The Blue Collar workforce
The blue collar discourse community is comprised of people from various walks of life that are united under a title, a title that identifies them as manual industrious workers. These workers are the backbone of a nation, they work anywhere from industrial setting to local consumer scale shops. Although our diversity creates language barriers that often lead to us being looked down on by our employers, it allowed an often overlooked form of commutation to ascend.
A year ago I worked in a factory that was producing industrial generators. People call it the “Russian” factory because most of the people that work there are Russian speakers. I was hired as a machinist; a person who works with machines
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Communication through body language and expression was more commonly used at work than spoken words. Sometimes you could tell if someone is in trouble just by the expression on their face; their hesitation to pull a switch, their frustration with the machinery or a questioning glance asking a neighbor for some assistance. This form of language was especially useful when we would communicate with an elderly deaf man that was working with us. He was a master of the trade, he had his own section of the shop that was completely his domain. His work was a lot more difficult than ours, to work at his station you had to have a talent for everything mechanical. Interacting with him on daily basis through hand gestures and expressions enhanced my ability to comprehend body language even further. I found that speaking at work was something that did not happen too …show more content…
As a blue collar worker I can tell you that we are often preoccupied with our thoughts trying to solve problems. Sometimes all we can do is a simple hand gesture. So we’ve learned to understand different gestures in their context, whether it’s “bring me that…”, “hold this”, “help me”, etc. With so much diversity in the workforce it often became the only form of communication we had. For regardless of what language barriers may exist between us, a hand wave is a universally understood symbol of “hello”. Thus my view on gestures and body language changed. As James Paul Gee says in “What is literacy?”, “Interpretation of print (body language) is just a view point on a set of symbols (gestures), and viewpoints are always embedded in a discourse.” However not only did my view change on language but the way I perceive it as well, words are not always necessary to convey a
I recently read the text “Blue-collar Brilliance” which was notable to me as it provided a very strong argument. As I reflect on it, I noticed that the idea of the article was categorized under “Work”, although it could easily be listed under other sections in the book I read it in, such as “Identity”.
“What Corporate America Can’t Build: A Sentence”, a newspaper article written by Sam Dillon, addresses corporate America and those in the education system coming into corporate America. The message Dillon conveys to his audience is that there is a problem with the clarity and effectiveness in communication as the work force progresses towards written communication, highlighted by how common emails have become. Dillon’s article strongly influences people in the education system that will soon be entering corporate America, along with those who are already in the workforce. The New York Times author manages to achieved this through his use of statistics that show how harmful
As put by Jen Waak in regarding the human need for community, “By surrounding yourself with others working toward a similar goal, you’ll get...yourself a bit further than you would have done on your own,” (Waak). By being able to see and participate in these different communities centered around different objectives, the goal becomes easier to achieve and bonds the group into something more through trying to reach it. This new unit is called a discourse community and is defined by John Swales as containing six specific characteristics: having a common goal, showing intercommunication and using lexis, having participation within the group, being defined by genres of texts, and having members with areas of expertise for the community. When looking
Blue Collar workers today are looked down upon by most of society. People think that if you have a blue collar job you aren’t smart and not successful. But in my opinion, blue collar workers are the backbone of our society, and deserve the same amount of respect as white collar workers. “Blue Collar Brilliance by Mike Rose” explains how blue collar workers are very smart and use a lot of brainpower to get their jobs done. Both his Uncle and mother were blue collar workers and that’s where he got his inspiration to stand up for blue collar workers around the world. He gives us examples of how his own family members were blue collar workers and how they were smart and how they excelled at their jobs. He uses his own experiences to show us that blue collar workers are in fact smart, able to adapt to many different situations, and deserve respect.
At Children’s First, our mission is to keep a safe, healthy, prosperous environment for children. Being a part of this community, I know firsthand what it takes to maintain an ideal setting for children to grow. It is essential for the caretakers to communicate, share information, and work together to put the children first. This core goal of ours, along with my own experience, analysis, interviewing, and observation demonstrate that Children’s First Daycare is a discourse community according to Swale’s six characteristics of a discourse community.
In the article, “Blue-Collar Brilliance” by Mike Rose, he begins with an anecdote of his mother working her blue-collar job at a diner as a waitress. Rose vividly describes her common day that is packed with a constant array of tedious tasks she has to accomplish to make her living. The authors goal appears to be making the reader appreciate the hard work of blue-collar workers because society places a stereotype on them as being less intelligent than someone with more schooling or even a white-collar job: “Our cultural iconography promotes the muscled arm, sleeve rolled tight against biceps, but no brightness behind the eye, no inmate that links hand and brain” (282). I agree with Rose’s conclusion that if we continue to place a stigma on
In his article “The Concept of Discourse Community,” John Swales describes a discourse community as a group of people that “have a broadly agreed set of common goals, contain certain mechanisms of intercommunication among its members, have acquired a specific lexis, and have a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of relevant content discoursal expertise” (Swales #). An example of such a discourse community is the legal profession. The legal profession has the common goal of understanding and applying general principles to particular factual situations. In doing so, lawyers use language, concepts, and methods that are unique to their community. In order to become a recognized member of the legal community, a person must graduate from law school and pass the bar exam thereby demonstrating an in depth knowledge concerning all areas of the law and the specialized rules, methods, and jargon used by lawyers to communicate about legal principles.
