Here are potential responses to the questions about Mirabelli's article: 1. Members of Lou's diner like Harvey have to manage literacies related to different customer groups - reading customers from different cultural/linguistic backgrounds and adapting their language appropriately. 2. Managing these multi-literacies could be more difficult than expected because workers have to quickly read customers and code-switch between different registers of language depending on the customer, all while providing good service. 3. The menu at Lou's diner is used to balance authority by establishing what food/drinks are available but also allowing flexibility in modifications to meet customer preferences within reason. 4. Mirabelli's ethnography focuses on the language used in

1. “Learning to Serve: The Language and Literacy of Food
Service Workers”

2. Mirabelli studies “multiliteracies”
 Addresses “the multiplicity of communication
channels and the increasing saliency of cultural and
linguistic diversity in the world today” (542).

3. What are some different
literacies in your discourse
communities?

4. Mirabelli discusses authority
 How does the menu establish and balance authority at
the diner?

5. How is authority balanced and
established in your DC?

6. Mirabelli’s Research Question?

7. Mirabelli asks..
 “How language is spoken, read, or written in a
restaurant may be vastly different from how it is used
in the classroom” (541).
 “This chapter explores these constructed ways of
‘reading’ texts (and customers) along with the verbal,
‘performances’ and other manipulations of self-
presentation that characterize interactive service
work” (541).

8. How does Mirabelli begin his
article?
 Breakdown the structure:

9. Looking at structure: Mirabelli
 (Introduction)
 Literacy and contemporary theory
 Methodology
 Lou’s Restaurant
 The Menu
 Conclusion

10. Student paper
 Break down the structure:
 -Introduction
 -Swales
 -Expertise

11. Remember Swales and the CARS model?
 Establish territory—Tell us what’s been said
 Claim centrality
 Make a topic generalization
 Review previous items of research
 Establish niche—Tell us what’s been missing
 Counter-claim
 Indicate a gap
 Raise a question
 Continue a tradition
 Occupy niche—Fill the gap
 Outline purposes
 Announce principal findings
 Indicate research-report structure

12. What about your structure?
 Introduction
 Jot down the names of the scholars you will refer to.
 Methodology
 Jot down what methods you will need to describe.
 Results/Discussion
 Decide what organization will best suit your argument and create
subject headings.
 By Swales’s characteristics
 By questions (see Wardle)
 By community-specific topics (see Mirabelli)
 Let’s compare notes.

13. Let’s establish a territory
I remember my first day as a Publix bagger two years ago. I went in
thinking, “Shoot, any moron could put groceries in a bag.” On my first
day I was paired with Dennis, a sixty-five-year-old bagger who’d been
working for Publix for eight years. He didn’t say much, but he told me to
watch him and, when I felt I was ready, to go ahead and take over for
him. I then observed what to put with what, what to keep by itself, and
what to double-bag. It was a little more complicated than I had thought
and I was impressed by their means of communicating these rules to
me.
(topic generalization)
Write about your DC. You could discuss your involvement, what
outsiders may think about your DC, or something interesting that
others may not know.

14. Let’s establish a territory…
Publix is a discourse community. John Swales states that a discourse community
has a broadly agreed set of common goals, has mechanisms of
intercommunication of its members, uses its participatory mechanisms
primarily to provide information and feedback, utilizes and hence possesses one
or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims, has acquired some
specific lexis, and has a threshold level of members with a suitable degree of
relevant content and discoursal expertise (Swales 288-91).
(reviewing previous items of research)
Discuss what you know about discourse communities. Use at least two authors.
You can discuss Swales and how he defines DCs, Wardle and authority, and/or
Mirabelli and multiliteracies/authority.

15. Let’s establish a niche
After reading Swales and his criteria, I realized that
discourse communities are everywhere and I had never
realized it. Even Publix, where I’ve worked as a bagger for
two years, is a discourse community according to Swales’
criteria.
(continuing a tradition)
At home: Write a few sentences linking your DC to a prior
definition of DCs. How is your community defined as a
DC? Post on FB or bring to class.

16. Mirabelli Quiz
 What multi-literacies do members of Lou’s diner (such
as Harvey) have to manage?
 How could managing these multi-literacies be more
difficult than people would expect?
 How is the menu used to balance authority at Lou’s
diner?
 How can you relate Mirabelli’s ethnography to the one
that you will be writing? For example, Mirabelli
focuses on the language (genres and lexis) of Lou’s
diner, and you will be focusing on…?