understand how writers think by observing them, instead of just analyzing their texts (Perl, 1979). Because much of writing was analog at that time, many of these writing activities were invisible or underemphasized in the writing classroom. Researching writing processes helped bring important writing activities to the front of mind.

Approaching writing as process helped teachers and researchers look beyond the text itself to see how writing processes could be improved, taught, or simply understood. For example, the revising and editing stage became a key element in most writing classes. This stage involves making changes to a text to improve its clarity, coherence, and overall quality, but also helps writers develop meta-awareness of how their processes work. Emig (1977) made the case that writing processes and learning processes work together to help writers develop knowledge, not just communicate what they know. Writers’ own reflections and self-assessments on these processes can help students improve how they handle complex writing situations (Anson, 2000; Howard, 2000). This meta-awareness can lead to a better understanding of the choices writers make. As digital technologies became more available and connected, a greater emphasis was placed on the role of editing and revising digital artifacts. Revision becomes a key moment of intervention for teachers, particularly as working with digital technologies gives them clear visibility into revision history and allows for greater reflection on the choices writers make.

2.2 A Collection of Choices

In both teaching and research, tracking and analyzing writers’ choices became a key part of understanding writing activities as more dynamic. Before the advent of computers, access to the writer’s thought process was difficult to access, requiring lab-like observations and speak-aloud protocols (Flower & Hayes, 1977). Researchers have often been limited to the written text, with little access to the writer's thought process, as well as the environment and tools that the writer uses to create the text (Anson and Kruse, “Plagiarism Detection and Intertextuality Software”). With word processors and cut/paste tools, both writers and researchers could see more of the choices they make while writing, not just when revising or editing (Kruse & Rapp, 2019; Liu, 2011). As a result, writing processes are not just seen as a series of steps, but as a constant revision and repositioning of ideas, as well as the re-examination of values, purposes, and audience. New computer technologies encouraged a more recursive view of the writing process (Collier, 1983; Selzer, 1983). For example, writers can re-order, delete, and add elements to a text in ways that may not fit into a linear view of writing (Sommers, 1980).

As the field of writing studies grew, many scholars and teachers looked at writing processes as more than just communication, but a way of thinking and learning. Researchers like Flower and Hayes (1981) used process as a way to explore the thinking behind composing. Writing activities became a series of choices that writers make as they develop their ideas, not just their texts. Breaking down writing activities into these decision points allows scholars and teachers to focus on specific kinds of activities that cultivate ways of thinking. Flower and Hayes recast process into a more dynamic and iterative process focused on better understanding what criteria govern writer choices. Effective writers plan what they have to say, translate or communicate these ideas, then review and evaluate the result. Instead of a linear process, though, this model became a way to track writers’ choices and thought patterns.

This became one way to help writing teachers to increase student awareness of implicit expectations in academic writing, a common approach to first year writing classes in the university. Writing activities become opportunities for student reflection, often leading to increased awareness of how academic discourse works. Consequently, these opportunities provide teachers with an effective way of helping students increase their efficacy when composing complex text like academic essays and research papers. When combined with technology, tools, and feedback strategies, understanding writing processes as a series of choices creates more agency for individual writers as they enter into communities of discourse.

2.3 Social Activity

Ultimately, this led researchers and teachers alike to think about writing activity within more social contexts (Collins, 1995). Instead of focusing on individual learning and writing, researchers and instructors began to focus more on collaborative learning and peer feedback as an integral part of the writing process (Bruffee, 1999). Using technology to increase student agency, interaction, and collaboration became a way to open up academic discourse to more social approaches to knowledge-making, especially with the rise of more collaborative tools like Google Docs, wikis, and blogs (Bradley, 2014; Tzu-Ching Chen, 2012). This provides students with the opportunity to read and provide feedback on each other’s writing, while also interacting with audiences in-class and online, raising awareness of audience and purpose.

In many ways, understanding writing activity in more social contexts has encouraged researchers and teachers to go beyond the linear models of composing, understanding writing as more ecological and networked (Kent, 1999). This social turn in writing studies eventually led to a pushback against the writing process as a set of discrete steps that writers go through to complete a text. Writing is more than just a cognitive process or a series of individual choices (Cooper, 1986; McComiskey, 2000). Even so, postprocess arguments focus on the social nature of text, not on the social nature of the individual or invention process (Fraiberg, 2010). In short, producing text is not about following a set of pre-written rules, but a series of dynamic interactions between the writer and the world around them, which includes technology and the digital world.

