Why Making?

Making is beginning to enter the popular imagination as well as the field of computers and writing. It was the subject of the 2013 Computers and Writing Keynote by James Paul Gee, and continues to pop up in conference programs, journal articles, and books. My purpose in this article is to define and explore making and present justifications for its importance to computers and writing. I first survey important historical influences on contemporary making practices in order to provide a historical basis for the maker movement. I then argue that teachers and scholars within computers and writing are already makers and that we should consider ourselves as such. Finally, I present implications of adopting maker practices and technologies for the field.