This important new text invites readers to step back from their busy professional lives and look at technical communication philosophically, to ask fundamental questions such as what does it mean to communicate? and how do language and graphics - the "signs" or "tools" of the technical communicator - relate to action in a technological world? Through this excursion in the theory of technical discourse, you will discover a fresh approach to reports, manuals, and proposals produced and consumed daily in business, government, and research organizations around the world. The authors examine familiar genres in two relatively new ways.