In his article “The Concept of Discourse Community,” John Swales reports that a certain group of people can be described as a discourse community if that group could share some characteristics. In order to figure out whether or not those characteristics apply to a certain group of people, a methodology, which is a closer study of the behaviors and activities of the group, must be conducted throughout observations and interviews with some of the members.
This paper conveys a study of a group of workers in Dayton Towers Luxury Apartments, and then relates, if possible, the results to the standards of discourse community that Swales describes in his article, followed by some explanations of what was learned from this experience. When I first entered the front office in Dayton Towers, the staff were smiling and welcoming the idea of being observed for a while. The office in the reception area of the building consists of two people; the leasing manager, and the building issues manager. There is a maintenance team, whom their staffs dress up uniformly and do not stay in the office, but have another room to stay in. There are 3 people under the maintenance department. The staffs communicate with each other informally.
I observed that each of them has a wireless communicating device. Amongst the responsibilities of the leasing office are to receive any complaints from the tenants, receive packages of mails on behalf of the tenants in case of their absence, and arrange monthly…