Oral and Written Communication skills are two of the most important skills a person could have in the workplace. Without the ability to effectively communicate or understand communication in written or auditory form taking and giving direction would be extremely difficult. Oral communication is simply the act of talking and listening. If a person can effectively convey his thoughts in spoken word and interpret others spoken words into their intended thought then they can effectively communicate orally. The same concept can be applied to the written word. The U.S. Deptartment of Labor breaks oral communication into two areas:
The average worker spends two-thousand and eighty hours a year at their place of employment. Communication within the workplace is often overlooked or not given as much importance as most people should allow, given the amount of time that is spent there. Beyond the more basic verbal speech, one must be aware of the nonverbal symbols and noise that can have an effect on communication. There are also cultural, environmental and internal factors that can effect communication and how successful it can be. The various perceptions that an individual has developed over their life can also effect communication. One’s ability to communicate effectively will determine the success and enjoyment that is to come from their job.
The first point I would like to illustrate is the way body language can have different effects on people. For example, in England the use of hands when you are speaking is quite rare, the odd movement of the hand may be seen but the most common use of hand signals or motions is when someone is making an insult. I will use the Italians as an example of at times exaggerated and frequent use of hands. The Italians often use their hands as a way of secondary communication. As they speak they dramatise their conversations which can be mistakenly perceived by some people as confrontation when in fact they are having a simple conversation. This is where the lack of knowledge of a culture can cause a misunderstanding. Another example of communication which can cause raised eyebrows is the way the French acknowledge one another is doing something called the “bises.” This is where they give a kiss on each cheek. (Depending on the region this could be two, three even four kisses.) It is considered rude to just verbally greet someone so the “bises” is the norm for them. However when they are out of their country they could receive strange looks because people don’t understand their reasons and therefore could be perceived that French m...
One’s career, school life, and even socializing are affected by communication. If you do not know how to communicate, you probably do not have many friends. Communication has been used since the days of the cavemen. When the cavemen learned to communicate they greatly increased their hunting potential. When they learned to communicate on the hunt and before the hunt, they caught much more game then when they were just randomly running after the animals with spears. In school, if teachers and students could not communicate well, how would anything ever get done? In a business, communication is the most important ingredient. Working at a corporation at a higher level, you deal with hundreds of important emails, meetings, phone calls, and other forms of communicating with your co-workers.
There are different types of communication (verbal, nonverbal, paralinguistic). Verbal communication is communicating with words. For instance, an individual speaks to another at a business meeting regarding profit margins. Second, nonverbal communication is communicating without the use of words but through gesture, body language, facial expression and eye contact (Baron, Branscombe, Byrne). Also these physical expressions can provide powerful and valuable information about others’ current feelings and reactions without the need of words. Lastly paralinguistic is defined as the use of emotional expression, gestures, and the location of the body in relation to the other's body, eye contact, and level of voice instead of verbally expressing these cues (Triandis). Additionally, paralinguistic is also known as paralanguage as a way to modify or nuance meaning, or convey emotion, with the use of pitch, volume, and intonation (Triandis). For instance, as described by Triandis’ article Culture and Communication, “in Bulgaria and south India a nod means "no,” and a shake of the head, means "yes".” It’s interesting how Triandis describes the amount of difficulty it was to compre...
...tention to how people react to one another’s comments, guessing the relationship between the people and guessing how each feels about what is being said. This can inform individuals to better understand the use of body language when conversing with other people. It is also important to take into account individual differences. Different cultures use different non-verbal gestures. Frequently, when observing these gestures alone the observer can get the wrong impression, for instance, the listener can subconsciously cross their arms. This does not mean that they are bored or annoyed with the speaker; it can be a gesture that they are comfortable with. Viewing gestures as a whole will prevent these misunderstandings. Non-verbal gestures are not only physical, for example; the tone of voice addressing a child will be different from the way it is addressed to an adult.
“DA-DA!” Who would have known that a simple word like that could be so powerful and strong enough to make a grown man like myself cry. In every job setting, a great way to represent ourselves is through communication. Communication is stemmed from the act of speech, in which plays a huge role, not only at a workplace but in reality as well. Speech is simply a higher form of communication between two or more people. Great speech practices may enhance a person’s opportunity of moving up within the company he or she works for, as well as venturing off to higher positions in a professional field. Having the ability to speak well is closely related to the ability to listen well. Speaking well in a professional setting can cause one to stand out over others more and help interpret a great first impression of who that person is.
Before the spoken word was commonly used to communicate, there was body language. Body language allowed people to effectively communicate with one another. Non-verbal gestures, facial expressions, and movements were used to express thoughts and feelings when the mouth was not. Later in history, a famous philosopher, politician, and scientist by the name of Francis Bacon stated that “as the tongue speaks to the ear so the gesture speaks to the eye.” Even though spoken l...