Understanding Discourse Communities, Dan Malzer

Title of Article + Proper MLA Citation for Works Cited page

Melzer, Dan. “Understanding Discourse Communities.” Writing Scapes: Readings on Writing, Volume 3, 2020, 100-115.

Summarize the article — include your reaction, thoughts, anything to help you remember its claims. 100 to 150 words

In Dan Melzer’s, Understanding Discourse communities he explains why discourse communities are important for college writing and beyond. A discourse community has the following features, a common set of goals, mechanisms of communication between members, use of mechanisms to provide feedback, one or more genres to further the goals of the group, a specialized language, and, expert members. Each academic discipline is a different discourse community. Discourse communities shape how and what we write. It may be difficult to write to a discourse community at first but you have to learn about it and ask questions to understand their goals and genres and language.   

Define new terms and concepts by quoting or paraphrasing the original author.

A new term that I learned is Lexis which means specialized language. In the reading, the author writes the definition of what a discourse community is and defines lexis in the sentence.

How does this reading connect to other articles from class and/or your own research?

Going forward learning about how to understand discourse communities will help me improve my writing but also help me understand my other classes. I now know what questions to ask myself when I enter a new discourse community.

Based on the reading, craft one question to act as a springboard for class discussion.

How does understanding discourse communities help you in your other classes beyond writing?

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