Colonial texts in post-colonial contexts

Abstract

This paper applies genre theory to nineteenth-century deeds used to appropriate land from indigenous people in British Columbia, Canada, and in Aotearoa New Zealand. These deeds have been the subject of intense scrutiny in legal and other settings via twentieth century interpretive strategies complicated and modified by postcolonial politics and cross-cultural pragmatics. Although focusing mainly on deeds used in B.C. in the 1850s, the paper also has in its purview other deeds and treaties in NZ and Canada. The analysis of these documents’ actions in colonial and postcolonial contexts concludes with a framing of genre that is not based on the mutual recognition of form and situation by genre participants, and indeed may even preclude it. This necessitates a further discussion of Miller’s (1984[1994]) conditions for making a genre claim, and ends with the positing of a special category of genres called contact genres.

Exigencies, Ecologies, and Internet Street Science: Genre Emergence in the Context of Fukushima Radiation-Risk Discourse

“…Just as Frank Farmer (2013) in After the Public Turn notes our field's general inattentiveness to counterpublics despite the public turn, there is a similar inattentiveness to publics and counterpublics in the subfield of RGS, which has primarily focused on genre systems within more defined and delimited institutional contexts, like classrooms and workplaces. With some notable exceptions-for example, Bazerman's (1999; studies of letters, patents, or tax forms; Miller's (1980) study of environmental impact statements; Campbell and Jamieson's (1990) study of political speeches; Makmillen's (2007) study of land deeds; Dryer's (2008) study of zoning codes; Miller and Shepherd's (2009) study of blogs; and various studies of journalistic genres (Bonini 2009;Caple 2009;Ramos 2009)-few studies of genre have focused on the more dispersed, dynamic performances of public life and on genres that occasion public deliberation, mediate rhetorical and public interactions, and inform collective public action.…”

Geographies of Public Genres: Navigating Rhetorical and Material Relations of the Public Petition

“…Just as Frank Farmer (2013) in After the Public Turn notes our field's general inattentiveness to counterpublics despite the public turn, there is a similar inattentiveness to publics and counterpublics in the subfield of RGS, which has primarily focused on genre systems within more defined and delimited institutional contexts, like classrooms and workplaces. With some notable exceptions-for example, Bazerman's (1999; studies of letters, patents, or tax forms; Miller's (1980) study of environmental impact statements; Campbell and Jamieson's (1990) study of political speeches; Makmillen's (2007) study of land deeds; Dryer's (2008) study of zoning codes; Miller and Shepherd's (2009) study of blogs; and various studies of journalistic genres (Bonini 2009;Caple 2009;Ramos 2009)-few studies of genre have focused on the more dispersed, dynamic performances of public life and on genres that occasion public deliberation, mediate rhetorical and public interactions, and inform collective public action.…”