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Yaqi Lei

Professor Webb

Ling 12 M/W 11am

19 Feb, 2019

Can Nan Kai American Debate Club be Considered a Discourse Community?

Everyone is a member of the society. Anthropologists define a society as a group of people

depending on one another for survival or well-being (Whittle). Thus, it is inevitable for people to

communicate and cooperate with others, resulting in numerous groups existing in the world. There

are different mechanisms, genres, and ways of interaction between people in different groups. For

example, I talk with other orphanage volunteers about kids’ situation and daily assignments, while I

email to my chemistry lab leader with inquiry and reports in lab. As there are so many groups in the

world, how can we decide that whether a group is a successful discourse community or not? Lin-

guists John Swales suggested that there are six characteristics contributing to a successful discourse

community. There should be a general goal for the community members. People communicate with

specific mechanisms, content, and genres. Specialized terms that outsiders cannot understand are

used among members. The community should have different levels of members (471-473). A group

can be a discourse community only if it meet all these six characters.

I was a head of finance department in Nan Kai American Debate Club (NKADC) in my high

school. It was a club for debaters to exchange ideas. We used to have club members participating in

national competitions. We used to hold provincial competitions. We attended camps and had labs to

improve our debating skills. To me, Nan Kai American Debate Club was a successful and influen-

tial discourse community because it met all six characteristic from Swales.
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Firstly, there is a common goal in our Nan Kai American Debate Club. Swales states that the

first defining feature for a discourse community is to have a broadly agreed common goal (471).

The public aim for NKADC was to develop members’ critical thinking level. As a group of high

school students, we lacked the ability to objectively analyze facts to form judgement. In NKSDC,

We learned how to prepare for a debate and how to perform in a debate. For example, we analyzed

the pros and cons of urbanization when writing for our first constructive speech for a debate. Then

based on our research, we wrote about our own opinions of urbanization with both sides arguments.

During the debate, we firstly decided our side by flipping a coin. Then we stated our claim concern-

ing urbanization and refuted opponents’ arguments. In the debate, we analyzed their statements, in-

tegrated with our research, and disproved their assertion, which needed a lot of work because we

cannot always anticipate opponents’ argument. In this way, we trained ourselves to analyze infor-

mation and offer our own opinions before the debate when examining the resolutions and during the

debate when refuting opponents’ statements. Thus, NKADC members have trained our critical

thinking skills. By successfully ensuring that members got to train our critical thinking ability,

NKADC meets the first one of the six discourse community characteristics.

Secondly, Nan Kai American Debate Club meets the second and third defining characteris-

tics form Swales—communication mechanisms and usage of them to provide information and feed-

back (471–472). There were different ways of communication for different groups of members in

the club. As Xiao, a member of NKADC, suggested in interview, we had meetings for people in

charge. All the ministers and the head of a club would gather together to make big decisions. For

example, we discussed where and when to hold an activity, assigned each department tasks, and de-

cided the special guest who would be invited to give the lecture. Besides, we had classes and labs

for NKADC members. In lectures, they listened to and learned from professional debaters such as
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David Weeks and Liam Mather with over ten-year debate experience sharing their experience. The

instructor answered their questions at the end of lecture. In labs, they discussed with lab members,

shared thoughts, and brainstormed about debate topics. In addition, club members wrote for their

debates. They took notes in lectures and labs. They did research and wrote for first constructive

speech for each debate. They also took notes in debates to record opponents’ points. Furthermore,

all debaters talked. During a debate, debaters firstly gave their constructive speech which states

their opinion. Then after hearing opponents’ speech, they refuted opponents’ arguments in the rebut-

tal round. In the crossfire round, all debaters asked each other questions and found flaws in the oth-

er teams argument. Lastly, each team would have an oral conclusion for the debate. All in all, meet-

ing, classes, writing, and talking are four main ways of communication in Nan Kai American De-

bate Club, which fulfills the second and third defining features of Swales six characteristics (471–

472).

In Nan Kai American Debate Club, there are different genres of communication which

makes it a successful discourse community according to Swales (472). Taking notes in lectures and

writing for constructive speech were the two types of writing that assist NKADC to realize its aim.

