1. Mirabelli is writing this piece to build respect for service work. Being literate as a server means knowing the words on the menu as well as having an understanding on how the food is prepared/cooked. Waiters can get the jump if the menus are overly complicated/ in a different language or if the menu is really long. They do this for monetary reason whether personal or for the restaurant.
2. The author is Tony Mirabelli who has a Ph.D. from Cal-Berkeley and has worked as a waiter. His intentions with this piece is to build respect for service workers by showing the complexities that go into it. I think there is more than one purpose the major one being  the respect for service workers and the other is to show an example of a discourse community not based in an academic setting
   • The author has worked as a server and has felt disrespected during that since that profession is looked at in a negative view (low skilled, unintelligent)
   • The intended audience is for this essay is anyone that goes to a dine-in restaurant (not in the service industry). The reader wants the audience to be anyone who has disrespected waiters/waitresses. The secondary audience is anyone interested in discourse communities and understand what they are.
   • This is about the complexities of serving and the author uses specific events of his previous experiences or the experiences of others to show how complex it can be and shows the disrespect others receive. Yes, the author uses deduction to help prove his point.
   • The author doesn’t really appeal to reason no statistical hard data was used but there was a form a logic laid out to prove his point.
   • The author uses a lot of pathos using examples of disrespect of another human to stir up emotions in the readers
   • The author does use some ethos having a personal experience with the restaurant that is the focus of this essay as well as experience with this job.
   • The author presents the text in an essay form will large paragraphs but also have real conversations used as examples.
   • This text kind of does its job. It did teach me some of the complexities that go into serving but it reminds me of what I do know. In the heat of the moment probably not people are still going to be emotional in these situations some might change while most will not. This text is likely to fail with people who are naturally emotional and impatient. Yes
3. The writer is Mirabelli. The intended readers are people not familiar with service work and possibly people getting into the industry. The issue is that service workers are not low skilled. The gap is that service work does require lots of skills, in particular multi-literacy.
4. The name of the discourse community is academics. The genre is a persuasive essay and has appeared in two different anthologies. The lexis is more formal, academic/intelligent. Mirabelli had to have a Ph.D. and had to be working in academic institution. He receives feedback from the editors/proof readers as the main mechanism for feedback also book reviews. The main goal of this DC is fighting against ignorance.
5. This essay is discourse for the academic discourse community.

• There is a sort of complexity and skill unnoticed to the public when it comes to the waiting on tables
• Literate acts can extend beyond the printed text involving verbal and nonverbal communication
• Study was done in a privately owned restaurant during Weekend evening shifts and voluntary participation
• At this restaurant it has different level of experience workers.
• The menu is the most important printed text used by waiters and waitresses. The menu is its own genre
• A word like marinara is common item found in many restaurants but it means something a little different depending on how the restaurant prepares and makes the sauce. (own lexis)
• Restaurant menus are written in a way so that it is long and sometimes incomprehensible to give the power of the interaction to the waiter/waitress.
• Knowing terms that many customers are unfamiliar with can help sell that dish or not knowing leads to the opposite effect
• The waiters/waitresses at this restaurant have to be proficient on the menu and reading people/the situation to be successful at their job

1. Swales says that speech communities are centripetal because they absorb people into a community. Meaning that they are members of that specific community from birth/upbringing. He says that discourse communities are centrifugal because they split people into occupational or special interest groups. Meaning that people can be apart of different groups based on interest or job (earning a spot in the group) and not be forced into a group of people that speak the same language.
2.  The six defining characteristics of a discourse community is the group has a common public goal(s), members communicate with each other and share information, has one or more genre specific to the group in communication, the group has their own terminology (language) that people outside the group might not understand, and a threshold level of members with varying knowledge.
3. One of the problems with the discourse community concept is that it doesn’t take into account any conflict between group members. (static definition, not how groups change over time, not a real-world description of what people do)

Questions after video

1. I think the gap is that the intended readers of this piece are not clear on the definition of a discourse community and they aren’t considering the problems of the concepts of discourse community
2. This piece gives a clear definition of what defines a discourse community and describes some of the problems
3. The intended audience of this essay is for academics (linguist, Eng. studies)
4. The danger of an essay like this is that it provides another way to label another person based on their discourse communities.

