Introduction

High school theater reminds me of two of my best high school memories. During my
junior and senior year, I chose to step out of my comfort zone and audition for the productions of
West Side Story and Guys & Dolls at my neighboring high school Watsonville High. WHS holds
auditions open to all public schools in my towns district. My charter high school did not have
drama or theater extracurricular activities at the time, thus my friends and I were inclined and
welcomed to audition. Although not knowing before I had joined the theater program, I came to
find that high school theater is a discourse community at large.
A discourse community has its own set of rules, common goals, and patterns while
carrying out an activity together. According to the Concept of Discourse Community, A
discourse community has broadly agreed set of common public goals (Wardle & Downs, 2011).
A discourse community can be seen as a social group with an interest in producing something
unique to its own group. For high school musicals, its discourse community revolves around the
tightknit family-like bond through the amount of time spent during rehearsals and the production.
My research will focus on the close connections and bonds built through high school theater
groups through secondary research, interviews, and personal observations from my own
experience in theater.
Methods
I chose to conduct primary research by interviewing one of my fellow cast mates, who
participated as a backup dancer in both of the musicals I participated in. Jessica Sanchez, a
current film major at the California State University, Long Beach (CSULB), agreed to an
interview over FaceTime regarding her personal experiences and observations of the WHS
theater program as a community. I also chose to reach out to my back stage manager of the

production West Side Story, Claudia Villalta, who is a second-year film major at CSULB as well.
I chose to reach out to these peers because they were highly involved in the theater program, and
chose to pursue a film path in education because of their wonderful high school experiences in
theater and plays. In the presentation of Concept of Community Discourse, the authors state
A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant
content and discoursal expertise (Wardle & Downs, 2011). These young ladies display a suitable
amount of expertise in the field after having participated in theater for three or more years in
their high school experience, thus providing useful insight into this discourse community.
Before conducting these interviews, I prepared several topics regarding how they viewed the
theater program as a community in itself. I refrained from using the phrase discourse
community when conducting my interviews because I didnt want to throw off my interviewees
with strong language. Rather, I asked them why they considered theater to be a community, and
what parts of the community were most important.
Results
During my interview with Sanchez, I asked her what it meant to be part of a theater
program. Performing with different high schools from the same district allowed us to connect
with different high school students and learn their stories. Even though we played different roles,
each of us had our own stories and brought our own background to our characters (J. Sanchez,
personal communication, November 20, 2016). Sanchez sees the theater programs incorporation
of different high school students as a way to build itself into its own community. She went on to
say, We became super close by the end of the musical. It was almost like a family. We supported
each other, and spent time together both during and outside of rehearsal time which allowed us to
get closer and build relationships (J. Sanchez, personal communication, November 20, 2016).

Villalta had similar claims to Sanchez, adding, Our whole community came out to see our
musical. They got to see the chemistry on stage, that was developed through the amount of time
we spent together. Auditions, rehearsals, run-throughs, hell week, you name it all of these
things helped us build a bond that made us like family. (C. Villalta, personal communication,
November 29, 2016). Both ladies mention the family aspect of theater, and the strong
relationships built through an extracurricular activity in high school that demands time and
dedication outside of school. As Nichols states in his published article, The educational value to
the pupil taking part in the play is not primarily in the public performance (Nichols, 1914). This
exemplifies that a lot of the meaning-making that goes on in the theater discourse community
happens behind the curtains, where bonds are being formed among cast mates.
Discussion
Within every discourse community, there are existing genres; genres are tools of
communication within the discourse community that use language specific words through
different mediums (Dirk, 2012). Dirk states, knowing what a genre is used for can help
people to accomplish goals (Dirk, 2012). In order for the community discourse to
accomplish a common goal, the genres can achieve the message they are sending out to its
members or its surrounding community through its members. Wardle and Downs claim, A
discourse community utilizes and hence posses one or more genres in the communicative
furtherance of its aims (Wardle & Downs, 2011). My high school in particular, used flyers to
promote our musical around town to accomplish its aim of spreading the news of the production
to our community of Watsonville. The flyers would be posted throughout WHS, as the students
were a main targeted audience to support their fellow peers. Flyers were also posted in local
shops and eateries, promoting the production to the public as well.

Tickets for admission into the show were another form of genre used to spread news of
the upcoming musical. Each ticket was designed with the musicals title, date and time of
performance. It also listed the times doors opened before the show began as well. Tickets were
another form of promotion, and all participants in the play were encouraged to keep a set of
tickets to sell on hand at any time. The tickets were sold for eight dollars if they were purchased
through a student, or ten dollars for audience members who purchased their tickets at the door.
This encouraged both audience members and theater members to interact personally, and
welcome people to the show.
The play bill is another form of the genre, common in both musicals and plays. All
playbills are given to each member of the audience as they enter the doors of the theater hall,
also known as the Mello Center for WHS. The play bill displays a picture of all members
involved in the production, a list of the songs performed throughout the musical in chronological
order, and a list of advertisements from local businesses that support our community and fund
our theater program.
There are also more informal sets of genres throughout the backstage and front stage,
which are only seen by those involved in the production. There are posters on the dressing room
doors identifying womens and mens dressing rooms. We had tape on the set floors to show cues
of certain furniture that had to be moved on and off set, and pieces of tape that signal the center
of the stage. Only people who attend rehearsals and are part of the production would understand
these stage cues, and they are not seen by the audience.
Aside from genres, a discourse community revolves around the production and
performance of its actors, dancers, singers, and backstage crew. All the time that is required and
put into productions come from the amount of effort it takes to put on a successful musical or

play. Costumes are typically set by a costume designer, which are then fitted and assigned to
certain actors/actresses and dancers. The set must be built, designed and painted before official
performances begin. The stage hands are required to know the cues of placing the set, who bring
furniture on and off the stage. The director and backstage manager are in charge of the actors and
how they conduct their behavior on and off the stage. To empower actors, a director must not
give, but give up, by relinquishing tasks or decisions to the actors that he/she would otherwise
make (Gonzalez, 2012). It is important for the director to allow creativity among its performers
in order to give the production its unique character. Of course, the performers play an integral
part of the production itself, being the primary focus on what the community gathers to watch.
Each member of the musical or play spends a fair amount of dedication and time together to put
on a fantastic performance.
Conclusion
A high school theater discourse community is connected through its dedication, as well as
time spent with one another focusing on the production for its audience. The discourse
community communicates in particular ways in order to attract a wide-ranged audience and
allow members of the community to communicate with one another. The high school theater
program I participated in was no exception of this discourse, as its mission was to put on to
passionate performances and draw in its audience members.

Citations
Dirk, K. (2012). Navigating Genres. Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing, 1, 249262.
Gonzalez, J. B. (1999). Directing High School Theater: The Impact of Student-Empowerment
Strategies and Unconventional Staging Techniques on Actors, Director, and
Audience. Youth Theatre Journal, 13(1), 422.
Nichols, W. H. (1914). The High-School Play. The English Journal, 3(10), 620630.
Shosh, J. M., & Wescoe, J. A. (2007). Making Meaningful Theater in an Empty Space. The
English Journal, 96(5), 4247.
Wardle, E., & Downs, D. (2011). The Concept of Discourse Community. Writing about Writing:
A College Reader.