Discourse Community

Accomplishing goals through intercommunication among members of a community is one characteristic that makes up a discourse community. A discourse community has six characteristics such as having a broadly agreed set of goals, a participatory mechanism to provide information or feedback, acquiring a specific level of language, and members with a suitable degree of relevant content. The community that is a community discourse is India. India occupies the greater part of South Asia and consists of twenty-nine states. India is most known for festivals, food, and jewelry. The constitution of India does not give any language the status of national language. So, communication among the people is not easy with twenty-two languages in one country. India consists of diverse ethnic races and groups who strictly follow specific customs. The cultural diversity of the country is what makes up the discourse customs within the community.

A discourse community comprises of a group of people sharing a common and distinct mode of communication or discourse, especially within a particular domain of intellectual or social activity (Oxforddictionaries, 2017). Some of the discourse communities I consider to be a part of, include an Indian joint family, my peer group, high school education in India, the Apple community and education at Pace university.

To be a part of a discourse community, one must be credible, possess factual knowledge and draw on the values of its members to be accepted into the community. At the same time, a person must learn typical ways people in that community communicate and argue. They share a certain genre—type of writing. Members of discourse communities provide information and feedback that are imperative in order for that discourse community to grow. In the following paper, I will discuss three discourse communities and a genre that they typically use: people who read Nutritional Facts religiously, college students, and industrial organizational psychologists.

Preschool teachers have not been given the credit they deserve, with lots of people over looking their importance. Being a preschool teacher is more than just watching a couple of kids for a couple of hours. This field requires a lot preparation and behind the scene work that put into the job, so it really is not as easy as it may seem. Preschool could possibly shape the rest of their academic lives. At this level of school the children learn their basic building blocks for learning that they will use forever. That leaves parents with big expectations for the teacher. And for the teacher, they will have to set goals, have a plan to reach those goals, and for the most part

In his article “The Concept of Discourse Community,” Professor John Swales defines what a discourse community is, following with a list of six different points that a group must align with in order to qualify as a discourse community. These parameters are as follows: “a broadly agreed set of common public goals,” “mechanisms of intercommunication among its members,” the use of “participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback”, use or possession of “one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims”, “some specific lexis”, and “a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise” (471-473).

Understand the ways that reader and writer wrote in and beyond the university. On way is writing essays about certain discourse communities like the “Persuasive” essay, where I had to write about a discourse community I was part of and how it used writing. It was a challenging essay on the part where I had to explain and give examples since my discourse community was my criminal justice study group. It was hard to describe how writing took place and make it persuasive showing why writing is important to my discourse community.Second is reading different articles that were connected to different discourse communities from each other. And writing a response to the article was great because it makes me think little and look deeper instead of

Effective writing allows for both the participation and addition of knowledge in discourse communities. A discourse community is a group of people that develop and share a sense of identity primarily through the sharing and exchanging of information on a specific subject or field. The two main form of communication in discourse communities are through reading and writing. Through reading one becomes familiar and starts to understand a community, and writing is when one participates in it. Each discourse community develops its own unique technical language, often referred to as lexis. The lexis allows communication between the community to be precise and to the point [6].

According to Porter, “A ‘discourse community’ is a group of individuals bound by a common interest who communicate through approved channels and whose discourse is regulated. A discourse community shares assumptions about what objects are appropriate for examination and discussion, what constitutes ‘evidence’ and ‘validity’ and what formal conventions are followed (38-39).” These five texts collectively constitute a community of discourse through their application of common language norms, characteristics, patterns and rhetorical strategies. All of the authors are writing about corresponding ideas and discussing their identical goals; the prevalence of gender inequality in the legal profession and the unjust consequences derived from it. Similarly, all five sources intentions are to oppose the standard viewpoint that gender inequality has diminished and provide evidence to support this claim. Their ideas of remedying gender inequality in the legal profession overlap as well as contradict one another.

As an incoming freshman at the University of Texas at Arlington I can say I have been in several organizations that have challenged my social skills. However, they were nothing compared to the discourse community I was a member of. It will be proven time and time again that I indeed was not only a member but also a valuable asset to this community. Let us ponder for a moment on what a discourse community actually is. It consists of many components involving but not limited to ethos, pathos, and logos. All three of which I possess and have mastered in my arts. You must realize what the set boundaries are for it to be included as such. Must sports be included even though it is more physical than conversely active? What about Student Government? Yes, we had conversations and planned events at meetings but our relationship with each other was only to a certain extent. Although my participation in sports and student government contributed to my When I think of a discourse community, automatically I associate it with the experience in my high school band. Our close knit community very well made me the person I am today.

