A discourse-based study of three communities of practice

How members maintain a harmonious relationship while threatening each other’s face via email

Datos Bibliográficos

ID5965610
AutoresVictor Chung Kwong Ho (Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong,), Victor Ho (0000-0002-6501-3473, Hong Kong Baptist University, autor de correspondencia)
Año2011
Volumen13
Número3
Páginas299-326
Fecha de publicación2011-06-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaDiscourse Studies (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1461-4456 • E-ISSN: 1461-7080
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1461445611400673
OpenAlexW2108583138
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas9
Referencias citadas45

This article discusses and compares the way the members of three communities of practice maintained a harmonious relationship with one another by managing rapport and performing relational work while threatening other members’ face in making requests through emails. The three communities of practice differed from one another in terms of the aim and nature of their joint enterprise, cultural composition and size. The ways rapport was managed were revealed by examining the employment of linguistic strategies of expressiveness-restraint, the choice of rhetorical strategies, the blending of institutional, professional and personal discourses, and the inclusion of various rapport-building moves. The performing of relational work was approached by identifying those discursive elements whose absence would not have made the current situation any the worse for it. It is found that the three communities of practice demonstrated both similarities and differences in the way they managed rapport and performed relational work

Community of practice · Linguistics · Pedagogy · Political science · Public relations · Rhetorical device · Rhetorical question · Social science · Sociology · Discourse Analysis in Language Studies · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition · Psychology · Social Psychology