Anne Johns on Discourse Communities

In "Discourse Communities and Communities of Practice: Membership, Conflict, and Diversity," linguist Anne Johns focuses more broadly on John Swales' definition of discourse communities. Intrigued by Swales' outlook on discourse communities, I believe Anne Johns continues his views in a more in-depth manner in order to combat various conflicts concerning discourse communities. Without discouraging Swales' credibility, Anne highlights that the standards of discourse communities are set in part by the environments in which they are created. People are born, or taken involuntarily by families or cultures, into some communities of practice, such as social, political, and recreational communities. On the other hand, academic communities are selected and voluntary. Following academia, discourse communities continue into the professional life because every major profession has organizations, practices, lexis, and genres. Without a doubt, every individual speaks and acts a certain way depending on their location and their company. For instance, I have a different voice at home, at work, and at school. I believe that Anne's continuation of Swales' scholarly article most definitely made Swales' analysis more believable and relateable.