Jonathan Calderon

Ethnographic study of a discourse community For the ethnographic study, I am still debating on whether to study my drill team that I commanded while in high school, or to study the nursing staff at the hospital who has become friends of mine. Both of them are discourse communities in their own respective areas. For the paper I think I might bring in multiple ways to bring in data. That way I can have many details and to have a better well rounded paper. When it comes to the interview sections of the paper, if I plan on doing the drill team I think I might interview the former commander who has to lead these cadets, as well as a younger cadet who isn't a leader yet and see how discourse communities can be different depending on the position inside of it. For the hospital I will just watch how nurses work around the floor I spent 3 months on, and since they are my friends since then they would love and be very willing to answer any questions I had. I think that I will first talk about what a discourse community and describe how my topic is a discourse community. Then I will describe what language makes the topic a discourse community. I will also describe in what situations these terms are used and why. Then after I describe fully about the community I'll then refer to the interview I performed and go over questions about the community, how long it took to understand the language and feel finally comfortable in that environment. What made you feel that you belonged when you first started working here? Who has authority here, and why?

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