Transnational Writing Programs:

Infrastructure as Relational and Emergent

"Infrastructure is a fundamentally relational concept."

Star and Ruhleder (1996), "Steps Toward an Ecology of Infrastructure" (p. 113)

In their essay, "Steps Toward an Ecology of Infrastructure," Susan Leigh Star and Karen Ruhleder (1996) noted that infrastructure is often visualized as a "substrate: something upon which something else 'runs' or 'operates'," such as bridges, roads, or water pipes" (p. 112). Within the technology-rich contexts of their research, however, such a static notion of infrastructure "is neither useful nor accurate in understanding the relationship between work/practice and technology" (p. 112-13). In response, they developed a dynamic, alternative approach to infrastructure that understands it as "something that emerges for people in practice, connected to activities and structures" (p. 112). For them, "infrastructure is a fundamentally relational concept. It becomes infrastructure in relation to organized practices" (p. 113).

In what follows, I demonstrate the heuristic value of Star and Ruhleder's characteristics of infrastructure for exploring transnational writing programs. A provocative demonstration of the less obvious, dynamic, and evolving aspects of infrastructure identified by Star and Ruhleder (1996) can be seen in Mary N. Muchiri, Nshindi G. Mulamba, Greg Myers, and Deoscorous B. Ndoloi's (1995) essay, "Importing Composition: Teaching and Researching Academic Writing Beyond North America."

In their essay, Muchiri et al. (1996) presented their experience of "what happens to the published literature on composition" in international contexts (p. 353). In the process, they reveal how composition research itself constitutes infrastructure, and what U.S. and Canadian-based composition studies often take for granted (p. 176):

• Star and Ruhleder (1996) explained that infrastructure has "Reach or Scope"; that is, it can be seen to have "reach beyond a single event or one-site practice" (p. 113).

  The four authors of "Importing Composition" drew from composition research for their studies of writing at four different universities: Kenyatta University, in Kenya; the University of Dar es Salaam, in Tanzania; the University of Lubumbashi, in Zaire; and in UK universities. When drawing on those experiences, the authors demonstrated that even while interest in composition research extends beyond U.S. and Canadian universities, when it "is exported, it changes meaning and serves different needs in the new context" (p. 176). Thus the reach and scope of composition research is directly related to the infrastructure present at different locations.

• Star and Ruhleder (1996) wrote that infrastructure is "Learned as part of membership"; that is: "Strangers and outsiders encounter infrastructure as a target object to be learned about. New participants acquire a naturalized familiarity with its objects as they become members" (p. 113).

  In his study of people who are learning to be members of the academic community, students writing dissertations, Mulamba found that over time literature review sections—a common genre feature of composition research—appeared and disappeared based on student's access to library materials:

  They [lecturers] recalled having done some site-writing themselves, but said that now students no longer read ... Students could point out, in their defense, that the books are old, and the library is almost permanently locked. Since 1991 (when the government of General Mobutu began its long and continuing collapse), the library at the American Cultural Centre, which did have some recent publications, has been ransacked. So students write up their dissertations based on other, earlier dissertations still available in the department ... It is not surprising that under these conditions the literature review disappears. (Muchiri et al., 1995, p. 186)

  In this way, Malumba's research highlights the role of infrastructure, in this case access to examples of important membership-granting genres, for providing novices opportunities to learn and become a part of the community of scholars.

• "Infrastructure," wrote Star and Ruhleder (1996), "both shapes and is shaped by the conventions of a community of practice"; that is, it "Links with conventions of practice" (p. 113).

  Ndoloi, as a researcher working abroad on fellowship, highlights the degree to which university faculty live and work in environments where their academic work is shaped by much more than teaching load, service expectations, and publication. He wrote:

  university lecturers at Dar drive pick-ups. It seems they do at the other universities in Africa as well. This is because they must also have something going on the side, delivering vegetables from one's village to the city, or keeping hens, or having a little cafe. ... These other jobs are of course unofficial, but the university salary is so small and so unreliable that they are usually necessary. It is difficult to do research, even if the materials are available, if one has to juggle several jobs at once. (Muchiri et al., 1995, p. 185)

• As each of the examples above also demonstrate, infrastructure is "Built on an installed base"; that is, it "does not grow de novo: it wrestles with the 'inertia of the installed base' and inherits strengths and limitations from that base" (Star & Ruhleder, 1996, p. 113).

  Muchiri, Mulamba, Myers, and Ndolois (1995) provided provocative examples of how infrastructure required by academic work "wrestles" with basic, material conditions. When libraries are "ransacked," for example, or when universities must close down periodically, or when faculty must work multiple jobs, the infrastructures supporting research are clearly limited or breaking down. In comparison, the volume of composition research in U.S. and Canadian universities shows the strength of its base: "in the US and Canada there are so many postgraduate degree programs, meetings, books, and funded projects; most of all, there are so many students, and teachers to teach them, and even some relatively secure positions for researchers" (Muchiri et al., 1995, p. 177).

When considering the scope or reach of infrastructure, transnational writing teachers and administrators must consider how effectively any given policy, procedure, curriculum, activity, or technology at one campus extends across borders and campuses.