Project 3

The concept of discourse community is one that has been extensively discussed among many scholars throughout literary history, and is one that is still greatly debated to this day. Before I define what discourse community will mean for this article, it is important to reference the main schools of thought that are prevalent to this large topic. Swales discusses discourse communities as an entity with rules and structure. To make an analogy, he treats them as countries; corporeal entities that anyone can enter and learn the rules and become a citizen. It is possible to be a multi-citizen in many different countries, and similarly Swales states that it is possible to be a member of more than one community. Following this analogy, you still have a main “country” that you are best versed at and stay at the most. This whole concept is very different from the one that Gee presents, that of Discourses, where he presents the opportunity for another wonderful analogy. He states that there are multiple Discourses, and though we many learn the rules of others and visit them, we truly only have one main discourse. This is similar to the states in the US, where you can go back and forth between the states and must follow all of the laws in said state, but you only live in one state at a time. These two different views on the same concept show the opposite sides that exist, and in reality there is a more moderated concept that fits a wider audience.