Discourse Communities

An Overview

Reflect on our class so far… What is the most important or most useful

thing you’ve learned about who you are as a reader, as a writer, and as astudent?

What kinds of connections can you make to the readings and writing you’ve done in the past? What connections can you see between the readings? Text-to-self Text-to-world Text-to-text

Let’s Review:

What are the six defining characteristics that Swale’s uses to identify a Discourse Community?

Goals

“A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals” (471).

Intercommunication

“A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members” (471).

Participation

“A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback” (472).

Genres

“A discourse community utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims” (472).

Lexis

“In addition to owning genres, a discourse community has acquired some specific lexis” (473).

Expertise

“A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise” (473).

Is it a Discourse Community?

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

A football team

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

A student council

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

Wayne State University

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

DIA volunteers

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

Tutoring Groups

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

Composition Scholars

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

Occupants of WSU dorms

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

Our class

GoalsIntercommunicationParticipationGenresLexisExpertise

Discussion

Swales argues that it is possible to participate in a discourse community without being fully assimilated to it. What does this mean?

Discussion

Consider a time when you participated in a discourse community but resisted it or were not assimilated into it. What happened?

Discussion

Do you understand your own reading and writing experiences differently now that you’ve read Swales’ description of how discourse communities work?

How can this understanding help you navigate new discourse communities in the future?