Though not necessarily a central theme, composition’s social turn parallels the rise of more accessible technologies for writers like Web 2.0 and social media, where users participate in the creation of content (instead of passively consuming). Writers begin interacting with others in different ways, using a range of tools, platforms, and genres inside and outside the classroom. Social media networks (like Facebook) and Enterprise Social Networks, like (Slack and Microsoft Teams) become important spaces for brainstorming, exploring, and drafting (Cummings, 2016; Cummings et al., 2017). Even virtual reality expands how we understand social interaction around writing (DeWinter & Vie, 2008). Many new collaborative spaces, like digital whiteboards and collaborative mind mapping tools, are also changing how writers work together visually and across networks (Hewett, 2006; Lin, 2019). Going beyond the individual processes of writing, the social turn in composition studies helped focus writing activity as an act of making meaning with others.

Understanding these interactions opens up a multi-faceted understanding of the writing process that provides a richer picture of how writing works and an openness for adapting it to new environments and technologies that understand writing activity in more dynamic and socially situated contexts. With the growth of digital tools, writing processes are now seen as a series of choices within a complex network of individual and social activities that can be observed within a variety of contexts, both online and off. While the emphasis on observing individual choices is still important, writers are now seen to participate in broader social activities. Writing activities become networks of social exchange, with feedback and support from peers, teachers, and other writers essential to successful writing. In this way, writing activity no longer needs to be seen as a solitary activity, but instead a part of a collaborative and recursive process of meaning-making.

3 From Process to Workflow Models

The increasing digitalization of writing in this century creates even more possibilities for both exploring and adapting the writing process to new digital contexts, especially as writing activity is distributed through more networks, both human and digital. While there is still a great deal of research about how writing is done in digital contexts, most current scholarship takes a multiliteracies approach, or the idea that there are many different forms and processes of writing (Khadka, 2018; Selber, 2004). For example, computers networks have expanded the range of social and textual spaces writers can use to produce and share text, like blogs and wikis. Digital technologies have also facilitated alternative forms of writing activity that are social, corporal, and multimodal, often described as networked ecologies (Hawk, 2007).

This shift has led to what Lockridge and Van Ittersum (2020) call workflow thinking or a more ecological approach to understanding process. Lockridge and Van Ittersum re-articulate the writing process as workflow, or a set of malleable activities connected to specific technologies or tools used to accomplish specific tasks. This can be a useful way of understanding the digitalization of writing processes, which tends to de-articulate the notion of individual writers outside of space and shows how our consciousness as writers emerges from the activity and interactions around various tools, spaces, and people. In this sense, postprocess scholars were correct. Workflow is not a codifiable process. It is not a set of steps that run in more or less the same order. Rather, workflow is an activity that moves through various tools, apps, and physical spaces in different ways and at different times.

The workflow approach to understanding the writing process reframes the study of writing to include both the technological and social components of writing. Instead of a linear or discrete process, writers are now seen as engaging in a set of interconnected activities, drawing on multiple resources to produce texts. In this way, writing is not seen as a single process, but an ecology of activities, tools, and spaces. Theories and pedagogies about writing need to take into account how tools are used and integrated into the writing process in these complex networks. This understanding of writing processes has the potential to open possibilities and create more flexibility to respond to changes that come with new technologies and forms of communication.

3.1 Towards Networked Metaphors

One major influence of digital technology on writing is the development of more networked metaphors to explore collaborative and distributed forms of writing. The metaphors used to understand the writing process are moving beyond the written page, the book, and the office space (Heilman, “The Beginnings of Word Processing: A Historical Account”). As these metaphors shift, our assumptions about how text and knowledge are created will have to adapt. Researchers and teachers need to develop methods for understanding how this shift in knowledge production occurs, what it means for teaching, and how writers engage with these changes. Network metaphors map the complexities of digital writing onto the idea of interweaving threads, rather than circles or straight lines.

Instead of thinking about writing processes in discrete steps or choices, using ecologies as a metaphor can help writers and researchers identify how writers intertwine writing activities in digital spaces. For example, using mind maps or social annotation tools is not just a pre-writing exercise, but also can be an important part of the drafting or revision stage. These activities might occur in digital spaces, physical spaces, or some combination of the two. Here are some questions that might help think about how the various spaces and technologies in this book might interrelate:

  • How are different spaces and tools connected? What happens between these?

  • How do the various writing activities that comprise the writing process change and adapt within the various tools and spaces?

