Devitt: Genre Awareness

When I think of genre, it is the typical categorization of a certain topic such as music, books, television show or movies as seen on Netflix. According to Devitt, teaching genre without engagement might ruin the way we think about street smarts vs. school smarts, it emphasizes stereotypes and puts labels on those who aren’t as educated or connected in the subject. At SDSU, the genres that I have encountered the most in my major are research papers, scientific papers/reports, analysis papers/reports. In my life, I have found that I often have to write my emails to various people in both professional and unprofessional tones. I think in today’s society, we also encounter social media type of genre that is a combination of people we know sharing their style of the genre that was taught to them most and it have somewhat stemmed their ideologies and beliefs. The purpose of these genre is allowing me to achieve different things in my life whether it is good grades, a favor from someone or a message that I want communicated with different individuals.

We often thing of genre as a set category but when Devitt speaks about genre awareness, it makes me think about the many different ways we can be looking at genre. Devitt talks about instructions in genre, no matter how detailed, will always be incomplete. This itself will ruin the experience of fully fulfilling a genre writing assignment. I feel this is in most of the classes that I have taken my whole life, where teachers are very strict upon the style in which we write in certain papers because of the “instructions” given for a genre of writing they are assigning to us.  Secondly, Devitt also talks about taking a genre from a typical learning place and put it in another—her example was, “learning business genre in technical writing courses rather than in actual workplaces” (340). I do believe that most of what we are taught is learning in the environment that it is supposed to be, but if we remove the stereotypical place we are learning certain genre from, would that change our views and perspectives? In addition, many teachers choose to teach in their comfort zone and this creates a power structure that channels information the teacher knows into the student and therefor, passing down their ideologies. This I will further explain below.

                “When a writer takes up a genre, they take up that genre’s ideology” (339)

                The genre a teacher decides to teach often will limit the students’ world to many other different genres. When teacher themselves believe in certain ideologies that a genre offers, it often will pass on to the student. Devitt seems to be advising teachers to take a neutral stand when it comes to the genre they choose to teach. I understand where Devitt is coming from but I also think it is important to be taught genres that will actually benefit many of us students in our future careers. I say this because we often have to learn many things on the job and with no help of school, we have to adjust quickly or else someone else will take our spots. Some of the things we learn on the job should be taught in school in order to prepare us better for the real world. So often, teachers try to have us see things from their views, our opportunities to engage and be aware of the subjects and genres learned is hindered.

                When Devitt speaks of “existing power structures and dynamics” (347), I think she is talking about how genre help people identify but also assume. The structure in which genre is taught shows where it came from. One of the example I can think of is during slavery, slaves used to mix some English into their native language to speak to their masters. However, this made them look like they we not educated individuals to the whites but they made their own language and genre. The same can be said about someone who grew up in certain areas and are accustomed to certain traditions but if it is seen as foreign, we often dismiss it or categorize it instead of embracing or engaging with a rhetorical point of view.