A Discursive Approach to Genre

Abstract

■ This article argues that genres are discursive categories that move beyond the boundaries of media texts and operate within industry, audience and social practices as well. It demonstrates the usefulness of an expanded genre analysis. The genre chain of mobi news, which relies on the use of mobile telephone cameras and is a popular genre in Slovenian and Balkan media, is explored by combining text analysis with an analysis of discourse practice and social practice. Mobi news items are produced as a denunciatory participatory practice in which audience participation is managed by the production team: journalists define the content and the structure of the news while the audience's activity is reduced to spying and denunciating. ■