Genre Criticism - Emphasis On Formal Features in Speech Genres

Emphasis On Formal Features in Speech Genres

The first group of rhetorical critics, following the example of theorists like M. M. Bakhtin, used formal features to analyze texts. For these critics, language is formed through a series of utterances that reflect specific conditions and goals of certain linguistic aspects. These aspects include thematic content, style, and compositional structure which form speech genres. Speech genres are diverse because of the various possibilities of human activity. In "The Problem of Speech Genres" (1986), Mikhail Bakhtin draws attention to the very significant difference between primary (simple) and secondary (complex) speech genres. According to Bahktin, primary speech genres form secondary speech genres and examples of secondary speech genres include novels, dramas, all kinds of scientific research, and major genres of commentary. Since these secondary genres involve complex and comparatively highly developed and organized cultural communication that is artistic and scientific, they absorb and digest various primary genres that have taken form in mediated speech communion. Bakhtin continues to explain that there are three factors of the whole utterance which include semantic exhaustiveness of the theme, the speaker’s plan or speech will, and the typical compositional and generic forms of finalization. The first factor refers to the way utterances are used within speech which is linked to the second factor of how the speaker determines to use the utterance.The third factor explains that all our utterances have definite and stable typical forms of construction, but that these forms can change when needed. As Bahktin writes, "These genres are so diverse because they differ depending on the situation, social position, and personal interrelations of the participants in the communication".