Discourse Communities Ethnography (Draft)

Discourse communities play a huge role in society. I guarantee you that at some
point of someones life he/she will be part of a discourse community. A discourse
community is a group of people who share common goals that use communication to
accomplish every single goal they might have. Its crucial for us, humans, to understand
how discourse communities function. People tend to judge communities without even
knowing a little about them. In this paper I will analyze two different discourse
communities to see how they communicate for the purpose of achieving the goals these two
have. Aside of analyzing these two communities, I will be comparing them to see if they
have some similarities or differences. I will base my observations on the six points that
John Swales, professor of linguistics at the University of Michigan, gives us in his article
The Concept of Discourse Community. Also reading Learning to Serve: The Language
and Literacy of Food Service Workers by Tony Mirabelli helped me a lot to look at these
two discourse communities.
My first discourse community is my soccer team, Niupi. This group exists for the
players, Niupi is a team where anyone can enjoy the beautiful sport of soccer and where
they escape reality at least for game. This a perfect activity to get rid of stress. We are
currently playing every Sunday on an indoor soccer league. A lot of people think that a
soccer team will only be successful if the players are talented. I analyzed this discourse
community to prove that it takes more than talent for soccer teams to achieve their goals.
Recently we had a game so I decided to take this opportunity to analyze how the players of
Niupi communicate between them to successfully accomplish their goals and to interview

the captain of the team. Having a personal experience in Niupi made my analysis a little bit
easier.
The main goal of the discourse community, Niupi, is to win every single tournament
they are playing. Aside of this particular goal, the team have more goals such as: winning
every game, to create a strong communication within the players so they can really play as
a team, and to pass with precision or without error. Communication plays a huge role in
achieving these goals because I noticed that when they were playing ineffective plays were
caused by the lack of communication. For example, there was a time where one player had
to run to get a pass but because the other player didnt hear our captain which cause him to
lose the ball in our zone so the other team ended up scoring. Players have to be constantly
paying attention about what the other team-mates say to be able to do a good game.
Niupi communicates in Spanish because we feel more comfortable with it. I noticed
that in corner kicks we only communicate with hand signals. We make signals with our
hands and each of them represent a different play. Outside the field, the members
communicate with each other through Facebook messenger and text messages. Also
sometimes the captain posts at a Facebook page that is designed for the members of this
this discourse community. These mediums of communication have the purpose to inform all
the players at what time we are playing and where. Also we use these multiliteracies to
talk about problems we are facing inside the teams.
Niupi have some specialized words (lexis) that are used among them. Lexis are
words that only members of the discourse communities will understand. During the game
the players would say things such as: assist, cao, and 2-3-1. To assist someone does not
only mean to pass the ball to someone else, but to put the other team-mate a half goal.

Assisting someone lets the other player to score so easily. A cao (in English nutmeg)
means to embarrass someone by passing the ball between their legs. When we are losing
the captain yells 2-3-1 this means we are changing from a different formation into a new
line up where we have two defense players, three midfielders, and one forwards. This lets
the team to have more control in the middle so the other team finds it harder to attack us.
The old timers are the better players we have in the team. Usually these players
have a lot more experience and know how to react in different occasions. They are the ones
that have more influence in the decisions that the captain makes. Also they get more
minutes to play than the other players. The new comers are kids who are barely getting to
know the type of game we use in our matches. They have to learn all our plays and lexis we
use. We help them by teaching them what every single thing we do or say means. With time
and practice they master our specialized words. There have been several times where our
team have faced conflicts. Usually the most common types of problems we see among the
players are created by envy, mistakes, and leadership. We try to solve them by effectively
communicating so no one feels out of the team.
Interview:
Bryan Alvarado (Captain):
-How long have you been here? Three years. I started to play in this team when I was 15,
now Im 18.
-What is Niupi for you? Niupi is a family for me. We have a really strong communication
among the players inside and outside the field. Playing for this fellas means a lot me.

-What is the main goal in Niupi? Our main goal is to win the tournament. In order to
accomplish this, we concentrate in game by game. We try to play as a whole.
Communication is the most important factor that let us win. I think a team will always fail
when a good communication doesnt exist within the players.
-Why are you involved? Because when I play I forget about all my problems, I scape my
reality. This team means everything to me.
-What do assist, cao and 2-3-1 mean? To assist someone is to make a pass with a
lot of precision where the other player will easily score. A cao is a way of embarrassing
the opponent by passing the ball between their legs. 2-3-1 is a formation we commonly
use when we are losing. When the game is hard I yelled 2-3-1 so the players know we are
changing formations.
-How did you learn this terms? When I first arrived at Niupi I did not know how to use
them. With time I master them.
The second discourse community is Vision Juvenil. Vision Juvenil is a Christian
youth group that gathers every Wednesday. Aside from their weekly meetings, every year
they organize a conference that lasts three days where thousands of young people from
different parts of the United States and Mexico come to experience a unique and real
experience with God. I choose Vision Juvenil, with the same purpose of Niupi, to analyze
how they use communication as a tool to achieve the goals they might have. I go all
Wednesdays but I took this past service they had to interview a member and analyze this
discourse community.

Vision Juvenil has three shared goals: 1. To break with the spiritual apathy that lives
in this generation, 2. To connect the youth with their purpose in this life, and 3. To train
religious leaders so they can be more efficient. To achieve these goals they create meetings
where the youth pastor, Jair Tenorio, uses a board to talk with the members about in which
direction they are currently going and to where they want to go. Besides meetings they
communicate via Facebook posts, emails, and text messages. The purposes of these
mechanisms of communication is to improve the performance of each individual.
Vision Juvenil have several specialized words (lexis) that they use to communicate between
them. When someone is preaching wand if they say lights this means that the lights are
too bright so they have to lower them. When they are about to open the doors they say
GRS which means get ready for service. The newcomers with time and some help of
the old timers, successfully learn the appropriate language, genres, and knowledge of the
group. Also before they can get into service they have to go through a training which is
giving by the old timers with the purpose of teaching them all they need to know. The
new comers with less expertise are young people that barely got into Vision Juvenil. The
old timers with expertise are adults that have been serving in this youth group for years.
Interview:
Joel Hernandez
-How long have you been here? I have been serving for almost one year.
-What is the main goal in Vision Juvenil? Here in Vision Juvenil we have three main
goals. 1. To break with the spiritual apathy 2. To connect the youth with their purpose in
this life, and 3. To train religious leaders.

-Why are you involved? Because I love to give my time to this generation. I really enjoy
serving other young people.
-What do lights, and GRS mean? If youre serving in the media, when the preachers
says lights it means that he cant see the crow because it is too bright so we have to
immediately lower them. GRS means to get ready for service. This means the service is
about to start.
-How did you learn this terms? The other staff members taught them to me. Also with
time you get used to them.
While looking at them we can see that these two discourse communities have
specific goals. To successfully achieve these goals the communities face their bigger
challenge, creating a strong communication. In order to create this communication both
communities created unique words that made it easier for the members. In the other hand,
we see that Vision Juvenil uses a more professional method to communicate among the
members such as creating meetings. Even though they both have different methods of
communicating, they still achieved their goals.