Running head: ANXIETY AND DEPRESSION DISCOURSE COMMUNITY 1

Anxiety and Depression Discourse Community: Ethnography

Amanda B. Santillan

The University of Texas at El Paso

ANXIETY AND DEPRESSION DISCOURSE COMMUNITY 2

Discourse communities take place in various platforms that individuals initially do not

recognize. They can occur in churches, schools, business, and even social media. A discourse

community must meet the six required characteristics defined by John Swales. After conducting

research, it can be argued that the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA)

online community exemplifies a discourse community.

ADAA is a nonprofit international organization dedicated to the prevention, treatment,

and cure of anxiety, depression and related disorders through education, practice, and research

(ADAA, 2017). The primary goal of this organization is to improve patient care through the

promoting of new research taken into practice. Sharing a common goal is one of the six

characteristics that defines a discourse community. Swales states: a discourse community

consists of a group of people who link up in order to pursue objectives that are prior to those of

socialization and solidarity, even if these latter should consequently occur (Swales, 1990,

pg.471). This statement supports the organization, due to the fact that members join for the

purpose of participating to achieve the common goal of improving mental patient care before any

socialization has occurred between any existing members.

Intercommunication participatory mechanisms are present in the Anxiety and Depression

Association of America web community. Several meetings are scheduled throughout the year so

members can gain knowledge about their organization, as well as to hear information on any

events they can participate in. Furthermore, several newsletters are sent out to members for
ANXIETY AND DEPRESSION DISCOURSE COMMUNITY 3

important notices and successes the organization has accomplished. Not only are meetings and

newsletters used, communication is constantly being taken place in a portal named my ADAA

Community. This is a portal where members and moderators can interact with each other, and

are able to communicate with numerous individuals that live outside the country. Certainly, the

participatory mechanisms are being used correctly to demonstrate a discourse community, a

discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and

feedback (Swales, 1990, pg.474).

A discourse community utilizes and hence possesses one or more genres in the

communicative furtherance of its aims (Swales, 1990, pg.474). ADAA has several number of

genres being used throughout their organization. ADAA associates with genres such as

conferences, webinars, podcasts, blog posts, journals, and E-newsletters. Furthermore, many can

agree that this characteristic is suffice for John Swales standard of a discourse community.

The fifth characteristic of a discourse community is described as communities acquiring a

specific lexis. In this case lexis being the vocabulary of a language that is distinct from its

grammar. This specialization may involve using lexical items known to the wider speech

communities in special and technical ways such as, using highly technical terminology as in

medical communities (Swales, 1990, pg.473). The Anxiety and Depression Association of

America is classified as a medical community, hence one can infer that there will be use of

highly technical terminology. For instance, Paul Holtzheimer the four year ADAA member

posted a professional blog post that consisted of highly technical medical terminology. He wrote

the following: Focal brain stimulation techniques are potentially powerful tools for the

investigation and treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders. These approaches include transcranial

magnetic stimulation (TMS), transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), and deep brain
ANXIETY AND DEPRESSION DISCOURSE COMMUNITY 4

stimulation among others. In general, focal brain stimulation applies electrical stimulation to a

discrete region of the brain to generate neurophysiological effects. Average people believe that

the word selection used above is considered to represent a type of lexis, that not everyone will

fully understand.

Finally, A discourse community has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree

of relevant content and discoursal expertise (Swales, 1990, pg.473). The Anxiety and Depression

Association of America has an engaging a membership of more than 1,700 professionals

(Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 2017). This consists of three different types of

memberships, students, trainee/postdoctoral fellow/resident, and professional. This meets the

claim that Swales stated. He said: survival of the community depends on a reasonable ratio

between novices and experts. All of the content posted on ADAA is entirely relevant to the

shared goal. Each post on this site deals with mental diseases of depression and anxiety, whether

if it is a patients story, patient support, informational feedback, or new medical advances for

anxiety and depression. There is obviously discoursal expertise taken place considering that there

are 1,700 professional members. The discoursal expertise is given by some of the following:

licensed clinical social workers, CEO of the National Eating Disorder Association, and

Professors of Psychiatry. Thus, proving that ADAA follows the requirement of the sixth

characteristic of a discourse community.

Overall, this paper has explained the six characteristics that John Swales considers to be

factors of a discourse community. Evidence was given as to why the Anxiety and Depression

Association of America is considered to be a discourse community. The evidence did support

Swales explanations and reasonings behind a discourse community. This evidence did meet the
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requirements for each of the six characteristics, thus implying that the ADAA is in fact,

considered to be a discourse community.

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Works Cited

About ADAA. (n.d.). Retrieved September 25, 2017, from https://adaa.org/professional/about-

adaa

Holtzheimer , P., Dr. (n.d.). Focal Brain Stimulation Interventions for Depression and Anxiety.

Retrieved September 25, 2017, from https://adaa.org/blogs/focal-brain-stimulation-interventions-

for-depression-and-anxiety

Swales, J. M. (1990) ''The Concept of Discourse Community." Genre Analysis: English in

Academic and Research Settings. Boston: Cambridge UP, 1990.21-32. Print.