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DISCOURSE
COMMUNITYS
Armando Chaidez
University of Texas at El Paso

Everyone has at least one discourse community that has their own guidelines, members,
and languages. Each discourse community is unique in its own way with every person having
their own perspectives.
One discourse community that everyone has is family, what consists of my family are
everyone in my immediate family and as well as my relatives. The purposes of writing in the
family are to inform the family in any situation relating to them. The way we all communicate
with each other is like how every other family communicates with each other email, phone calls,
text messages, and social networks but only do so when a family member is not living with us in
the meantime for example one of my brothers leaves for out of town internship we all
communicate with him using email and social networks. The topics our family go over events
that relate to our family such as birthdays, graduations, family meetings with our relatives. Our
guidelines are not too strict only we have to have to respect each other but we dont really say
this we only do it. Languages that we use are both English and Spanish however it really depends
on the person with our family, if I was talking to my mom or dad I would speak Spanish since
they know more Spanish, if I was talking to my brother I would speak English since were both
used to English. To become a member of our family one would need to be born, adopted or
marry into our family.
The next discourse community is my friends which is all my close friends and our group.
Purposes to write in this group could relate to school and other activities we participate in as a
group. Communication in our group is as the same as any other group of friends text messages,
social networks. Topics in our group of friends range from video games, movies, and music and
entertainment events. With our group there really isnt any guidelines anything goes. With my
friends we speak both English and Spanish but also depending on the person if someone in the

group is more fluent in English or Spanish we speak to them in that language. To become a
member of our group one only needs to talk to us and start hanging out with us during the times
we meet.
In the next discourse community college is the next one with my peers, acquaintances,
professors, TAs, counselors, and advisors. The purposes to writing in this community is to help
each individual improve in their writing but can also mean to writing for other subjects such as
an essay about history. The genres used in college are all the types used with the other discourse
communities specifically email and social networks, email is used to contact other students or
instructors for help, social networks are also used but only in the case of universities to help
promote events taking place in the college. The topics that are written about college are all the
information about students, professors and everyone involved with the college. Guidelines in the
college are not that strict as in school but there are rules but it depends on the teacher and their
classroom for example one professor could be stricter about attendance than others by lowering a
students grade if they are not attending class. Language is used widely in college with many
different languages are used in the college although English and Spanish are the most used there
is also French, Portuguese, Arabic, and Hebrew to name a few. To become a student of the
college one need to get accepted by it and meeting the requirements to join by either having a
high school diploma or GED then applying for the college.
The last discourse community is the High School band that I was in which audience was
my classmates in the band and the band director and drum techs. The purposes about writing in
band was about issues related to the band such as if someone wanted to talk about and issue
going on. Genres used in the band include email, a website of our own that we use to post
upcoming events, phone and text messages are also used as well as traditional letters on paper.

Topics that the band discusses include topics such as music or events that happen in the school
that involves the band such as football games, and pep rallies. Guidelines and rules are heavily
enforced with the band such as that everyone shows up to practice on time and prepared, being
late would result in detention. Another rule was being committed to the band or not be in the
band at all if, for example you would need to attend every band related event missing more than
two events without a proper excuse could result in you getting kicked off the band. Language in
the band is the same as the rest English is main type of language used but some Italian is used to
describe the musical terms like the term Andante which is Italian for walking. To become a
member of the band one only needs to join and attend every event related to the band and follow
the rules and guidelines.
These are four of the discourse communities used in my life, everyone has their own
discourse communities that they follow with these four being just being four examples of many
other ones.