Quote #1: “when a university becomes established in a town, the presence of this constellation of discourse communities influences the wider urban environment; as a result, the urban environment provides services that are helpful to the university, such as cheap student housing, cheap restaurants, museums, and more bookshops” (page 4/ paragraph 9).

Explanation: This quote is interesting to me because at first I didn’t know what Discourse Community was and didn’t realize that I have been part of it all along. I can relate to it, in which me being in college especially in this English class is considered as a Discourse Community since students including myself are here with similar goals. This can include adapting in a new learning environment, trying to expand on our writing techniques and at the same time trying to pass this class while using as much possible resources we can. Though college is done online as of now instead of in-person meeting, students are still trying to communicate and work together on zoom or create group chat as a way to help enhance their way of learning.

Quote #2: “hospitals in the U.S. have a rich menu of codes that the staff employ, especially in emergencies, partly for efficiency and partly to keep information from patients and the general public. So, “code 236 on floor six” might indicate a heart attack on that floor” (page 9/ paragraph 26).

Explanation: This quote is interesting to me because one of the characteristic of Discourse Community is acquiring some specific lexis, after knowing what this means, I never knew that having a unique way of communicating in the job field can be considered as a Discourse Community. I always thought that this would be considered as a simple coding language or term that people use in the medical profession/field that they should already know about. Now that knowing that having a unique way of communicating is a Discourse Community, I can sort of say that I can relate to this somehow, by saying that I have experience in previous schooling, in which I hear teachers or staff in my school (so far elementary to high-school) would make announcement stating “Code Blue”, to which I don’t know what this exactly means. So, I guess that I can say that teachers and staff in school have their own coding system that students do not know, or in other words they have their own coding system so students wouldn’t know what it means and panic in the middle of learning.

3 Discourse Communities I participate in

  1. One Discourse Community that I participate in is being a student in college. Being a student in college is considered a Discourse Community because there are many students who go to college to do academically well in which it will help them when they get out of college and start their career. The values of being a college student is to gain new knowledge, graduate, getting accepted in their desired major. Some assumptions that define or build up academic would be participating, teamwork, group study so students can do well on tests, exam and other given assignment. The communication tools that are used are zoom, Blackboard, and emails
  2. A second Discourse Community that I participate in is working at the hospital. This Discourse Community is what I used to be part of in High-school but not anymore. I got an internship to apply the skills that I learned in the CTE program to the outside world. Being placed in the Human Resource department of the hospital, I got see how the department regulate and used certain unique terms to do important task. The values of doing an internship at the hospital are assisting director with computer related work, filing and general office duties, and getting hands on experience. Some assumption that define of build up this working experience is teamwork and completing taks on time. The communication tools that are used are emails, calls, and talking face to face.
  3. The third Discourse Community that I participate in is the CTE program that is only available for certain student. I also no longer am part of this since this was only in High-school, but what this program entails is that it mostly involves technology related stuff such as coding. Yet again, this programs also used unique terms when dealing with class-related work or projects such as front-end developer, back-end developer and etc. The values of being in the CTE program is that students get to learn how to code advance things and create website that can be published, mostly gaining new knowledge and experiencing it. Some assumptions that define or build up this program are teamwork and being a leader or mentor to other students who are new to this program. The communication tools that are used are in-person meeting and emails.