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Maria Gouin

Ms Litle

Eng 121 003

16 March 2017

Bazermans Theory

We have highly typified genres of documents and highly typified social structures within

which those documents create social facts that affect the actions, rights, and obligations of

others. (Bazerman, 367). Bazerman believes that all humans are connected, that we create a

pattern that can be systemized. In this one sentence he states his theory on how social facts,

speech acts, and genres are the structure of everyday life.

Bazerman defines social facts as things people believe to be true, and therefore bear on

how they define a situation. (368). Many people believe something just because the majority of

society says its true. He uses school systems as an example to explain social facts, by saying we

all follow a curriculum that was made up and obeyed, but never questioned. Just because socially

we are told that when we are a certain age we are to attend school and in order to pass and go

onto college (where you do it all over again to obtain a degree and get a good job) you must get

good grades by following this curriculum. Which is what most people want because its a social

fact that if you dont go to college than youll be a bum. For the most part though, you are forced

to go to school by your parents, who in reality are making you go due to fear of the government

because it is the law that you attend school. There are just things we do because we are told they

need to be done. It could be as simple as many friends telling you Susie and Derek kissed (when

in fact they did not); or popping your knuckles gives you arthritis (I recently found out is not
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true); to the government, who tells us we have to follow these laws, but in reality they too are

just tales someone made up for us. Myths, legends, rumors, and old wise tales are all social facts.

The social facts consist of meaningful social actions being accomplished through

language, or speech acts. (Bazerman, 367-368). Normally, by verbally agreeing to a bet and

shaking hands, someone has to pay up at the end of said bet, but due to social facts one may take

the speech act of, Wanna bet? as a joke while the other did not, resulting in a conflict.

(Bazerman, 369) There are three parts of speech acts, the lectionary act, illocutionary act, and the

perlocutionary effect. Wanna bet? is the lectionary act, its what was literally said. (Bazerman,

370). The illocutionary act was the person seriously intending on making a real bet and expecting

money if he wins, but the other person taking it as a joke is the perlocutionary effect.

Genres are only the types individuals recognized as being used by themselves and

others. Genres are what we believe they are. That is, they are social facts about the kinds of

speech acts people can make and the ways they can make them. (Bazerman, 373). Basically,

Bazermans right when he says its all linked together. Take music for example, we all know

genre of music like Hip-hop, well we only know it to be Hip-hop because someone once upon a

time labeled it to be so (a social fact). Genres are things we characterize. Inside genres are genre

sets and genre systems. By being a citizen we are a genre sets, the collection of types of texts

someone in particular role is likely to produce. (Bazerman, 374) of a genre system, the

government. A genre system is composed of several genre sets of people working together in an

organized way, plus the pattern relations in the production, flow, and use of these documents.

(Bazerman, 374). So, in short, the government is organized groups of people, or branches, that

have specific duties they must up hold in order to keep society running properly. By doing so,
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they are just living their lives also, as genre sets, having their own set of rules and regulations

they must abide by.

Charles Bazerman really has something here, with this social system-ology. Hes a little

difficult to decipher, but his overall break down of society made sense. This brilliant theory

shows how humans are linked, despite what some many think, and we have a pattern. Only when

we see this pattern are we able to change it and be better as a whole. The genre tree of human

activity explains how we function as a society.

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Works Cited

Bazerman, Charles. Speech Acts, Genres, and Activity Systems: How Texts Organized

Activity and People. What Writing does and How It Does it: An Introduction to Analysis Texts

and Textual Practices. Ed. Charles Bazerman and Paul Prior. London: Routledge, 2004. 309-339.