Discourses: How Do Communities Shape Writing?

• Discourses are a group of people in the same setting during that time
• A group of people shared goals or purposes and uses communication to accomplish them is a discourse community
• Use of language, interpretation of media, and ways of seeing can all very between different discourses
• Communities of practice is another name for discourse communities
• People keep learning to write and use language in new ways with more interaction between different discourses

The Concept of Discourse Community

• “Cluster of ideas” is a way to help identify a discourse community but not definitively
• This Swale guy has a problem with how vague the term “discourse community” is defined and wants to lay out a narrower definition
• Some define or look at discourse communities as a subset of speech communities
• Speech community is a group that share similar linguistic rules
• A discourse community (DC) has a broadly agreed set of common public goals
• A DC has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members
• A DC uses it participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback
• A DC utilizes and possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims
• In addition to owning genres, a discourse community has acquired some specific lexis (aka specific language, lingo, or slang used by the DC)
• A DC has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content and discoursal expertise (maintaining a reasonable novice to expert ratio in the group)
• DCs don’t have to be in an academic setting/ academic group
• This definition/view of DC doesn’t account for or look at any sort of conflict in the group

The authors assumptions:

In the thesis the author makes assumptions that the read has knowledge of these previous major sporting moments (fictional or real life) where the underdog comes out on top. He also assumes readers know who the Yankees are and what they have accomplished. All of these assumptions are valid because of the overall comparison between sports (the Yankees) and the U.S. I think the assumption of the underdog moments are necessary but still help with the argument. The author stated who his favorite sports teams were and that they are not the most popular with fans of other teams. The author didn’t fail to assume shared beliefs and addressed them.

Questions for rhetorical reading:

The author uses more sports slang in the article to appeal to fans of sports and in particular baseball. The author is trying to persuade fans that dislike the Yankees to see that this is hypocritical when it comes to their support of the U.S in an international perspective.

This was written in 2004 when the Yankees acquired A-Rod in a trade also the U.S is in a war in Iraq. The references made throughout the article are outdated today and a younger audience would miss out on some of the points.

The writer’s intended audience is sports fans, more specifically baseball fans that dislike the Yankees. The author addresses this audience as “Yankee haters”.

The author uses the subject matter to appeal to reason. He uses factual evidence from baseball history and compare them with the U.S. The author uses pathos as well with some word choice used that many that he is trying to persuade would use when talking about the Yankees.

The text is an article in paragraph form with no visuals. The authors style is kind of satirical.

Effective working thesis statement:

The issue is that “Yankee haters” don’t understand America and he goes on to argue why this is. This thesis is easily contestable. The thesis does have a sharp focus on the topic. At this point in time I don’t think this thesis has the potential to change as more information comes to light. The thesis does not help map out the structure of the argument/article. I do think that this articles thesis invites more information.

Aim of the authors argument:

The authors aim of the argument is to persuade. The author thinks his audience is baseball fans that dislike the Yankees because they are rich and have the means to get the best players unlike most other ball clubs. The author thinks that these people need to be persuaded to not dislike a team because they have the most money in an unfair system because they have support for their country that is dominant in an unfair system.

Motivating the readers:

The author does use evidence that most people would find persuasive because baseball is America’s sport and most fans of baseball have pride in their country and using the two helps make the article have more of an impact. He treats his readers as intelligent. The author is direct but in a satirical way with his readers in the position that he takes and what he wants them to think.

Words about Words:

The author does appear trustworthy by knowing a lot about baseball and how it works when it comes to the business side. The author does use logos in the argument by making clear and logical connections between the U.S and Yankees and how the support of one conflicts with the dislike of the other. The author does use pathos when it comes to the way the audience feels about the Yankees and makes his word choice to be more consistent with the audience.

