The notion of Discourse Community is central to comprehend the meaning of academic literacy. When speaking about discourse communities, researchers include different characteristics to bear into consideration. For researchers like Bizzell , discourse community derives from the concept of speech community. She believes that discourse community is a comprehensive term and defines it as :
"… a group of people who share certain language-using practices ... [that] can be seen as conventionalized" by social interactions within the group and in its dealings with outsiders. It borrows from the concept of "speech community." It is "bound together primarily by its uses of language, although bound perhaps by other ties as well, geographical, socioeconomic, ethnic, professional, and so on" (p. 222). (Kelly-Kleese, C ., 2001)
The aims of this paper are to focalize on Swales´ definition of the term discourse community and to analyze some articles on Education providing supporting evidence to illustrate Swales´ basic criteria on the requirements that a discourse community should meet. The six necessary characteristics are :
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 expertise (pp 24-26) (Swales, J. Genre Analysis )
In the analysis of the articles two characteristics, information exchange and participatory mechanisms , appear not only related but also repeated throughout .
“….. It is the writers, and at times the texts, that hold the real power.The power of university scholars to name "what is" comes largely from their ability to be prolific with their writing and publishing ventures. By focusing on sharing their knowledge, findings, and interpretations, they create policy and redefine the language and reality of higher education; engaging in scholarship is a well developed aspect of the culture of this discourse community. The power to name "what is" comes also from one's level of prestige within the community….” (Kelly-Kleese, 2001)
“Teachers will be conducting research and presenting their ideas to their colleagues. Teacher-researchers will contribute to new definitions of what it means to teach. Teacher research will contribute to the knowledge base of the profession, and teacher researchers will participate as equal partners in the discourse of the profession. Teacher research will reshape the understanding of how [students] learn and will transform our schools into learning communities.” (pp. 117-121)( Kelly-Kleese , C. , 2004)
People exchange information by participating in their community, either in written or oral form. Academic writing is generally written so the text has to be included as part of the community or the “triad” as Rafoth calls it . That is the reason why Rafoth (1998) notes :
“….a strength of discourse communities lies in the inclusion of writers, readers and texts. The readers, however, play a passive role in this triad--it is the writers, and at times the texts, that hold the real power.( Kelly-Kleese ,C., 2204)
The writers, who possess the knowledge, share it with the readers in the form of books, articles or bulletins and , in this sharing , the text acquires real power.
In the articles considered for analysis in this paper , the use of highly specialized terminology is present throughout. Some examples are: ERIC database (Kelly-Kleese C., 2004 . ) , NCATE standards ( Wenzlaff, T & Wieseman, K .,2004 ) CHAT , ZPD ( Hoffman-Kipp, . Artiles, & Lopez-Torres , 2003)
As regards this characteristic, the use of highly specialized language does not limit itself to abbreviations and acronyms.There is also specialized vocabulary that sets a boundary as regards understanding to those who do not belong to the discourse community of teaching or linguistics . Such is the case of the following words : Open door, material artifacts ( (Kelly-Kleese, C., 2001 ), communicative competence (Kelly-Kleese ,C., 2004 ), peer interactions, teacher materials, Likert scale, visual learners, reflective teaching (Wenzlaff, T & Wieseman, K ., 2004 )
As for the characteristic involving community specific genres, the two articles by Kelly- Kleese (2001) (2004) illustrate it clearly in the issue of scholarship in community colleges. She states the necessity of college communities to be in contact with forms of higher education so that , in the end , community colleges will be able to assimilate the borrowings and acquire a new status.
“…. One of the purposes of this criterion is to question discourse community status for new or newly-emergent groupings.Such groupings need, as it were, to settle down and work out their communicative proceedings and practices before they can be recognized as discourse communities. If a new grouping borrows genres from other discourse communities, such borrowings have to be assimilated….” (p.26) (Swales, J . ,1990)
As a conclusion I would say that the notion of discourse community can be encompassed in the phrase “shared language”, being bodily ,vocal, graphic or gestural. The phrase embraces the notions of speech and socialization which are inherent to the human race.
References
Hoffman-Kipp P., Artiles , A.. & Lopez-Torres , L. ( 2003 ) Theory Into Practice . Beyond Rreflection: Teacher Learning as Praxis
Kelly-Kleese, C ( 2001) Editor's Choice: An Open Memo to Community College Faculty and Administrators .Community College Review
Kelly-Kleese C. ( 2004) .UCLA Community College Review: Community College Scholarship and Discourse Community College
Swales , J. (1990) . Genre Analysis .English in Academic and Research settings
Wenzlaff, T. & Wieseman, K ( 2004 ) . Teachers Need Teachers to Grow. Teacher Education Quarterly
