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Jasmine Moore

Professor Volstad

UWRIT 1104-026

19 September 2018

Was it Really a Dream?

“Heard the world is ending soon I assumed that they told ya, they tryna dinosaur us, so

now it’s time to go up,” I jam to Gorillaz new song “Ascension” as I walk to class. “Why did I

choose to take Western History?” I ask myself as I trudge up this steep hill while trying to shield

my eyes from the giant ball of burning gas that we call the Sun. Today is going to be a good day.

As I make it to my class and sit down in one of those claustrophobic desks, I start to drift off to

sleep. With one eyeball closed I just make out the outline of my professor when I finally start to

close my eyes.

All of a sudden I feel a strong stinging sensation like I’ve been stung by a bee. I open my

eyes just in time to see a sword plunging down into my chest. Now that I think about it the

sensation does feel more like me being stabbed by a metal object. It’s too late to think about it

now because suddenly I am being slapped awake by a … I don’t even know what to call it. The

only way to describe what is in front of me is pitiful. Seriously, I am being slapped by a bag of

bones that have been secured together by scraps of clothing. Anyways, I truly have no idea what

is going on. I look around at my surroundings and see other strange looking creatures walking

and flying around. “What is this place?” I ask the bag of bones. “Welcome to the World of

Warcraft” it responded.

Welcome to the World of Warcraft? Am I dreaming? “You look lost, let me give you a

tour around,” the bag of bones said. “Ok, but before we go can I ask you a question?” I ask.
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“Sure,” the bag of bones said. “What is your name?” I ask. “My name is Browser,” Browser

responded. Browser and I walked through the green grass that was scattered with corpses of

creatures and reached a dark cabin that was covered in webs. “What is this place?” I ask. “This is

where you choose your destiny my friend,” Browser responded. “Step inside and you will be

presented with different choices. You can choose your race, gender, and your appearance as well

as whether or not you are on the good or evil side,” Browser said.

Stepping inside of the cabin, I am engulfed in darkness. All of a sudden I see an

illumination show up on the wall. It has a list of categories ranging from race to appearance.

Tapping on race, I see a row of creatures show up. The one that stands out the most is the one

called the Undead. Seeing it up close I know that this is what I want to be. I am a huge fan of

purple so seeing the option to have purple hair is a no brainer and to have my hair defy gravity

by standing straight up in the air is a win-win situation. I am also a fan of the color blue, so of

course my skin is blue. I love metal so two metal bars with studs that go across my eyes really

helps me stand out. After I am done getting a make-over, I exit the cabin and reveal myself to

Browser. “What do you think?” I ask. “You look like a true Undead….um, what is your name?”

Browser asked. “My name is Ascension, I am a proud member of the Horde and I am here to

reclaim my dignity,” I replied.

My first mission was to basically meet with the devils sidekick in a tomb and gather

materials to make a concoction. After this boring mission, I was finally able to start kicking some

creature’s bottoms by using death magic to drain their lives. The happiness that comes from

seeing their lives drained from them is so satisfying because I know that the same was done to

me in my past life. As I attack this flying demon I feel lightheaded. What is happening to me!?
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“Jasmine…..Jasmine wake up!” someone yelled. “What....Maria, what do you want?” I

said. “Class is over, come on!” she replies. I get out of my seat and look down at my arms and

hands to make sure that this is real. That was a crazy dream, who would’ve thought that I could

be so hardcore. As Maria and I walked out of the classroom, I could’ve sworn that I saw a flash

of blue out of the corner of my eye.

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Who Would’ve Thought?

When you hear the word community, what is the first thing that comes to mind? Is it the

feeling of joy that you get when you are around the people that you love? Or does the thought of

the definition come to mind? According to Merriam-Webster, the definition of a community is “a

group of people with a common characteristic or interest living together within a larger society.” Commented [S1]: When you define using the dictionary,
you need to cite the dictionary, so it should be an in-text
citation as well as in your Work Cited.
If any of these come to mind then you are correct. Digging deeper we can also look at the factors

that make up a community. I will begin this essay by contrasting speech and discourse

communities, then I will analyze how these differences impact the way that we interact with each

other, and I will conclude by revealing my findings about the two communities.

In Swales book, “The Concept of Discourse Community” he quotes “at the outset, a

speech community was seen as being composed of those who share similar linguistic rules”

(Bloomfield, 1933). This means that if you share a common language such as English or Commented [S2]: You cited in APA for this MLA paper

Spanish with other individuals you are a part of a speech community. According to Swales, “in a

discourse community, the communicative needs of the goal tend to predominate in the

development and maintenance of its discoursal characteristics.” In other words, a discourse Commented [S3]: Citation?

community focuses on sharing knowledge in the form of communication while a speech

community primarily focuses on the knowledge of speech.

Another way to distinguish a speech community from a discourse community is that

speech communities are “centripetal” while discourse communities are “centrifugal.”. This Commented [S4]: Punctuation goes inside quotations

means that in a speech community people are “absorbed” into society. They are typically born

into a speech community while in a discourse community people are “separated into

occupational or specialty-interest groups” (Swales, 1990).