The informal type would be the notes in lectures. People wrote down important things they learned

from the professional debater or some random thoughts during the class. Those notes were indica-

tion of their thoughts getting more profound and deep, which can help them objectively analyze in-

formation and train their critical thinking skills. The formal genre was writing the constructive

speech draft. Shermis et al. suggest that argumentative writing is “a type of discourse where the

writer convinces others to a particular point of view” (Wang and Kwangsu 502). The draft is con-

vincing argumentative writing since debaters tried to persuade judges and opponents to believe their

argument in the speech. There was a specified format for the speech with claim, warrant, and im-
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pact in each contentions. Debaters assert their opinion in claim, give evidence to support in warrant,

and states the significance in impact, which makes debaters’ speech persuasive and the speech draft

argumentative. As the format for constructive speech was well established, debaters could follow

correct logic flow, which helped them to form reasonable judgment. Thus, NKADC members’ abili-

ty of critical thinking developed a lot, which is the main goal of NKADC. To sum up, taking notes

and argumentative writing are two genres of writing to further NKADC’s goal, which makes it a

discourse community as stated by Swales.

In addition, specialized terms was utilized among NKADC members. “Resolution” and

“constructive speech” are two examples of lexis used commonly among members that indicate roles

in debates. “Resolution” is the topic of one debate. It is usually a statement. For instance, when the

organizers firstly announced the competition, they included the resolution of “The United States

Federal Government Should Adopt a Carbon Tax”. If I was not a NKADC member, I would never

know the role of this sentence. In lectures, I learned that this was the statement for debaters to argue

about, so I prepared to both prove this statement as pro side and disprove it as con side. The phrase

“constructive speech” is another example of lexis (Xiao). In a debate, when the moderator says,

“Now it is constructive speech round,” debater one will give his speech and establish their team’s

statement. If I have not learn about the format of public forum debate, I would never know who

speaks in this round and what this round is for. Similarly, lexis for the roles of people, such as “run-

ner” was used in pharmacy, an effective discourse community described in Lab Girl (33). Runners

are the people who hand-delivering medicines to nursing stations. This term was commonly used

only by the members of pharmacy. An outsider may not understand the role for runners. Like the

pharmacy, NKADC is an influential discourse community with special terminology indicating roles.
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Lastly, ranks of members were important for being a discourse community as Swales claims

(473). In NKADC, there were department leaders, club head, and club members. Everyone had dif-

ferent tasks to do in the club. Department leaders and club head ensured operation of the whole

club. Each department leaders is responsible for one part of an activity. Planning department made

big decisions, submitted to school, and assigned tasks to other departments. Financial department

took charge in money in NKADC and did most of the purchase. Publicity department designed

promotional booklet, posters, and online posts to publicize club activities. Head of the club mainly

evaluated the proposal made by department leaders and made sure that each leader could finish their

tasks on time. Members in the club mainly improved their debating skills by participating in activi-

ties. They had lectures, discussed in labs, and competed in contests. In a nutshell, there were various

ranks of people having different tasks in NKADC, making it a discourse community.

In conclusion, Nan Kai American Debate Club was a successful and significant discourse

community because it meets all six defining characteristics from Swales. Its commonly agreed goal

was to help members develop critical thinking ability. Members used four main communication

mechanisms including meetings for department leaders, classes and labs for members to develop

debate skills, writing, and speaking in debate to exchange information and feedbacks. There was

different genres of writing, such as taking notes in classes and argumentative writing for construc-

tive speech. Specialized terminology, such as “resolution” and “constructive speech,” was utilized

among members. People were divided in different ranks as club head, department leaders, and club

members. My experience in this discourse community have helped get ready for my university. In

UCSB, a research university, I spent very little time to get used to doing research and writing pa-

pers. I became more efficient when analyzing information. NKADC is an beneficial discourse

community that has great impact on members.


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Works Cited

Jahren, Hope. Lab Girl.Vintage Books. 2017.

Swales, John. “The Concept of Discourse Community.” Writing about Writing: A College Reader,

edited by Elizabeth Wardle and Doug Downs, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011, pp. 466-479.Orig-

inally published in Genre Analysis: English in Academic and Research Settings, Cambridge

University Press, 1990, pp. 21-32. Accessed 10 Mar. 2019.

Whittle, Matthew D. “Class 1: Welcome.” Anthropology 2, 28 Sept. 2018, Campbell Hall, UC San-

ta Barbara. Lecture.

Xiao, Shaw. “Re: DC Interview.” Received by Yaqi Lei, 24 Feb. 2019. Email interview.

Wang, Xin, and Kwangsu Cho. “Computational Linguistic Assessment of Genre Differences Fo

cusing on Text Cohesive Devices of Student Writing: Implications for Library Instruc

tion.” The Journal of Academic Librarianship, vol. 36, no. 6, Nov. 2010, pp. 501–510.,

doi:10.1016/j.acalib.2010.08.006. Accessed 10 Mar. 2019.