Castia Hunter Enc 1102 MWF 930-1015 Summary Swales, John. The Concept of Discourse Community.

Genre Analysis: English in Academic Research Settings. Boston: Cambridge UP, 1990. 21-32. Print. Analysis 01/28/13 Although I have read this article before, rereading it with a different perspective brought some new things to light for me. While reading I was able to do an evaluation of whether or This article by John Swales is a break down on not the different branches within the criminal what he believes that a discourse community justice major can be considered a discourse should consists of. Although these rules are not community. I have come to the conclusion that set it stone, they are good guidelines to go by the criminal justice field, specifically lawyers, when evaluating what can be considered a can be considered a discourse community. discourse community. Swale requires for there Sure, I could go down the check list and name to be (1) a specific lexis (2) common goals (3) off every one of the requirements and the levels of expertise (4) feedback (5) evidence of the fulfillment of that requirement, mechanisms of intercommunication and (6) has but I wanted to try taking a different approach one or more genres to help in the furtherance of In my Enc 1101class we were always asked the their goals. You can belong to multiple questions So what? and Why is this discourse communities as long as one groups important? ,so I read with that mindset this common goals do not interfere with anothers. time. I then realized that the one key point that It is still questionable about how one may go I over looked during my initial reading is about joining a discourse community, yet Swales discussion of the rhetorical situation. people do very often whether they know it or This caused me to propose a question to not. investigate. Even if my discourse community can fulfill all of Swales requirements, if theyre not used in the right context does the effectiveness of these rules become invalid? For instance, if a lawyer uses the specific lexis for community while giving a speech to a group of band kids, I feel like their message will be less effective because their audience does not have the proper background information in order for the message to be properly understood. This idea leads me to the suggestion of adding another requirement of discourse communities having to be able to use all the other requirements in a proper context.