Discourse community's definition

According to Swales (1990), there are some basic criteria for a discourse community to be recognized as such. These characteristics would serve to indicate whether a certain community could be considered a discourse community or not. To begin with, the people within a discourse community have common goals and community-specific genres. Kutz (1997) sustains this idea when he refers to the college community as a discourse community. He argues that the members of a college community have developed a common discourse that involves shared knowledge, common purposes, common relationships, and similar attitudes and values, shared understandings about how to communicate their knowledge and achieve their shared purposes, and a flow of discourse that has a particular structure and style (Kelly-Kleese, 2004, p.2). Furthermore, Bizzell (1992) maintains that a discourse community “is a group of people who share certain language-using practices … [that] can be seen as conventionalized” by social interactions within the group and its dealing with outsiders (Kelly-Kleese, 2001, p.1).

In addition, Swales (1990) argues that a discourse community has participatory mechanisms as well as a proper information exchange. This aspect is illustrated by Bowers (1987) when he refers to college faculty members, who are often relegated to the role of reader within the university discourse community while others take on the role of writer; they are seen as the receivers of knowledge, not the producers. But, within their own discourse community, they have more individual “ability to negotiate meanings and purposes instead of passively accepting the social realities defined by others” (Kelly-Kleese, 2001, p.3). What is more, as described in the article “Beyond Reflection” when defining situated learning discourse community, “teachers interact with colleagues in goal-directed activities that require communication and the exchange of ideas where reflection itself is not contained wholly in the mind of the individual but is ‘distributed’ through sign systems and artifacts that are embedded in the social activity of the school community” (Hoffman-Kipp, Artiles, & Lopez Torres, 2003, p.3)

Finally, Swales (1990) believes that the members in a discourse community have a high level of expertise and are able to communicate using highly specialized terminology. This point of view is supported by Zito (1984), who argues that within a discourse community, “only those who are qualified by some socially institutionalized agency may engage in such discourse and be taken seriously…the academic ‘turf’ [is] a battleground for the right to speak with authority” (Kelly-Kleese, 2004, p.3)

As has been shown, the characteristics established by Swales (1990) seem to be very logical and efficient in defining a discourse community. Many authors, such as Kutz and Bizzell, agree with them and we can find plenty of examples that illustrate Swales’ basic criteria.

References

Hoffman-Kipp, P., Artiles, A.J., & Lopez Torres, L. (2003). Beyond reflection: teacher learning as praxis. Theory into practice. Retrieved September 2009, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_mONQM/is_3_42/ai_108442653

Kelly-Kleese, C. (2001). Editor’s choice: An open memo to Community College Faculty and Administrators. Community College Review. Retrieved September 2009, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_mOHCZ/is_1_29/ai_n77481463

Kelly-Kleese, C. (2004). UCLA community college review: community college scholarship and discourse. Community College Review. Retrieved September 2009, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_mOHCZ/is_1_32/ai_n6361541

Swales, J. M. (1990). Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.