Finding people who share common interests and enjoy the same activities as yourself can often be difficult to find, but is necessary to have. Especially during college, a time where you are receiving your independence, but unsure of what that truly means, feeling lonely is valid and expected. However, college can offer many resources to aid you in these emotions, by having plenty of discourse communities you can join, or even offering you the opportunity to create your own. As quoted by Herzberg in The Concept of Discourse Community, “the idea of a “discourse community” is not well defined yet” (469). Despite the vague concept John Swales offers, he further goes on to elaborate on what six characteristics discourse communities can be identified through. A discourse community which one of my roommates participates in is the Vietnamese Student Association (VSA). The VSA is a cultural club for students at University of California, Davis, who identify as Vietnamese, and want to come together with others a part of the same background. The VSA is a perfect model of a discourse community, as it passes the checkpoints Swales provides to identify one.

Life is like a massive highway that have infinite routes anyone can choose take to reach some type of designated goal. Those various routes lead to distinct exits, where one can discover a group or groups that share similarities dealing with viewpoints, beliefs, or understanding towards a particular goal. These groups can be identified as discourse communities. According to, “The Concept of Discourse Community,” in the textbook, Writing About Writing, John Swales stressed that in order to be classified as a discourse community the group has to have all six defining characteristics. Swales emphasized, “A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals, mechanisms of intercommunication among its members, uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback, utilities and hence processes one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims, acquires specific lexis, and has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discourse expertise” (Swales, 221-222). Keeping this key detail in mind, there is numerous type of discourse out there.

A discourse community is defined as a group of people involved in and communicating about a particular topic, issue, or in a particular field. We all belong to multiple discourse communities.To earn a position of a discourse community one must possess accurate knowledge, establish reliability of members to be accepted and learn to persuade other members of the community. The discourse community that I identify with personally and the profession I plan to pursue is the world of film production. However, there are many jobs that need to be done on a film set leading to there being multiple discourse communities within the film industry, what I want to focus on specifically is the DP, otherwise known as the “director of photography”. According to “The Concept of Discourse Community,” by educator and researcher John Swales, a discourse community is defined by six characteristics.

A discourse community is a group of people who share a set of discourses, understood as basic values and assumptions, and ways of communicating about those goals. John Swales defines a discourse community as "groups that have goals or purposes, and use communication to achieve these goals." The community I choose to identify with is special education. Special education teachers, or aids, really dedicate themselves and their time to others who need special assistance or treatment. The California Department of Education supports high quality educational programs for California’s big student population. According to the ideas from the federal government, the variety of the education working environment is one of the fastest growing areas of the American economy. The importance in understanding this career includes emotional, and physical growth of each student. Working with students who have disabilities can be very rewarding, but it is sometimes emotionally demanding and physically draining. Before stepping into the job of becoming a special education teacher, it is important to understand the patience that is needed in order to work with special children.

Discourse communities are all around us, which can include a sports team, academics, and many others. However today I am focusing on a discourse community that relates to my major, criminal justice. In order for me to understand swales six characteristics I interviewed a homicide detective relating to criminal justice. A discourse community is a group of people involved in and communicating about a particular topic, issue, or in a particular field. A discourse community is defined by six characteristics. The six defining characteristics of a discourse community require a set of common goals, there must also be mechanisms of communications within the community as well as feedback among members. Genre, the fourth characteristic, describing the various methods of output. The last two are terminology, and expertise. In order to really understand that criminal justice is a discourse community, I had to do research, and interview an expert in the field. To be a part of a discourse community, one must be credible, possess factual knowledge and draw on the values of its members to be accepted into the community. At the same time a person must learn typical ways people in that community communicate and argue. They share a certain genre which is a type of writing. Members of discourse communities provide information and feedback that are imperative in order for that discourse community to grow. My interviewee, Carol Mims, is a child homicide detective. She is an alumni here at

Since the dawn of time that humans have reigned around the world, they have formed groups or communities that share common goals or interest. John Swales (1990), a respectable professor of linguistics at the University of Michigan, developed a list of characteristics to determine communities or, as he calls it, a discourse community. He identifies these characteristics as all the discourse communities has agreed upon common goals, mechanisms of intercommunication among its members, provide information and feedback, possess one or more genres of communication, distinguish vocabulary or lexis, and requirement for memberships (Swales, 1990, p. 1-5). The International Game Developers Association (IGDA), falls into the category as a discourse community. Founded in 1994, IGDA is a non-profit professional association that collaborates with projects that encompasses members from all fields of game development. They bring together developers to improve their lives and prepare the next generation of developers. The IGDA is a professional discourse community that defines all of Swales characteristic to be considered as a discourse community.