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A discourse community that I had the pleasure of being a part of was the World of

Warcraft community. I am not a “gamer” type of person so playing the World of Warcraft was

definitely a new and fun experience to me. I loved how interesting the plot of the game was. It

always involved something new such as a mission. I believe that stepping into this unfamiliar

territory was really an eye-opener because I discovered a new “community” that existed online. I

met so many diverse individuals while playing in this community and learned how to collaborate

better with other individuals. The World of Warcraft served as a perfect discourse community

because I had to work with others to get certain missions accomplished and to ask for advice

which helped me succeed. Almost everybody that I interacted with on World of Warcraft shared

a common goal, and that was to move forward.

That is why I believe that it is really important to consider and participate in discourse

communities because it allows you to grow both intellectually and emotionally. You learn new

perspectives and how to handle those perspectives. For example, I got cursed out during a

mission because I did not know how to properly navigate the area that I was in. I handled the

situation by maintaining a composed demeanor and not draining the character’s soul.

Playing World of Warcraft alone versus playing it in my group altered my view about

discourse communities slightly in the sense that when I played it alone my goal was to pass my

missions. When I played it in my group I realized how each one of us had a different goal in

mind. One of us wanted to have fun and joke around without a specific goal in mind. The other

two were not into the game as I was, therefore their drive to succeed was not as strong as mine.

Looking back at the definition of a discourse community which states that “the communicative

needs of the goal tend to predominate in the development and maintenance of its discoursal

characteristics,” I realize that although the players in World of Warcraft are a community we do
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not all share the same goals. That realization was a big eye-opener to me because I realized that I

had been thinking about discourse communities in the wrong light.

Discovering that every player in World of Warcraft shared a common language which

was in the form of the commands shined a new light on how easily you can become a part of a

speech community. When I was playing World of Warcraft, I was immediately “absorbed” into

the new language that the players used. I quickly realized that in order to survive the game I had

to become a part of their speech community. Commented [S5]: Not quite. Still a discourse community,
it just has to do with lexis. Its not an entirely separate
language.
In fact, playing World of Warcraft helped me identify a surprising correlation between

speech and discourse communities. My intended majors are Communications and Spanish and I

believe that participating in this community helped me develop a deeper realization of how

universal communication is from the story plot to the unique languages that the characters use.

Due to my strong observation skills, I was able to easily figure out what commands meant what

as well as how to navigate the area without running into trouble. Due to this observation, I was

able to determine that “discourse communities borrow from the sociolinguistic concept of speech

communities” (Swales, 1990). The commands used in World of Warcraft stem from a common

language that is used among the players in the game thus making World of Warcraft both a

discourse and speech community.

As you can see the overall goal of a discourse community is to bring together a group of

individuals that have similar but not identical goals as well as interests. World of Warcraft is a

perfect example of a discourse community because it contains a group of individuals who all

share a common interest which in this case is gaming. We are all connected through taking the

initiative of playing the game. We are connected by everyone beginning in the same place. When

we first began to play World of Warcraft we all had to first create a character and start from level
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one1. We are bonded as a discourse community through the steps that we had to take in order to Commented [S6]: Spell out numbers smaller than 20

move forward. We are bonded through the difficulties that we first encountered when we began

to play. These are just some of the factors that bond the gaming community together.

The overall goal of World of Warcraft not only included the inclusiveness of a discourse

community but also involved becoming a part of the speech community located within as well.

The commands that every player has to learn while playing the game helps us bond through

speech. Speech communities, although focused on speech, can really extend the knowledge

gained from discourse communities by incorporating verbal and symbolical language within the

community.

After dissecting and analyzing both the speech and discourse community I have come to

the conclusion that I finally understand the meaning of them both. Although both speech and

discourse communities have their differences, in reality they both share a common bond between

them. Without speech communities, playing the World of Warcraft would be nearly impossible

due to the inability to connect verbally and symbolically with other players. Without discourse

communities you can’t extend your mind and grow intellectually because you wouldn’t have

anyone to give you feedback. No feedback is equal to no growth. Who doesn’t want to grow and

move forward?

I truly believe that this assignment has really opened my eyes about how impactful both

discourse and speech communities are in the way that humans interact with each other. Starting

off, I did not understand what a discourse community was. I thought that it was just a fancy term

used to describe a community, which in a way it is. Now that I dissected and analyzed the term I

understand just how universal discourse communities are as well as how important they are in

communicating and interacting with others. I would have never guessed that I would become a
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part of the World of Warcraft discourse community and become one with its speech community

as well.
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Works Cited

Swales, John. “The Concept of Discourse Community.” Genre Analysis: English in Academic

and Research Settings. Boston: Cambridge UP, 1990. 21-32. Print.

Bloomfield, L. 1933, Language. New York: Holt & Company.

Jasmine,

Great job! You definitely understood the unit and the assignment’s placement within it! Formatted: Font color: Accent 6