RUNNING HEAD: DISCOURSE COMMUNITY ETHNOGRAPHY

Discourse Community Ethnography

Veronica Mendoza
The University of Texas at El Paso

Abstract

DISCOURSE COMMUNITY ETHNOGRAPHY

A discourse community is a group of individuals who share a common set of goals (Swales,
1990). The majority of people are part of a discourse community; some know they are in one and
some dont. Discourse communities exist all around us. There could be just a couple of people or
a whole bunch of people. Based on the characteristics Swales and Porter shared in their readings
I have analyzed Harmony Miners Organization. After my analysis I will determine if Harmony
Miners is part of a Discourse community and if it fits with all Swales characteristics.

Introduction

DISCOURSE COMMUNITY ETHNOGRAPHY

Discourse communities are all around us; some people dont even know they are a part of one.
The definition varies between swales and Porter although their explanations share a lot in
common. Discourse communities are all around us, some might just have a few members and
some might have many members.
Literature Review
We will be analyzing the article Intertextuality and the Discourse Community by James
E Porters (1986) and The concept of Discourse Communities by John Swales. In the article
The Concept of Discourse Community, John Swales (1990) defines the idea of a discourse
community and then he continues by comparing his definition of a discourse community with a
speech community. The difference between the both is that one of them you are automatically
born in to one by speech communities sharing the same language while the other one recruits
its members. Although in order to be in a speech community you really have to meet up because
the whole point of it is being able to express and share your ideas through the language. On the
other hand, for discourse communities you dont have to meet up at all to discuss and reach the
goal that the discourse community.
The definition of a discourse community according to James Porter is, A discourse
community is a group of individuals bound by common interest to communicate through
approved channels whose discourse is regulated. In this reading, he talks about intertextuality.
Intertextuality is the relationship between two different types of work. Porter describes it as
different ideas from other texts to create one idea. What Porter describes leaves people thinking,
they never think about these things till they read Porters work. They provide different
perspectives. Everything that you read and see is an idea that comes from another source. It
doesnt necessarily mean that its on purpose. Everything that is seen is intertextual, everything

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that has been written or made is because they got an idea from something else. Those ideas or
things gave you information to make something on your own. For example, scholarly articles are
made from different books and findings other people have made. A discourse community relates
to intertextuality because they have similar goals and ideas because it borrows ideas for other
similar types of texts.
According to Swales (1990), there are six essential characteristics that make up a
discourse community. With that being said we will analyze John swales six characteristics that
make up a discourse community. These characteristics share common public goals. That means
that the group comes together to achieve one specific objectives or objectives. The second
characteristic states that a discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among
it's members; This basically states how the members of the discourse community communicates
with one another. For example, through a group text message, email, or in person or even phone
calls. The third point states how the organization can also provide helpful information and
feedback. This points out how the community relays on its members to be active and participate
in order to achieve the goal. For example, Harmony Miners Organization provides students with
workshops, community service and internship opportunities. The members have to be active in
order for all these events to function. The fourth characteristic states . A discourse community
utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims
Swales (1990). That basically states how the community reaches out to the community. The fifth
characteristic talks about how every discourse community has its own specific lexis in other
words they have acronyms that only the members might be able to understand. The sixth and
final characteristic is how a discourse community has a threshold level of members". Meaning
that they have members with different skills or experiences in order to make the community

