Discourse community

"[1] Some examples of a discourse community might be those who read and/or contribute to a particular academic journal, or members of an email list for Madonna fans.

The hypothetical journal and email list can each be seen as an example of a forum, or a "concrete, local manifestation of the operation of the discourse community.

A discourse community is a textual system with stated and unstated conventions, a vital history, mechanisms for wielding power, institutional hierarchies, vested interests, and so on."

Porter held the belief that all new ideas added to a discourse community had an impact on the group, changing it forever.

[8] A discourse community can be viewed as a social network, built from participants who share some set of communicative purposes.

Just as the digital world is constantly evolving, "discourse communities continually define and redefine themselves through communications among members", according to Berkenkotter.

[9] These virtual discourse communities consist of a group of people brought together "by natural will and a set of shared ideas and ideals".

[13] "The term discourse community has been criticized in being imprecise and inaccurate, by emphasizing the uniformity, symmetrical relations and cooperation within text circulation networks.

Members of the discourse community take on either assigned or maintained roles which serve as discursive authority, rights, expectations and constraints.

Within an online discourse community text oftentimes circulate in what can be considered to be heterogeneous groupings, as teachers write to audiences of administrators, scholars, colleagues, parents and students.

"These and other social complexities suggest a more subtle and varied sociological vocabulary is needed to describe the set of relations within text circulation networks as well as to describe the ways genres mediate the actions and relations within these social collectivities, such as that provided by sociocultural theories of genre and activity.