Workshop Letter to Stephanie

Dear Stephanie Skilton,

            In your draft I really like how you focus in on your interview. You use Swales six defining characteristics well to show how the sorority is a discourse community. By also quoting Swales your audience is able to have a concrete understanding to what a discourse community is. But I do think you can add a few examples from your own life to strengthen your claim. I am also wondering if you are sticking to one claim, or adding in a few more?

            “Furthermore, we are all part of a discourse community, whether it be a sports team, a sorority, a specific profession/job, or even your culture.” I like how you include this sentence. It explains to your audience that everyone is part of a discourse community including themselves. It gives them a better understanding, and when you give examples it strengthens what you are stating.

 

I also like how you spaced out the six defining characteristics of discourse communities. This way you are able to see them individually. When they are separated it’s not only easier to read, but the audience is able to see they are all different from each other.

  1. “A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals”.
  2. “A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members”.
  3. “A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback”.
  4. “A discourse community utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims”.
  5. “A discourse community has acquired some specific lexis”.
  6. “A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise”. (471,472,473)

”Swales utilizes the example of “The Hong Kong Study Circle” Here I think you can expand a little further. Explain a little more in depth and maybe even support it with an example from your life.

 

“A discourse community has acquired some specific lexis. In other words, they use specific language or jargon that “outsiders” might not understand in conversation.” This is a great sentence. I feel jargon is a huge part of what makes up a discourse community. It’s what makes it exclusive. It divides the insiders from the outsiders. Here I really think you can add in a personal example of a discourse community you are from, and share it’s jargon with the audience.