Purpose of Stein’s essay:

Dominate via war. Crushing Iraq. Convince people about involvement. Question how we use the military. Inquiry

• Conventional forms of an argument in a certain discipline is to persuade other researchers into doing their own studies or apply the information to a preexisting problem
• A successful argument includes a claim on a disputed/contested topic and then using reliable evidence to back it up
• When choosing a topic for a research paper it is important to ask, is the issue contested? Is the issue something you are invested in? Is it limited enough in terms of amount of actual research?
• A thesis statement contains, the topic and the claim made on the topic
• When starting a paper have a working thesis that can be subject to change as more research is done
• It is important to consider the other sides arguments and the concerns they may have with your side
• Consider the intended audience when forming an argument and choose the best tone, style, and diction from there
• From the audience consider how much background knowledge they may have on the subject
• When forming an argument find as much common ground as possible to keep both sides engaged (Rogerian argument)
• Classical form of argument is based on that humans are naturally open minded and predictable
• Important things to do in an argument, know more on the topic then the audience, define the terms used to support the argument, and use evidence effectively
• For evidence distinguish between fact and opinion, find expert knowledge, have caution when using personal or anecdotal experience (not the main support of the argument)
• Logos used to appeal to reason, logic is used to lay out the argument as to why the claim is true or the most logical point of view
• Ethos to appeal more trustworthy to the audience
• Pathos to appeal to people emotions to persuade them
• Arguments can be analyzed by the Toulmin method, a trickle-down method; data, claim, warrants, backing, qualifiers, rebuttals
• Fallacy is an error in reasoning, fallacies of relevance add unrelated evidence, fallacy of ambiguity has unclear terms/hard to understand evidence
• Concede: give credence to an opposing viewpoint
• Refute: examine an alternative viewpoint and explain why it is incorrect or not the best
• Be sure to proof read the essay when finished

Predictions of “In Defense of Domination”

Title:

The title does not remind me of anything that I have read. There are not any contents for the title to summarize

Contents:

No chapters are provided. No headings are used. No tables, graphics, or photos were included.

Context:

This is an article with no words that surround the text. Only the authors name has been provided and when it was written. The title is the only piece of context before the text and it may suggest a political/social piece.

Your Prior Knowledge:

I don’t know anything about the author or what the subject might specifically be. I don’t know what experiences I can relate to the topic. This article reminds me of a new articles from CNN but nothing specific.

Genres and the Purposes They Convey

The genre of the text is an article. The purpose of this article might be to inform or persuade. Expect to see logos appear in the article. I am reading this article for class. I don’t know how I could use it as a cited source in my own writing.

Predictions of the article:

I think it will be some political/social piece. The article will begin by introducing a social “problem” then lay out why it is a problem and finish by taking the other view point.

Questions to Ask after a First Reading:

The text is about the New York Yankees. The text made me feel nostalgic remembering mid 2000s baseball. This article reminds me of whenever people use a baseball analogy discussing any non-sport related topic. The most important part is the parallels made between the Yankees and the USA. The text is about how the US went from being an “underdog” to dominate during its history but the people still see it as an underdog. I don’t know what the text should mention that it might not have said.

Evaluating evidence:

The evidence is accurate and did seem correct. The evidence provided is relevant to the underlying claim. The evidence did not come from a source of authority? There is enough evidence to be convincing of the underlying claim. The evidence is represented in the form of a metaphor using details about the Yankees and its relation to the other teams in the capitalistic nature of the MLB and comparing the USA to the other countries in the world in the same sense.

Austin Frisby

Dr. Bailie

ENGL 2089 – 009

6/28/19

• Active readers ask questions for further understanding of the text
• Make predictions before or while reading to be more engaged
• Use the title, table of contents, or prior knowledge to help make predictions
• Reading for gist: to get familiar with the central idea/topic
• Reading for depth: connecting the text to life experiences or other pieces of work
• Things to do while annotating; ask questions, make connections, summarize, alternative perspectives, relating to big issues. (actively annotating)
• To write a summary short the text down to the main points that still makes sense to the reader and no opinions/interpretations
• Critical reading is thinking while reading
• It is important that during critical reading to distinguish between fact, opinion, and belief
• Fact: statement that is specific and can be verified
• Opinion: based on fact but includes interpretation
• Belief: conviction that cannot be proven or disproven
• There are underlying assumptions in statements to help form the argument
• Rhetorical analysis is a method of analyzing the effects of a text and how the author achieves them
• All text can be read as an argument even if a text was written to inform or entertain
• Diction can influence how a text is perceived
• Research papers/speeches use formal diction. In-formal diction used to identify with readers
• Style is the arrangement of words into sentences
• Every text is part of a wider conversation and can be used to attribute motive to the writer