Richard Ly Professor Wolcott 9/18/13 Medical Journals: Analyzing The Genre of A Discourse Community Journals are used greatly

in the medical community and have been published since the technology for printing was first around. They are used widely throughout the medical community to share results on a new drug or information explaining a different method to perform a current procedure. Christopher C. Booth, MD states that they are "a vehicle for the expression of dissent and for the publication medico-political ideas" (Booth, 398). From having information on an improved form of performing open-heart surgery to having the procedure to perform a traditional folklore technique to cure malaria, journals have been key to sharing information, whether it be throughout the medical community or just to the general public. This paper is focused on analyzing the medical discourse community throughout a type of genre of that community: the journals. With one example alone, it isn't possible to accurately analyze the community since there wouldn't be anything to compare it to. After reviewing "Early Diagnosis of Myocardial Infarction Using Absolute and Relative Changes in Cardiac Troponin Concentrations", "Review of Nomenclature in Colonic Surgery- Proposal of a Standardized Nomenclature Based on Mesocolic Anatomy", and "Outcomes of the Adjustable Gastric Band In a Publicly Funded Obesity Program", much is brought up about the discourse community upon comparison between the journals, such as: the style, organization, and

participation of the journals, the rhetorical situations of the emotional stand point, credibility towards the journal itself, and the evidence used to back up the information given. Before comparing the genres, it would be necessary to first explain the waythis paper will view the word "genre". For this, the explanation will come from John Swales' "Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings". In this, Swales states "a discourse community has developed and continues to develop discoursal expectations. These may involve appropriacy of topics, the form, function and positioning of discoursal elements, and the roles texts play in the operation of the discourse community" (Swales, pg26). When comparing all three journals, one key point that is easily seen is the organization: all three articles, regardless of the different topics, have the same structure in organizing the information. Over time, journals after journals were being published, each contributing to this basic structure the medical journals now follow. Every part of a journal is important in describing the discourse community, especially the medical discourse community. With these, the importance of credibility is shown by the location of the contributing authors; next to the title, it's the first thing the reader will see. It not only shows the names of the contributing authors, it also shows their college/hospital they attend/work at. This can be shown when looking at "...Adjustable Gastric Band...". Right below the title has the four authors of this journal. It also shows their title next to their name. Even with the other two articles, it can be assumed that without an MD or some degree equivalent to it, it wouldn't be too likely to have the opportunity to contribute to a medical journal. The authors aren't the only factor when dealing with credibility, it also depends on the people they cite. When looking at all three

journals, they all have something in common: the work cited are from people who are credible themselves. Without credibility, a writer won't have too high of a chance to be published. How do these genres evoke emotions to the readers? They don't. These medical genres do not attempt to bring out emotion of people; in this case of the medical community, facts and graphs are what matter. On page 235 of "...Adjustable Gastric Band...", it shows three tables and one graph showing information based on the results of the gastric band. "...Colonic Surgery..." doesn't have any graphs or charts. It does, however, have Figures on pages 3,4 to give visual aids to help with the nomenclature since it is based on anatomical position. The use of graphs, charts, and figures shows that medical journals appeal to science. The participation of the medical journals is limited to the members within or in the process of going into the discourse community. When searching for medical journals online, it came to my attention that, although not impossible, it is difficult to find a medical journal without paying anything for it. Most medical journals online require to purchase some form of membership to the whole site or to pay a one-time fee to purchase the one journal. Having a cost to obtain a journal would limit the amount of people who are able to receive one. The use of medical terminology to the people in the discourse community would be labeled as a rhetorical situation since the members of the community use this second language every day. With the amount of medical terminology found within the all the journals, it can be concluded that these articles aren't for the general public. This can be seen in "...Myocardial Infarction..." in the title alone. The average person would not be able to understand what "absolute or relative changes in cardiac Troponin" means so it would be difficult for them to comprehend the background of the journal alone. In this discourse community, the members use a lexis

within the medical journal which does limit the amount of people being able to understand the genre to just the people in the community. In conclusion to the analysis of the genres taken from the medical discourse community that within the journals, the authors only focus on the facts; they avoid emotions completely. In all journals, use of graphs, charts, statistics and other visual aids were used greatly to explain the results of the method they are pushing. Not only that, but also the fact that the journals are limited to the people within the discourse community. Also, it is not enough to be a member in this discourse community to have work published; to have work published, not only does the work cited have to be credible but you must yourself be credible.

Works Cited Birch, Daniel W. Chiu, Chieh Jack. Karmali, Shahzeer. Shi, XinZhe. "Outcomes of the Adjustable Gastric Band in a Publicly Funded Obesity Program." Canadian Medical Association 2013: Pages 233-236. Web Booth, Christopher. The Origin And Growth of Medical Journals. 1990 American College of Physicians/American College of Physicians. http://annals.org/article.aspx?articleid=704090. Web. 19 September 2013 Culligan, K. Remzi, F.H. Soop, M. Coffey, J.C. "Review of Nomenclature in Colonic SurgeryProposal of A Standardized Nomenclature Based On Mesocolic Anatomy." The Surgeon, Journal of the Royal Colleges of Surgeons of Edinburgh and Ireland 2012: Pages 1-5. Web Irfan, Affan. Reichlin, Tobias. Twerenbold, Raphael. Meister, Marc. Moehring, Berit. Wildi, Karin. Bassetti, Stefano. Zellweger, Christa. Gimenez, Maria Rubini. Hoeller, Rebeca. Murray, Karsten. Sou, Seoung Mann. Mueller, Mira. Mosimann, Tamina. Reiter, Miriam. Haaf, Philip. Ziller, Ronny. Freidank, Heike. Osswald, Stefan. Mueller, Christian. " Early Diagnosis of Myocardial Infarction Using Absolute and Relative Changes in Cardiac Troponin Concentrations. " The American Journal Of Medicine 2013: Pages 781-788. Web

Swales, John M. "2.2 Speech Communities and Discourse Communities. "Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings." Cambridge [England: Cambridge UP, 1990. 23-24. Print.