This workshop will introduce you to big data analysis basics. The presentation portion includes an overview of the definition and uses of big textual data in technical communication, tips for finding big data repositories, concepts for big data project design, basic text mining methodologies, and the ethical and legal issues that emerge from conducting text mining and big data research. Attendees will examine and discuss case studies to reflect on key concepts in the presentation. The hands-on component includes a brief introduction to simple procedures, such as creating word clouds and frequency tables R using R-Studio, and concludes with a tour of text mining using RapidMiner.