Sophia Fundora
Towards the beginning of Navigating Genres, Kerry Dirk highlights that genres used to mean form and simply just filling in the blanks. To be completely honest, when it comes to pieces of writing, I have always thought that to be the golden rule. Whenever I read something that strayed away from the typical expected norms from a certain genre, I applauded it for breaking the boundaries that were apparently never really there to begin with.
Dirk wrote that genre theory has progressed since the time when genres were just seen as predetermined structures with blanks to fill in. She refers to a piece rhetorician Lloyd Bitzer wrote on how new genres are created all the time from new events that require the creation of a response. Essentially, it's the idea that every situation elicits a new and/or different response. As Bitzer puts it, genres are developed through the appropriate responses to similar situations being seen, heard or read repeatedly. Dirk uses George Washington's first State of the Union Address as an example for this since he had all the freedom to structure his piece however he wanted and pave the way. Since that was the first ever presidential address, all the presidents that have came and will come after it follow that same exact (or similar) structure.
Dirk also highlights the importance of rhetorical situation when talking about genres. Dirk pointed out that we use rhetorical situation in our every day lives. When ever I draft a tweet or send someone a funny picture, I do it with an expected outcome of what the person or the people online seeing my tweet are to say and how they are to react. News and article headlines do this all the time, using a rhetorical action that elicits that specific response they are looking for, which is why Dirk classifies them as their own genre as well. Overall, I think Dirk really put it in to perspective and was able to show me, the reader, that although genres have rules, they are always changing and writers themselves are the catalyst for change.
Towards the beginning of Navigating Genres, Kerry Dirk highlights that genres used to mean form and simply just filling in the blanks. To be completely honest, when it comes to pieces of writing, I have always thought that to be the golden rule. Whenever I read something that strayed away from the typical expected norms from a certain genre, I applauded it for breaking the boundaries that were apparently never really there to begin with.
Dirk wrote that genre theory has progressed since the time when genres were just seen as predetermined structures with blanks to fill in. She refers to a piece rhetorician Lloyd Bitzer wrote on how new genres are created all the time from new events that require the creation of a response. Essentially, it's the idea that every situation elicits a new and/or different response. As Bitzer puts it, genres are developed through the appropriate responses to similar situations being seen, heard or read repeatedly. Dirk uses George Washington's first State of the Union Address as an example for this since he had all the freedom to structure his piece however he wanted and pave the way. Since that was the first ever presidential address, all the presidents that have came and will come after it follow that same exact (or similar) structure.
Dirk also highlights the importance of rhetorical situation when talking about genres. Dirk pointed out that we use rhetorical situation in our every day lives. When ever I draft a tweet or send someone a funny picture, I do it with an expected outcome of what the person or the people online seeing my tweet are to say and how they are to react. News and article headlines do this all the time, using a rhetorical action that elicits that specific response they are looking for, which is why Dirk classifies them as their own genre as well. Overall, I think Dirk really put it in to perspective and was able to show me, the reader, that although genres have rules, they are always changing and writers themselves are the catalyst for change.
I also enjoyed how Dirk used George Washington's state of the union address as how he created a genre that is still used to this day. I think this example was a good way of Dirk showing us how genres apply to every writen work and how certain texts such as a tweet or an union address has certain features that are expected to be seen within these works.
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