James Paul Gee’s Literacy Discourse on Linguistics: Introduction was based on the focus on literacy studies and how linguistics shouldn’t be a language or literacy but a social practice for every individual. He referred to “discourse” as a sort of “identity kit’ that comes with completed instructions to help an individual learn how to act, talk, and most of the time write. This kit usually helps the individual be trained to be linguistic and recognize others who speak, act and write linguistically. James emphasized that the idea of language is not just used for communication, but also for our engagement with our surroundings in the world.
A simple example of a discourse could be a relationship between a teacher and a student. He briefly mentions a categorization between capital “D” and lower case “d.” For capital “D” is essentially referring to a way of peaking and writing about a certain topic. Lowercase “d” refers to not a specific sense but just a general one.
He also mentioned Primary and Secondary discourse. A primary discourse basically represents communication and language from the beginning of an individual’s life. Usually, primary discourse shapes an individual’s life, their identity, their values, and how they interact with others. A secondary discourse is a more formal way an individual represents themselves as. Meaning a way of an individual communicating that is specific to a certain limit, discipline or social group. The secondary and primary discourse may also fall into dominant and non-dominant depending on the scenario.
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