  • What kinds of physical spaces, environments, or infrastructures lie beneath the digital networks and technologies that now make up the writing process?

  • How do these ecologies change over time?

An ecological view of writing helps writers and researchers examine the writing process as an emergent set of activities that is dynamic and ever-changing. How we put together writing activities in changing environments is a more useful way to approach the digitalization of the writing process.

Lockridge and Van Ittersum’s workflow mapping can be a helpful way for writers and researchers to think about the writing process and how they may change in various technological and digital contexts. To better understand how a writing process can be tweaked, writers can map out the digital spaces and tools to see how workflows might be adapted. These maps are not meant for describing a static reality, but to provide a snapshot of a dynamic system with specific points of agency that can increase writing quality or efficiency using these primary questions:

  • What tasks make up the writing process, and how do they relate in space and time?

  • What technologies do writers use to accomplish the tasks on the map?

  • How does changing tasks, technology, or position benefit or influence the workflow?

  • How do writers shuttle between tools and platforms?

  • How do writers understand their activities?

  • What is the relation between inscription and revision?

These questions, along with workflow maps, are useful for a more holistic perspective at the digitalization of the writing process. Tinkering with apps and adjusting workflow is now an important part of the writing process, requiring both writers and researchers to think about how the writing process can be shaped and reshaped in different contexts.

3.2 Expansion of Invention

The proliferation of invention spaces within these complex networks allows writers and collaborators to linger longer in the invention stage and experiment in deeper ways (Kruse et al., “Creativity Software and Idea Mapping Technology”). The invention phase of the writing process can also expand to include other ideas writers might consider when making meaning, as well as new modes of knowledge creation. When students can experiment with other modes of inquiry, they also learn that writing is one way of making meaning, but not the only way.

New annotation and note-taking tools allow for easier capture of new ideas and more experimental approaches to organizing those ideas (Pitura, Digital Note-Taking for Writing). As new tools become available, so do new forms of thinking and organizing knowledge. This includes new forms of understanding information, the ways in which we use new tools and technologies to think (Kruse & Anson, “Writing and Thinking: What Changes with Digital Technologies?”), and the ways in which we think about how we can best use the tools that are available (Anson & Kruse, “Plagiarism Detection and Intertextuality Software”).

Many of these tools also use various hypertext methods to connect text and ideas in different ways (Cummings, “Content Management System 3.0: Emerging Digital Writing Workspaces”; Lang & Baehr, “Hypertext, Hyperlinks, and the World Wide Web”). When writing is used as a means of exploration, writers learn that they have the power to control their own learning by linking ideas in new ways. Writers can actively choose how the information they consume in the classroom connects, even across disciplines and contexts. When writers are given the opportunity to build and revise their own learning, they are learning that there is always another way of thinking about a problem or concept (McKinney, this volume).

Even plagiarism detection might be considered a part of various writing activities invention and revision process, helping students understand intertextuality in its early forms (Anson & Kruse, “Plagiarism Detection and Intertextuality Software”). As the invention process expands in terms of media and modes of inquiry, there is an opportunity to create a learning environment where students see themselves as creators and not just consumers of knowledge. New media tools enable us to track and report plagiarism in much more detail and provide more complex analyses of source material than is possible with traditional document writing. In addition to reporting plagiarism, these tools enable more nuanced analysis of the relationship between student text and source material.

3.3 Increased Collaboration

One of the main advantages to writing in the digital age is that it allows for easier integration of writing with other content areas and learning activities (Hodgson et al., “Social Annotation: Promising Technologies and Practices in Writing”). Writing is often confined to a single classroom and a single teacher. New tools and technologies allow for a much more flexible and dynamic approach to writing and writing assessment. Though new writing platforms like OneDrive and Google Docs have increased collaborative options in the drafting phase (Castelló et al., “Synchronous and Asynchronous Collaborative Writing”), these affordances extend beyond writing production. The digitalization of the writing process allows for more tailored and idiosyncratic approaches to writing and invention, and collaborative tools have also increased opportunities for more social approaches to knowledge management, invention, and the writing process.

