My Discourse Community One of the discourse communities I have recently joined is the freshman BiologyMajor community.

It seems strange to think of this as a discourse community, but it surprisingly meets Swales criteria. I immediately ruled out the possibilities of this community being a community of practice because a community of practice is more personal and belief-based. The lexis has been something I notice in this community, with words like natural selection, primary, secondary and tertiary structure, along with binding and synthesizing. Since day one, the theory of evolution has been referenced and noted with almost every other subject we focus on. In the beginning of the Biology course, the professor went over the importance of evolution to life and proceeded to explain why it was integral in the course because we study all biological processes. Other aspects that make this discourse community in my eyes are the number of publications, articles and videos we are assigned to read and watch to acquire understanding of topics. These account for the different genres in intercommunication. The videos use a lexis that broadly fits the discourse community, with some more challenging concepts and texts to introduce the newby freshmen, who have to mush fake their way through. Also, studying for exams and talking about the questions and concepts can be so specific that anyone outside the community may find puzzling or just jibberish which makes the community unique.