In Wardle’s article on identity versus authority, the importance of knowing how to write in these new environments was heavily emphasized. Being new anywhere is an adjustment, but learning the new cues, genres, and form of writing within that new workplace seems to be something that is expected of us. However with being new you haven’t learned the ways of writing compared to the old workers there.
The socio-historic and cultural- historical views are theories that help understand how newcomers write. They are faced with the difficulty of how they identify and view themselves versus how others in their work community view them. According to Wardle, newcomers’ inability to write in ways their workplace considers appropriate or effective does have to do with their identity. They may not be self-aware of how much their identity pours out and is shown in their writing. It doesn’t have so much to do with inexperience of the standard form for this new job but more so, lack of language awareness. They may be ignorant to the genres and lexis they use in this workplace.
Authority in the workplace has more to do with trust and respect from others within that community. When speaking in this new workplace, you have to learn their appropriate way of speaking and language. Eventually you become expected to adapt to the community’s lifestyle in speech. Once gaining that new awareness, you are able to have appropriate authority because you can then speak to them in their own practices and it be effective to the community.
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