Wardle discusses the difficulty that many people have acclimating to a new discourse community/ecology, as well as her personal experience trying to fit into a particular discourse community/ecology in her graduate school program. Instead of calling them "discourse communities" she calls them "activity systems". She states that...
"for workers to be successfully enculturated into new communities of practice or activity systems, including learning to write in ways that are appropriate to those communities, neophytes must learn and conform to the conventions, codes, and genres of those communities. However, when and how much each neophyte must conform largely depends on how much authority and cultural capital the neophyte possesses or cultivates to accomplish work effectively." (pg 523)
Wardle is basically saying that although we don't always feel that we fit into the particular discourse community we are in during certain parts of our lives, we still have to find a way to function appropriately within that community. She feels that in order for students to be successful in doing so when they graduate and join the professional world, they must "consider what it means to write in the workplace." Looking at writing from one's future profession is a good way to do this. Once again, I can relate this to one of the earlier articles we read about "Reading Like a Writer". In this case, it is important for students to read writings from one's future profession in such a way that they can consider the important aspects of that kind of writing. This way maybe it will be easier for students to acclimate to the new writing environment when they graduate.
Wardle mentions that many people in the general public are criticizing professors for not preparing students for writing in the professional world. Maybe the issue isn't that students do not lack "polished language", they may just not know the proper way to apply language in writing in their own profession. Academic writing and professional writing discourse communities are very different from one another.
One of the biggest differences I noticed between the academic writing of Johnson, Clark and Burton and the professional writing of Windsor is the story-like opening of the former writing piece. Johnson, Clark and Burton use a hypothetical scenario in a story form as an introduction to their work. Some readers may find this juvenile, but in some cases I believe that it may be the right way to go about their topic. If their target audience is students, this could be a good way to relate to many of them.
Great post, and I like your discussion of Wardle's comment about the public's complaints. A big issue for writing scholars is that most of the world thinks that writing is a basic skill that just requires good grammar.
ReplyDeleteKeep up the great work.
I love how you tied in these readings to the Reading Like a Writer articles we discussed at the beginning of the quarter. I also liked you comment: "Academic writing and professional writing discourse communities are very different from one another." I agree. I often find I must write in an academic way rather than the way I will be writing in my profession. That is why I find classes such as this one to be beneficial - it teaches us to think like people in our future professions.
ReplyDeleteyou said this perfectly:
ReplyDelete"Wardle is basically saying that although we don't always feel that we fit into the particular discourse community we are in during certain parts of our lives, we still have to find a way to function appropriately within that community."
It kind of shows that you just have to be able to function int the environment, you don't need to be an expert.