The Ethics of Teaching Ethics in Professional Communication

The teaching of ethics in professional communication courses for non-English majors is problematic because teachers of those courses are usually trained in literary studies, a profession that has traditionally viewed with suspicion the ethical orientation of science, technology, and business professions. This article examines the history of this problematic, focusing on the “Engineering Publicity” program at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the 1920s. The article suggests that students may be empowered to enter and transform their professions more through examining ethical critiques of science, technology, and business carried on within and among the professions they will enter than by examining ethical critiques from the profession of literary studies.

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