Devitt and Company

 

Summary

 

This article was a actually a combination of three different articles by three different authors all discussing the similar topics of genre and ethnography. Devitt talks about how genres affect our daily lives. She also talks about how some genres are created specifically for people outside of that community. She goes on to talk about how genres affect our everyday lives such as ballots and the judicial system. She talks about genre analysis, and how some words may have a different meaning depending on what community you are a part of. Devitt uses an example of a court case where the word might means two different things to the lawyer and the jury because they are part of different communities. Bawarshi says that genres are ways of classifying texts, and uses an example of the medical community to show how the same word can mean different things in different communities. Lastly, Reiff talks about how genres and ethnography can help students inside the classroom, as well as take the things they learn in the classroom and relate them to the real world.

 

Connections

All three authors give their opinions on how genres are depicted, and how many different definitions of genre there actually are. They all use different definitions to describe how genres affect our everyday lives. They also have some similar opinions as Gee did.

 

Definitions

 

Bawarshi says genres gives us specific access to the sites of language use that make up communities, in all their complexity. Swales says that only the people in the community can read and understand their texts. This is where they differ. Bawarshi thinks an outsider can study the language of the community and learn the genre of the community without being a part of it, unlike Swales. I agree more with Bawarshi, and I think that would be the better definition to use in our class.

 

Opinions

 

I enjoyed reading this article because it showed the viewpoints of three different people and how they feel about genres and their communities. Also, I found interesting the amount of different possible definitions of genre, and that none of them could pick just one

 



Smitherman

Summary

The main topic of Smitherman's article is Black English. She talks about whether Blacks should have to learn how to use proper white english or if they should know both dialects. Also, she talks about how today we consider Black english to be grammatically incorrect, but in fact there was a time when it was correct. When white english came along, they changed the language and said that their language was correct and Black english was incorrect. This can be looked at as pretty racist, but what Smitherman is trying to show is how often language gets changed by events and society.

You can connect this article to many readings we have done because they all discuss changing the language. The language needs to change and evolve as the people that speak it change and evolve as well. There can be many different versions of the same language. I know from personal experience that reading a Shakespeare play is almost like reading a different language, even though it is considered English and I speak English.

Sloppy incorrect grammer, according to the author, is when the writer has bad sentence structure and no details or support. Sloppy correct grammar is when the writer uses correct sentence structure and has details to support it, but it may not seem right in the eyes of the teacher or grader. 

I found this article interesting to read. The first thing I like about it is how Smitherman added paragraphs, almost like anecdotes, in smaller font that broke up the article and made easier to read in addition to holding on to my attention. Also, I think she brings up some interesting topics about how language is changing everyday, almost like technology, and there may be more than one correct way to speak or write a certain language.