This document discusses academic genres and their drivers. It begins by defining academic genre as typified rhetorical actions that are conventionally used in recurring social contexts. Genre is useful pedagogically as it allows people to perform certain functions, gain legitimacy, and exhibit recognizable features determined by social expectations. The document then analyzes the differences between genres expected of high school students, undergraduates, and professors. High school students are expected to produce genres for teachers, undergraduates for professors, and professors for research communities. The stakes are higher for undergraduates and professors who must demonstrate skills and knowledge acquisition or make new research contributions. Shared features across levels include convention following but authorship expectations differ.

1. Teaching Genre in the
Writing Center: The
drivers of academic genre
Ron Martinez, Ph.D.

2. Today:
● Look at the assignment
● Introduce academic genre
● Drivers of academic genre
● New assignment, syllabus

3. Definitions of genre
“Typified rhetorical action” - “conventionalized social motives which are found in
recurrent situation‐types” (Carolyn Miller, 1984)
“Recurring or characteristic textual (oral or written) responses to the requirements of the
social context” (Polio & Williams, 2011, p. 496)
“Socially recognized ways of using language” (Hyland, 2002, p. 114)

4. Genre is pedagogically useful
● Perform certain functions;
● Gain legitimacy as a result of recognition;
● Exhibit features that are determined by these functions;
● Contain prototypical and repeated formal conventions;
● Present formal expectations shared within communities
● Often have “genre clusters,” i.e. “spoken and written texts can cluster together in a given social
context” (Hyland, 2009, p. 27)
(Ferris & Hedgcock, 2014)

5. Analyze the genre (individually, then in groups)
1. How is this meme recognizable?
2. What recurring features/conventions can you identify?
3. Find and save at least one “prototypical” example, and one not-so-
good example (e.g. that do not meet the expectations of the genre).

23. I can see they are dancing, and it is
beautiful - but don`t ask me to do it!

24. Interim summary of points related to genre
● Genre is a deliberate response to a social communicative need, usually with a
particular intended effect.
● Genre is often defined by recurrent features (and is therefore “recognizable”).
● Genre is about convention and expectation.
● A text that is intended to represent a particular genre, but “flouts”
features/conventions of that genre may not achieve the desired effect.
● Genre is “co-created” (the author alone cannot determine genre).

25. Genre in Academia

26. A focus on the “producers” of academic genres
High School Undergrad Professor

27. A focus on the “producers” of academic genres
High School Undergrad Professor
1. What are examples of genres they are expected to produce?
2. For whom do they need to produce these genres?
3. What other differences can you think of between these students (regarding
writing, and authorship)?

28. Gardner, S., & Nesi, H. (2013). A classification of genre families in university
student writing. Applied linguistics, 34(1), 25-52.
“(University) assignments differ from research genres and from
instructional material in significant respects. Where research
genres aim to persuade the reader of the validity of new findings,
and textbooks aim to explain or instruct, assignments generally aim
to demonstrate the acquisition of required skills and accepted
knowledge.”

29. A focus on the “producers” of academic genres
High School Undergrad Professor
1. What are examples of genres they are expected to produce?
2. What are the “stakes” Involved? How might these stakes affect writing?
3. What other differences can you think of between these students (regarding
writing, and authorship)?

30. A focus on the “producers” of academic genres
High School Undergrad Professor
1. What are examples of genres they are expected to produce?
2. For whom do they need to produce these genres? What are the “stakes?”
3. What other differences can you think of between these students (regarding
writing, and authorship)? What about shared features?
OCCLUDED PUBLIC
REACTIVE AGENCY

33. CLICK ON IMAGE FOR ARTICLE

35. Homework
Please read the Wingate paper, making
notes about these questions:
1. What concepts of ‘argument’ do students have when arriving at
university?
2. What difficulties do students experience with argumentation in
academic writing?
3. What is meant an “unaverred,” “solipsistic” and “unattributed”
voices? Have you encountered these in your students’/clients’
academic writing? Why do you think these happen?