My Discourse Communities

There are discourse communities everywhere you go. A discourse community is defined
as a group of two or more people with similar likes and interests. I believe that a discourse
community is defined as any group of people that have anything in common, small or big. A few
examples of discourse communities would be a classroom, a religious group, a group of friends,
and even a field of work. I will be examining the professional discourse community of
construction management. Construction management is a field of work that has many different
positions within the field. Within the major discourse community of construction management,
there are smaller communities that are considered the different career paths. These career paths
consist of jobs such as a project manager, a superintendent, or a field engineer. There are many
more opportunities, but these are just a few.
John Swales wrote an article called The Concept of Discourse Communities. In this
article he introduces six characteristics that describe every discourse community. The first
characteristic he gave was that a discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common
public goals (Swales 471). To me, this just meant that each discourse community has a specific
list of goals, or something of the sort, that they are trying to achieve. This is one of the six
characteristics every discourse community has. The second characteristic Swales stated is that a
discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members (Swales 471)
meaning that the discourse community has their own method of exchanging information. To me,
this can mean that the group of people that communicate information with each other using any
form of communication. This includes communicating within the community orally, through
text or even through a website. The third characteristic is was described by Swales as a

discourse community [using] its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and
feedback (Swales 472), or the place where the information is exchanged. This characteristic to
me means that the discourse community has one or many places in which they communicate
information. This links back to the second characteristic. Places where information can be
exchanged, or a forum, can be an office, a conference room, email, a website, etc. The fourth
characteristic Swales introduces in his article is a discourse community utilizes and hence
possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims (Swales 472), so in
normal people words meaning each discourse community has its different types of writing that
they use to communicate. These genres differ according to who they are addressing and
communicating with. This brings me into Swales fifth characteristic being a discourse
community has acquired some specific lexis (Swales 473). Discourse communities have
different terminology they use within the discourse community and when communicating outside
of their community to the public. Whether it be slang Spanish or Shakespearean English, a
discourse community uses their specific vocabulary. I think that this is one of the most important
characteristics of a discourse community because it puts them aside from everyone else. Having
your own language or vocabulary makes it difficult for anyone to just join in. The knowledge of
a person in the discourse community is also one of Swales characteristics, a discourse
community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and
discoursal expertise (Swales 473). The level of expertise a person within the group has differs
with that persons level of understanding and knowledge. I believe that it is very necessary to
have different people with different levels of knowledge in a discourse community because it

gives a variety to the types of people and allows the people within the group to see multiple
perspectives of a specific situation.
The discourse community of construction management is like a foreign language. In
order to help me better understand how this community follows these characteristics that Swales
describes, I interviewed Professor Keith Bisharat of the Construction Management department at
California State University of Sacramento. I interviewed him and asked him about the different
characteristics of a discourse community; common public goals, information exchange, forum,
genres, terminology, and expertise. These were his responses.
Why did you decide to come into the field of construction management?
The first thing said was a quote. That specific quote he gave me is life is what happens
when youre planning other things, because he didnt start off his education in the discourse
community of construction management. Professor Bisharat started off his educational career as
a part of the discourse community of architecture. He graduated from UC Berkeley with his
degree in architecture. He later discovered that he wouldnt really get to do much design work
early on in his career as an architect. He then began working as a laborer and began working on
construction fields and learned to love the field of construction management. He worked for
some time on the field and decided to go back to graduate school and got his masters degree in
construction management. He then decided to become a professor to teach about the discourse
community of management.
What do you believe are the common public goals of the discourse community of
construction management?

Jessica Fitzwislon, from the Construction Management video by ThinkTVPBS, stated

that as a construction manager their job is to make sure that the projects deliver on time and on
budget, meaning that their goal at the end of a project is to make sure theyve achieved these
two main points. Professor Bisharat stated that he believes the goals of the people within the
discourse community are monetary. Within the community, they serve for the reason of making
money at the end of the day. He also believes that often times people within the community do
charitable acts in order to improve the society that they live in. These acts of charity that are done
by the construction industry include examples such as someone voluntarily fixing a bench at the
local park or helping out a neighbor to put up cabinets in their home.
What is your experience with exchanging information in the past and in the present? What
are the different methods used?
When working in the field at the time that he did, Professor Bisharat didnt have the
luxury of communicating electronically. At that time they used regular mail to communicate and
sometimes telephone. Nowadays, the general contractor is able to communicate with the field
workers from the office instantaneously through email or through online programs. They also
have weekly meetings in the trailer office on the sight. The easiest way to exchange information
is oral communication.
What types of forums have you used in the past and what forums do you use now?
There are many different forums used. The most common form is email in the present day. Also,
very commonly used now are programs that keep all the project plans, drawings, photos and
reports on file. One example of a program that does this is called PlanGrid. Other forums include
conference rooms, on the construction site, and in the trailer.

What genres of writing have you used in the past and present? Which did you find was the
most beneficial?
Professor Bisharat believes that in the discourse community of construction management
they use every kind [of genre] you can think of, such as technical reports, subcontract scopes
and agreements, daily correspondence with the owner of the project, field reports, and many
more. Bisharat told me that he doesnt think that there is one genre of writing that is more
important than the other because they each play a very specific role. No two genres can be used
interchangeably. Each genre is used to communicate something specifically to a certain group of
people.
What type of terminology is constantly used in this discourse community? How do you
think this sets you aside from other communities?
Terminology in construction management is essential according to Professor Bisharat.
He says that it is very necessary to communicate with other people within the discourse
community. There are so many terms in this discourse community that are used so often that
Bisharat says you cant have a conversation with somebody to solve a problem unless you can
speak the language. A couple examples of lexis that he gave were words such as delivery
system, pores, and surfaces.
What are the different levels of expertise? How can one achieve a higher level of expertise?
There are different levels of expertise within every discourse community, whether that be
a student like me or a professor of the discourse community such as Professor Bisharat. The
different levels of expertise in the field of construction would be the field engineer working on
the project site, to the project manager, to the owner of the project. Professor Bisharat says that

the different levels of expertise range from rudimentary knowledge to extensive deep
knowledge of the engineering systems and the business, being that expertise relies on ones
level of knowledge.
The discourse community of construction management is a very wide community with
many different positions and levels. Swales states in his article that every discourse community
has six characteristics. I think that with my interview with Professor Bisharat, I have proven that
Swales statement is true. The characteristics of discourse communities that Swales gave and the
what they meant to me all were proven to be a part of the construction management community.
The discourse community of construction management does indeed follow the six characteristics
of common public goals, information exchange, forum, genres, terminology, and expertise. I
have always viewed the discourse community of construction management as a very private
community. I now see that it is a very wide discourse community that many people are a part of
without even knowing it. It is a community in which the people within communicate and
collaborate with many people outside of the discourse community.

References
Swales, John. The Concept of Discourse Community. Genre Analysis: English in Academic
and Research Settings. Boston: Cambridge UP, 1990. 21-32. Print.
Construction Management. Youtube. ThinkTVPBS, 16 Nov. 2012. Web. 16 Mar. 2016.
www.plangrid.com
Bisharat, Keith. Discourse Community Interview. Personal Interview. 14 Mar. 2016.