Swales' 6 Points
1. The discourse must share common goals.
The Post is Ohio University’s independent, student-run newspaper that’s goal
is to inform and entertain the Athens community.
2. There must be some form of communication among the members of the discourse.
Communication is used within The Post to divvy up who writes what.
3. There is a way to show the progress of the discourse.
Progress within The Post can be shown by the amount of copies that are
read/sold.
4. A discourse processes a genre.
Within The Post, there are many different genres, such as: news, sports,
culture, and opinion. These genres are interpreted through the members
writing.
5. The discourse must use some specific lexis.
The members of The Post have acquired a certain lingo that is used to keep
members on the same page. For example, the section that a member is
assigned to write is called a beat. If you are writing about the football team, you
are writing the football beat.
6. A discourse must have a certain number of members before it can technically exist.
The Post has 16 editors and many students who write for each genre.
By meeting each one of these requirements, issued by Swales, The Post is considered to be a discourse community.