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successful. For example, in Harmony Miners Organization different members know how to do
many different things. They offer cooking classes so some of the members need to know how to
cook in order to teach the rest of the members. Some might just need help especially incoming
freshman with things as easy as applying for financial aid, or applying for scholarships. We have
members that work at the Mike Loya building so they hold meetings for any members that need
help.
Methods
In order to fully determine and understand if Harmony Miners Organization was part of a
discourse community. I have been part of the organization for a while but I never paid attention
to all the characteristics. When I joined last year I began by attending their meetings and joined
their group chat on Facebook messenger. I also followed them in all their social media pages
they had like Snapchat Instagram, and Facebook. In their recent meeting I collected the evidence
by taking notes and by simply observing how the members would interact with one another
while they were working with each other. I never realized how Harmony miners was indeed a
discourse community till I began observing. In order to get more information, I held a meeting
with all the administrators, they all had similar view points including myself on what their vision
for what Harmony Miners was. I then talked the members by themselves and asked them the
same question, their answers where all very similar. I also found that there were posters about
Harmony Miners at both of the Harmony high schools in El Paso. I also talked to the
Superintendent the Harmonys in El Paso he then proceeded to tell me that Harmony Miners was
the most successful student organization that Harmony Public Schools has ever had.
Discussion

DISCOURSE COMMUNITY ETHNOGRAPHY

In order to demonstrate that Harmony Miners Organization is part of a discourse community
we will use John Swales (1990) six essential characteristics.
1.A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals (Swales, 1990,
p.472).
Harmony Miners Organization's main goal is to make the learning environment fun. They
want to help you out through college opening doors and opportunities for internship and
international travel for all types of college student majors. The majority of the members are
Harmony Science Academy Alumni, but is open to and has members of many different high
schools here in El Paso according to their roster that they gave me.
2. A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members
(Swales, 1990, p. 472).
Harmony Miners Organization has mandatory meetings every 1st Monday of every month
aside from their events. The meetings are always held in the Harmony Public Schools district
office. They can also be reached through the many different social media pages that the have and
the group message that they have on Facebook Messenger. The numbers for the administration
members are also given to the members of the organization in case they have specific questions
or concerns, like if they need to pay their membership fee they will contact the treasurer, or if
they have a community service or student activity idea they can reach out to the specific admin
and later the admin presents the idea to the whole board of administrators.
3. A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information
and feedback (Swales, 1990, p. 472).
Harmony Miners Organization provides students with workshops, community service,
international travel and internship opportunities. The members have to be active in order for all
these events to function. For example, Harmony Miners held its annual freshman welcoming at

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the beginning of the semester they provided the freshman with a lot of helpful and lots of
feedback with stuff from when to register for classes to how to apply for financial aid and many
other helpful resources.
4. A discourse community utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the
communicative furtherance of its aims (Swales.1990, p. 472).
Harmony miners communicates with its members via email, group chats, social media posts and
sometimes individual text messages. In addition to that theres monthly mandatory meetings.
5. In addition to owning genres, a discourse community had acquired some specific lexis
(Swales, 1990, p. 473).
Harmony Miners Organization also know as HMO has developed several acronyms for
example MMMM which stands for Miner Mandatory Monday Meeting, HMO which stands for
Harmony Miners Organization, AAPOS (Annual Alumni Posada)

6. A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant
content and discourse expertise (Swales, 1990, p.473).
Harmony Miners Organization has several administrators its starts off with the President
and Vice president, Secretary, and Treasurer, after that its the Media coordinator, Student
Activities which is divided into two parts and ran by two people. One part is for student activities
at Utep and the other one is outside of Utep. The last one is the Community Service coordinator.
All of the events have to be brought up to the board to be approved. Once its approved the
budget approval has to be filled out by the coordinator and sent to the treasurer and then
approved by her. After all of that the event is then presented to the members.
Conclusion

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In conclusion I found that Harmony Miners Organization supports all of Swales discourse
community concepts. It shares a common goal, has specific language, uses genres of
communication, and most importantly communicates with its members in many ways.

Reference page
Porter, J. E. (1986). Intertextuality and the Discourse Community. In E. Wardle, & D.
Downs, Writing about Writing (p. 400). Boston, New York: bedford St. Martins.
Swales, J. (1990). The Concept of Discourse Community. In E. Wardle, & D. Downs,
Writing about Writing (pp. 215-223). Boston, New York: Bedford/ St. Martin's.

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