Composition is the practical transmission of ideas and performs a reliable communication function. Composition should be practically structured. Rules and structure are required in order to be widely communicable; highly communicable composition indicates quality of thought and credibility to an audience (not that quality thoughts don’t happen outside proper composition, but they will largely die outside of it as well). From this point we can look at the recipients of particular communications and further qualify what structure and shape the communication should take. Appropriateness of form varies from text messages, to academic papers, to web based documents, to poetry, etc.
When forms of communication become less functional, changes will evolve within the structure of composition and traditional structures will be replaced by a mode of higher efficiency. Composition becomes less functional when things such as new technologies or changing social frameworks call for new or altered modes of communication. However, reformers must understand prior structures. Only from that point are credible changes brought about to meet communication needs. While in the grand scheme composition is fluid, it must be relatively fixed in order to be useful.
Megan--I like your ideas here. Composition can be impractical, as well. And, there is lack of structure that can be important. It all depends on audience. Think about hypertext reading, for instance, that is not structured linearly, but gives audiences more directive voice in selecting how the stories or compositions proceed. Reading one's hypermediated curriculum vita, for instance, is an example. And what about discourse that is merely meant to inform instead of persuade?
ReplyDeleteI don't see composition becoming less functional when new technologies come in to the fold. These technologies just require the field adapt to the implications their impact can have. Scholars need to recognize that methods for communication are radically different now than they were 5 years ago. If composition functions as a way to help people communicate, it should be able to adapt some the prior ideas into any number of mediums.
ReplyDeleteI think that to make an intentional choice not to use structure is still a structural choice; even the statement "lack of structure" must reference structure.
ReplyDeleteAlso, my point was that traditional standards of composition become less functional, not that composition itself no longer has a function. It is precisely because it is not functional that adaptive modes of composition emerge.