Social annotation tools, new note-taking tools, CMS 3.0 tools allow for more social approaches to knowledge management and invention … not just drafting (Cummings, Content Management System 3.0: Emerging Digital Writing Workspaces; Pitura, “Digital Note-Taking for Writing”). These tools also provide new ways for instructors to involve themselves in the writing process (Hodgson et al., “Social Annotation: Promising Technologies and Practices in Writing”). Digital peer review platforms take this a step further, allowing instructors to systematize their feedback procedures in the classroom, even to the point of incorporating tutoring activities (Anson, “Digital Student Peer Review Programs”; Banawan et al., “The Future of Intelligent Tutoring Systems for Writing”). The digitalization of the writing process has also enabled new and previously impossible collaboration opportunities, going beyond just peer editing and review (Anson, “Digital Student Peer Review Programs”). They can share ideas, notes, and sources. As these tools become more common and their affordances become more socially understood, writers will begin to experiment with these tools in their own work.

3.4 Observing the Writing Process

With these new digital spaces, both writers and researchers will have more opportunities to observe and analyze writing activities that have not always been visible or emphasized in writing studies. Before the digital age, observing the writing process or workflows was difficult, requiring lab conditions or self-reporting. Writing is now increasingly visible through new and emerging tools and technologies, as described in this book.

Metrics such as time elapsed between drafts, the speed, duration, and intensity of text editing, and the amount and types of external sources consulted are all key metrics that can be tracked through new tools. Teachers can also use these tools to collect, organize and present documentation of writing activity for both research and student reflection. This can include the organization of writing artifacts like drafts, notes, and student portfolios (Bräuer & Ziegelbauer, “The Electronic Portfolio: Self-Regulation and Reflective Practice”). Similarly, the digitalization of the writing process has also made it easier to track types and sources of feedback, such as peer review, annotations, and comments (Anson, “Digital Student Peer Review Programs”; Hodgson et al., “Social Annotation: Promising Technologies and Practices in Writing”).

New digital tools, such as social annotation, note-taking and next-gen CMS technologies, also provide opportunities to observe and research the invention process in new ways (Hodgson et al., “Social Annotation: Promising Technologies and Practices in Writing”; Kruse & Rapp, “Word Processing Software: The Rise of MS Word”; Pitura, “Digital Note-Taking for Writing”). The use of automated plagiarism detection can provide a window into the ways students are incorporating external content into their writing (Anson & Kruse, “Plagiarism Detection and Intertextuality Software”).

New technologies will also help researchers organize and analyze larger, yet more detailed chunks of data. The digital availability of academic text, along with automated analytical tools, will allow researchers to more easily identify patterns in writing activity, not just in published journals, but in other spaces as well (Shibani, “Analytic Techniques for Automated Analysis of Writing”). Keystroke logging (Wengelin & Johansson, “Investigating Writing Processes with Keystroke Logging”) can help us observe how writers develop their writing not just in drafts, but in prewriting spaces like notetaking tools and emerging digital workspaces.

4 Conclusion: Future Developments

With the onset of digital writing, writing processes have become dependent on a variety of technologies and tools. We cannot assume that writing is still a consistent pattern of activities. The choices writers make are guided by individual decisions and the availability of tools. What works today may be outdated tomorrow, or what works for one content area may not work for another. In addition, new approaches to managing the digital writing process may require new types of hardware and services. Conventional word processors like Microsoft Word or Google Docs constantly add new functionalities which can be used optionally. All of these variables may make the process of adapting to and integrating new technologies into teaching, research, and writing more nuanced and difficult to define. Researchers and teachers must understand the technological tools available to writers and what is possible in these spaces to more fully understand the choices writers make.

Researchers should continue to think about how writers and technology work together co-constitutively to shape our writing workflows. Neither the technology nor the writer is in full control of the writing process; each shapes the other. Writers do not exist in a vacuum, but within a complex environment that is more and more digital, but never entirely so. But new technologies provide artifacts for the study of the writing process. The digitalization of the writing process means that we have access to a wider range of artifacts than ever before. We can now trace the evolution of a particular artifact over time and space and how writing is used by different people in different contexts. This suggests that writing is a complex, integrated set of actions, not just putting words together on paper or in a Word Doc.

As the visibility of writing activities increases in different ways, scholars should also think about what new aspects of the writing process might be accessible to research, while also thinking about what elements of the process are still hiding. For example, keylogging makes self-editing more available for research, but perhaps makes rhetorical choices less visible in the research process.

In this contribution, I have explored the various ways in which the digitalization of the writing process is affecting the writer and the production of content. We have seen how writing tools and spaces are being redesigned to meet the needs of writers and how the design of these tools and spaces affect how writing is produced. The idea of a dynamic, technologically mediated writing process is useful when we see writing as a complex, integrated set of actions that are organized in time and integrated into both digital and physical spaces. Even a quick glance through the chapters in his books shows many opportunities for researching and reflecting on the writing process in new ways.