Micro-Activity #2: Introduction to Discourse Communities Rodrigo A Vega

Double-entry journal for Swales reading:

Quote 1: “In the ELI, the shelf-life of its products, typically textbooks and tests, runs some 5–10 years or so before they are revised or replaced. While in the Computer Center, the shelf- life of computer manuals, etc., is often just a matter of months before an update appears or some patch is incorporated.” (page 2/paragraph 2/by John M. Swales)

Response: I found this compelling, because it shows on how different fields can have information stored being changed over time.

Quote 2: “To an outsider, a linguistics department, for instance, might seem to represent a collectivity of folks with a like-minded interest in language. However, to an insider, there are clear differences between a phonetician and a phonologist, or between those who pursue the relationship between language and mind, and those who pursue the relationship between language and society.” (page 4/ paragraph 10/ by John M. Swales)

Response: I found this compelling, for the reason being that this a great example on how a discourse community can have sub communities.

Here are 3 discourse communities that I participate in:

Being a college student 

I am a male that’s 20 years old (As of August 31, 2020), and I’m a college student. I take classes, study, and try to develop myself more as many college students do. Values that college students have is to learn more on the careers that they are interest in, interact with people who have similar interest as we do, etc. Assumptions of college students is that they know where they are going with their career choices. And the reality is that some might choose a different career or do something different with any skills that they have learned. The ways that college students communicate are but are not limited to can be on campus where they can be talking in classroom based on the work that they are doing, some might communicate with each other with communication services such as emails, some might become close friends and talk to each about things outside of college.

ENG 1101

In my English class we as students take this class as it’s a required for many mayors, we work through this class to do our work and maybe get better at it. We share the values of wanting to develop ourselves forward, assumptions can be that you probably choose the class just because you need it. And ways of communication are by doing work, by speaking with the professor, students commenting on others works, and students commenting on other opinions.

The video game community

It is a community based around the media of video games, which is mostly an interactive video and auditory computerize experience. There are people that like designing the games, there some that play video games for entertainment purposes, and some that do so in a competitive way. The values of the gaming community can vary deeding on that they do within the gaming community. Such as but not limited to designing games that people will enjoy, getting satisfaction from playing a game, and/or become a better player in the game. Assumptions of video games is that some people can see them as a waste of time, although the reality of it is that you need to make sure that you balance time out with video games. Because video games can make you feel good, but you need to make sure you accomplish your responsibilities. Ways of communication in gaming can depend on what you’re doing in gaming. It can be an online voice chat with multiplayer games, it can be a video upload or stream of a game, it can be conversations with other people about the game and many more.