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Genre Analysis Isaac Lopez University of Texas at El Paso

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The topic that the two genres are focusing on is women who lived in Ancient Greece. The first source is titled Women in Ancient Greece, which is an online video of a lecture by John Hoffman. The second source is a book written by author Sue Blundell and is titled Women in Ancient Greece. The topic of women in Ancient Greece is interesting because of the differences women experienced when comparing the cities that existed in the Ancient Greek world. There is a great amount of diversity when comparing these cities. The intended audience for this online video was for the class the lecture was originally given to. After the fact, the video was uploaded to the online video source Youtube where the audience became any online viewer who is interested in learning about the topic. Those who view this video belong in the community of online video viewers. It is possible for members of this community to communicate with each other via private messages as well as on a comment board that is present on the site of the video. The speaker of the video does not assume any prior knowledge on the topic and presents the material in a way that is easy to understand. Any viewer of the video will most likely be interested in the topic of women in Ancient Greece. The information is given to the view in a chronological manner, beginning with some of the most prominent women in Ancient Greece and continuing on to the end of the Ancient Greek era. The language and style used by the one giving the lecture is formal, yet at times the lecturer uses an informal tone. Along with the lecturers spoken words is a power point presentation, which gives an outline of what the speaker is discussing. This allows the viewer to keep in mind the main points that are being discussed. The speaker has an inherent credibility, being that he is a professor of history and has probably given this course several times in the past. There are no attempts at any emotional stimuli of the viewer/ audience by the speaker. The speaker gives the

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presentation in a completely neutral manner. Perhaps the only exception is that the speaker attempts to get an emotional response in the form of humor. However this is not an emotional response in the sense that it is connected to the material being presented. The intended audience for this book is anyone who is interested in the topic. The book differs from the video by offering a more in depth treatment of the topic, as well as a much longer time period that is covered. There is no easy answer as to which discourse community the reader will belong to. It could range from a singlet that is reading the book on his or herself to an entire classroom that is using the book as supplemental material. The audience is likely to be interested in the topic of women in Ancient Greece who happen to come across this book. Similar to the lecture, this book presents the information in a chronological order. However, as stated above, there is a much longer time period that is covered in this book. The language used in this book is completely formal. There is a use of specialized language used in this genre. The author uses Greek words, with the appropriate definitions, to help convey ideas as well as give settings before going into discussion of women in those settings. This is one feature that stands out to me most when analyzing this genre. The way the author is able to create the setting of this era is very elegant because it gives the reader an easy understanding of the material. The credibility of the author is created by a short biography given at the beginning of the book, which describes the authors experience as a writer as well as some of the authors previous works on the subject of Ancient Greece. The two genres used are in the form of a lecture titled Women in Ancient Greece, which has been uploaded to the online video source Youtube by John Hoffman, and the written book Women in Ancient Greece by Susan Blundell. These two genres focus exclusively on the subject of women in Ancient Greece. The genre that gives a more thorough treatment of the topic

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is the written book Women in Ancient Greece by Susan Blundell. The book is able to cover much more information than what is given in the one-hour lecture. The book also does something that the lecture does not, which is to provide a setting before going into detail about the topic. The book does a much better job giving information on the topic than the lecture. This was expected from the beginning. How is one to provide as much information as a book in a onehour lecture?

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References Blundell, S. (1995). Women in Ancient Greece. Harvard University Press.

Hoffman, J. (2012). Women in Ancient Greece [Web]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUZFi6q8kWg