Var. Readings

Taken as a body, this week’s readings introduce us to genre theory by identifying what appears to be long-standing conflict in the attempt to define “genre” – is genre defined by structure/format/grammatical clues (objective)? Or is it defined by topic and purpose of communication (subjective)? - and offering variations on the same theme for resolution.

Fish identifies the conflict in defining genre as “opposition between objectivity and subjectivity … neither exists in the pure form that would give the opposition its point” (1028). Freadman notes that the historical propensity to view genres as conforming to a “recipe” for writing has led to the “discrediting of the very notion of genre”. Frye’s tables (1452-3, 1455-6) detail the seasonal and comic/tragic genre archetype as, respectively, examples of genre identified by simple descriptive means and identified by purpose, action, and setting, respectively. While these tables/analysis tools provide practical ways to systematically and comprehensively delineate genres in texts we examine, Frye admits that the “inductive approach to the archetype was a mere hunch. The important point is not the deficiencies of either procedure, taken by itself, but the fact that, somewhere and somehow, the two are clearly going to meet in the middle.” (1951).

Goody provides an example of a conceptual tool that we (from our ethnocentric perspective) might initially believe would make an excellent tool to attempt this ‘meeting in the middle’: the seemingly-objective mnemonic skill of list- or hierarchy-making. As one semiotic system inherent in literate societies, lists both influence the conceptual structure of the culture that makes them and the literate structure influences the hierarchy of lists. It works both ways – the writing itself influences the cognitive process of the culture and cognitive processes suggest the structure of written texts. Goody also points out that lists and hierarchies may be irrelevant in cultures that are traditionally based on oral texts. (51). I wonder, then, what are the conceptual structures of those cultures? Can those genres be communicated effectively to those of us who are strongly text-oriented?

Bahktin suggests breaking communications down to the level of the individual word. He clarifies the concept of varied contextual meanings for a word (a semiotic symbol) and exhaustively explains the contextuality of a word (or symbol, more broadly) on p1244: “the word is expressive but this expression does not inhere in the word itself. It originates at the point of contact between the word and actual reality, under the conditions of the real situation articulated by the individual utterance … the word appears as an expression of some evaluative position of an individual person.” So, its up to the people communicating to establish, or ferret out, the actual meaning of the word in the particular context.

On 1243, Bahktin clearly identifies crucial audience understanding/reception of the communication (or text, in the case of the broader conversation we are having) : “Here the meaning of the word pertains to a particular actual reality … we do not understand the meaning of a given word simply as a word of a language; rather, we assume an active responsive position with respect to it” (bold mine).

This “active position” with respect to a communication or text is exactly where Freadman picks up the conversation with her tennis analogy – its less about the rules/structure of “the game” itself, than it is about ‘the playing of the game” (60), the realities of the actions, reactions, and interactions that influence each and every “shot” taken in the game. Genre can be identified by the purpose, reception/understanding, and the “situatedness” of a particular text.

Situatedness, of course, is a function of culture and Geertz explains how interpretive anthropology can help us hear other voices whose understanding differ from ours and who, therefore, are valuable vessels of alternate perspective and interpretation of the symbols we could learn to share meaning of. Geertz carries the conversation full circle (or at least in my little summary, it works well to organize it as such) by noting that we must “decend into detail … to grasp firmly the essential character of not only various cultures but the various sorts of individuals within each culture … the road to the general, to the relevatory simplicities of science, lie through a concern with the particular, the circumstantial.”

I read this to mean that it is only by traveling consciously through the structure, the details of a text, through to the generalization, the understood meaning within the context it is found, can we comprehend that the definition of genre is not an either/or in modern literature. Rather, genre is a synthesis of structure/format, the context of transmission, and the understandings held by the intended audience. It is both objective and subjective – consideration of both perspectives (counter-intuitively, for certain) clarifies understanding of textual meaning.