Genre
Genre (from French genre 'kind, or sort')[1] is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time.[2] In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other forms of art or entertainment, based on some set of stylistic criteria.[3] Often, works fit into multiple genres by way of borrowing and recombining these conventions. Stand-alone texts, works, or pieces of communication may have individual styles, but genres are amalgams of these texts based on agreed-upon or socially inferred conventions. Some genres may have rigid, strictly adhered-to guidelines, while others may show great flexibility.
This article is about the concept of genres. For a list of genres, see List of genres. For genre studies or genre theory, see Genre studies. For other uses, see Genre (disambiguation).
Genre began as an absolute classification system for ancient Greek literature, as set out in Aristotle's Poetics.[4] For Aristotle, poetry (odes, epics, etc.), prose, and performance each had specific design features that supported appropriate content of each genre. Speech patterns for comedy would not be appropriate for tragedy, for example, and even actors were restricted to their genre under the assumption that a type of person could tell one type of story best.
Genres proliferate and develop beyond Aristotle's classifications— in response to changes in audiences and creators.[5] Genre has become a dynamic tool to help the public make sense out of unpredictability through artistic expression. Given that art is often a response to a social state, in that people write, paint, sing, dance, and otherwise produce art about what they know about, the use of genre as a tool must be able to adapt to changing meanings.
The term genre is much used in the history and criticism of visual art, but in art history has meanings that overlap rather confusingly. Genre painting is a term for paintings where the main subject features human figures to whom no specific identity attaches – in other words, figures are not portraits, characters from a story, or allegorical personifications. These are distinguished from staffage: incidental figures in what is primarily a landscape or architectural painting. Genre painting may also be used as a wider term covering genre painting proper, and other specialized types of paintings such as still-life, landscapes, marine paintings and animal paintings.
The concept of the "hierarchy of genres" was a powerful one in artistic theory, especially between the 17th and 19th centuries. It was strongest in France, where it was associated with the Académie française which held a central role in academic art. The genres in hierarchical order are:
Rhetoric[edit]
In the field of rhetoric, genre theorists usually understand genres as types of actions rather than types or forms of texts.[12] On this perspective, texts are channels through which genres are enacted. Carolyn Miller's[13] work has been especially important for this perspective. Drawing on Lloyd Bitzer's concept of rhetorical situation,[14] Miller reasons that recurring rhetorical problems tend to elicit recurring responses; drawing on Alfred Schütz,[15] she reasons that these recurring responses become "typified" – that is, socially constructed as recognizable types. Miller argues that these "typified rhetorical actions" (p. 151) are properly understood as genres.
Building off of Miller, Charles Bazerman and Clay Spinuzzi have argued that genres understood as actions derive their meaning from other genres – that is, other actions. Bazerman therefore proposes that we analyze genres in terms of "genre systems",[16] while Spinuzzi prefers the closely related concept of "genre ecologies".[17] Reiff and Bawarshi define genre analysis as a critical reading of people's patterns of communication in different situations.[12]
This tradition has had implications for the teaching of writing in American colleges and universities. Combining rhetorical genre theory with activity theory, David Russell has proposed that standard English composition courses are ill-suited to teach the genres that students will write in other contexts across the university and beyond.[18] Elizabeth Wardle contends that standard composition courses do teach genres, but that these are inauthentic "mutt genres" that are often of little use outside composition courses.[19]
Genre is effective as a tool in rhetoric because it allows a speaker to set the context for a rhetorical discussion. Devitt, Reiff, and Bawarshi suggest that rhetorical genres may be assigned based on careful analysis of the subject matter and consideration of the audience.[20]
Genre is related to Ludwig Wittgenstein's theory of Family resemblance in which he describes how genres act like a family tree, where members of a family are related, but not exact copies of one another. [21]
Audiences[edit]
Although genres are not always precisely definable, genre considerations are one of the most important factors in determining what a person will see or read. The classification properties of genre can attract or repel potential users depending on the individual's understanding of a genre.
Genre creates an expectation in that expectation is met or not. Many genres have built-in audiences and corresponding publications that support them, such as magazines and websites. Inversely, audiences may call out for change in an antecedent genre and create an entirely new genre.
The term may be used in categorizing web pages, like "news page" and "fan page", with both very different layout, audience, and intention (Rosso, 2008). Some search engines like Vivísimo try to group found web pages into automated categories in an attempt to show various genres the search hits might fit.
Subgenre[edit]
A subgenre is a subordinate within a genre,[22][23] Two stories being the same genre can still sometimes differ in subgenre. For example, if a fantasy story has darker and more frightening elements of fantasy, it would belong in the subgenre of dark fantasy; whereas another fantasy story that features magic swords and wizards would belong to the subgenre of sword and sorcery.