Definition : A class of texts (spoken or written) viewed by the speech community as being of the same type because sharing a set of common features (eg of layout, organisation, linguistic style and other linguistic features.
Examples : Novels, church sermons, weather forecasts, advertisements, speeches, charity appeals, letters, news articles etc. These may further divide into sub-genres : eg letters may be letters of application for a job, letters of complaint etc; novels may be crime novels, fantasy novels, historical novels etc; advertisements include print adverts, advertising features article, TV and radio adverts. Each sub-genre will share many of the features of the main genre, but also show some of their own.
Further information : As an example, typical features of news article are :
- Introduced by a headline in large bold type, which uses specific linguistic features such as the use of present simple verbs to express past events (here "dies"):
Woman dies after farewell to horse at Wigan hospital
- the use of apposition to introduce the protagonists of the story - Infirmary nurse Gail Taylor ....
- the use of direct speech to report what protagonists say : Infirmary nurse Gail Taylor said: "The horse, Bronwen, walked steadily towards Sheila."
All examples from : http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-29951094
Further Reading
Jones, R.H. Discourse Analysis, Routledge
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