Jaime Valdovinos

Sophia
UWP 1
11/17/18
Fitness As a Community
Introduction:
The gym, or fitness, a better term to use as an umbrella to cover the different
disciples of fitness is seen through many lenses. By this I mean that people have emotions
towards it. Some see it as a chore, dragging their feet to simply put on their athletic wear.
Others are passionate about it and do nothing but dream about stepping foot into the gym
the next day. For some people it is their job to be under the same roof where weights and
sweat are dropped. For those that do attend the gym, whether it is doctors
recommendation or self-will they all share similar goals that are accomplish through the
genres. That is the purpose of this article to show how the fitness industry is a form of
discourse community. As described by John Swales, A discourse community has a
broadly agreed set of common public goals (Swales 2011). These shared goals that are
shared help create the community as they help people to communicate with each other
through different genres. In Amy Devitts article Materiality and Genre in The Study of
Discourse Communities she states, Whether we are studying academic, professional, or
public communities, genres, considered as material entities, enable us to enrich the idea
of a discourse community by giving discipline and focus to the study of unities of
language and society. What is interesting about this is that the different members of
fitness can view this community differently; it can either be professional or casual.

Through genres however it allows them to be connected locally as well as nationally and
even international. Genres create fluidity in communication within the community. It
becomes a domino affect where genres allow for communication to develop and
communication allows for goals to be shared and accomplished.
We have to understand that fitness is not only defined by bodybuilding, one
discipline of fitness and the one we probably notice the most at the gym. Fitness also
covers sports, strongman, which is one style of training, and martial arts to give you an
idea of how fitness is found in different disciplines. There has been a massive
development in the fitness industry since 1890s when bodybuilding began to grow. And
with this growth it brought growth in different types of training and development of new
branches of fitness. This is apparent in the article Fit and Flexible: The fitness Industry,
Personal Trainers and Emotional Service Labor where author Jennifer Smith Maguire
states Since the early 1970s, the pursuit of fitness has developed into a multi-billion
dollar industry in the United States, spanning the health food, exercise equipment,
instructional video, and health club industries. (2001). We see how fitness is not
working out, fitness has branched out where genres and forms of communication become
important and needed in order for the growth of the community to occur. CrossFit, one of
the newest disciplines of fitness, was founded in 2000. The first ever CrossFit Games
were in 2007 and since then have grown from only a few competitors to many nationally
and internationally.
Personally I will be focusing the traditional outlook of working out. By this I
mean researching the goals that bodybuilding and common people like you and myself
have. I have participated in many sports and have dedicated a couple of my years in the

gym. I belong to the motivated group of people that are enthusiastic of exerting an X
amount of force to move an object. Being part of this community I hope to be able to
demonstrate the goals and genres that help classify it as a discourse community.

Methods:
I interviewed two owners of the same gym. One of the owners used to compete
professionally as a bodybuilder. The other gym owner is a personal trainer that has
incorporated fitness into his routine for over ten years of his life. The bodybuilder will be
referred to as subject X and his collogue, the personal trainer, will be subject Y. I asked
proposed the same questions to both subjects to see if there would be a big difference on
the answers keeping in mind that they work together. However I did not interview them at
the same time so that the subjects could give me a unique answer rather than agreeing
with each other if they were to be interviewed at the same time. I asked them both what
was a common reason why clients became members of their gym/started working out. I
also asked how they communicated amongst each other, other gym owners, and to their
clients. When I mentioned genres they were not that sure by what I meant. I had to
provide examples of what I meant by genres in order for them to understand.

Results:
The answers from both subjects were unique in their own way but they were also
connected by some characteristics. When I asked Subject X (bodybuilder) what were
common reasons why their clients joined the fitness community his response was because
they wanted to look good and have a similar physique like him. Subject Ys responds was

a little different, he mentioned that his clients would tell him that they were in search of
improving their lives and becoming healthier. These two answers might not seem related
but they demonstrate a common goal; their clients have the intention of improving some
aspect of their lives through fitness. The two other questions about how they
communicated and the types of genres that they used merged to together. Once they were
more comfortable with the idea of what I meant by genre they said that they use about the
same type of genres. Both subject X and Y create workout programs and type of nutrition
programs for their clients. Keeping in mind that it is a business the reports and programs
that they create have to be professional and very formal. However, they said when using
social media to promote through videos and pictures they are less formal. They have
found out that a more relaxed approach has helped them gain clients. Both subjects
mention that through workout programs and posts on social media clients communicate
with other clients. This shows how common goals and lexis are shared amongst the
fitness community. When elaborating on communication I discovered that subject X was
more technical with his terminology than subject Y. For example, when describing an
exercise he mentioned the biological name of the muscle that was being activated. While
subject Y also knew proper terminology he talked in a manner that was more general and
that clients could understand perhaps a little easier.

Analysis:
Genres play a big role in discourse communities in which they help create the
feeling of community. Devitt says, all genres are designed precisely to bring specialist
and non specialist communities together. Genres help illustrate a discourse community

to people that are interested or that do not belong in it yet in that community. For
example, in the gym there are posters with fitness models that show how to perform an
exercise or other posters with instructions on how to use a machine properly and safely.
Someone that attends the gym regularly would be better suited with the needed
vocabulary to understand the poster than a person that steps foot at the door for the first
time. Genres in the gym also include the usage of social media to post pictures and share
valuable information with the rest of the community. Swales also states In addition to
owning genres, a discourse community has acquired a specific lexis. (Swales 2011).
Language in these genres can vary from slang to strict. Usually you can find informal
language in social media that uses abbreviations and hashtags under pictures. At the other
in you might find a very well articulated posted on Facebook regarding the discovery of a
new training method or new food that magically makes you lose weight with the blink of
an eye. The important thing to grasp from this is that the degree of strictness might appeal
differently to certain people. To older folks formality might attract them more compared
to younger folks that are up to date with the terminology.

Conclusion:
From the interviews and the research that I conducted I found interesting things
that I myself had not previously thought about. I did not realize that the fitness
community covered a big environment where the exchange of goals and genres
frequently occurred. Swales says that a discourse community is defined by the sharing of
common goals that have been greed upon. These can be shared only through

communication and through the different genres that allow for information to be
transferred.

Work Cited :
Wardle, E., & Downs, D. (2011). The concept of discourse community. writing about
writing: A College Reader, 2011.
Baechle, T. R., & Earle, R. W. (2008). Essentials of strength training and conditioning.
Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics.
Jennifer M.S., (2001). Sociology of sport journal: Fit and flexible: the fitness industry,
personal trainers and emotional service labor. Human Kinetics