What Is A Discourse Community

In life there are many different groups that we become a part of, whether it is a friend, work, school, or music group. Researchers have deemed these groups as discourse communities. Ann Johns explains discourse communities as, “a basis for sharing and holding in common: shared expectations, shared participation, commonly held ways of expressing” (320). Discourse communities hold certain standards and actions that lead to the functioning of the group. The Bartlett City Court Clerk’s Office is a stand out discourse community that has certain vocabulary, genres, and tasks that allow them to work as a cohesive group. The Bartlett City Court Clerk’s office is where people typically go to attend court and go before a judge to handle their affairs.
Inputting tickets, filling tickets, and registering arrest reports are simple tasks that have a detrimental effect on the system if they are not completed, so everyone must be able to do this. These paper documents are examples of genres or written work that is used among the discourse community to allow goals to be met. Tickets must be inserted and filled quickly because if they are not in the computer system then people will not be scheduled for court properly. Because of the amount of work necessary in this discourse community, the tasks are distributed to different people to make sure that all jobs are completed with ease. In the interview with Jolane Cook, she informed me that seven people work full time at the Clerk’s office and they are all designated specific jobs. Bill Loyd is the head court clerk and he over sees everyone and make sure they all get their work completed. He also handles appeals, which is when a person pays for their case to be sent to another court and a different judge so their case will be handled there and violations of probation, which are when people that have been released from jail and are put under “a period of good behavior under supervision”,according to the dictionary, and this good behavior has been broken. Under Loyd is Jolane Cook, she assists him and helps the other workers. Pam Kirby and Ayasha Jones handle court on Mondays and Wednesdays so they can assist the judge by taking notes and making sure his verdict is sent to the clerk office so payments can be handled. Melissa Ripp handles held estates, which are cases that are sent to the grand jury. The other two ladies that work at the front counter handle people coming in to pay for their tickets and answering phones. Completing these different tasks brings fourth a hierarchy within the discourse community, with Loyd at the top and the two front desk women at the bottom. Although there is a hierarchy,