Interior Design Genres

The Field-Based Research (FBR) project asks you to conduct primary research within your professional field of study.  Your primary research will require you to interview a professional in your field in order to gather, discuss, and analyze three typical genres used on a daily basis within the field. You'll gather the information you need by interviewing someone in your discourse community, observing writing-related activities in that discourse community, and analyzing texts from three genres used in that discourse community.  You'll collect data, begin analyzing it using a process called coding, and draft a description of your research methods. You'll use that work to present your findings in written and presentation form by coding, analyzing, and reflecting upon your findings. Steps and due dates for conducting your interview, observation, and genre analysis are listed below.
Assignment Prompt
Locate three short texts (or sections of texts) that represent three different genres used in your discourse community. Start by asking your interviewee(s) for examples of texts read, written, or otherwise used by professionals in the field. For instance, if you're investigating a medical discourse community, you might examine the introduction of a research article, a patient medical history form, and an article from a newsletter for doctors, nurses, or other medical professionals. Other places to seek texts are on the websites of professional organizations for your field.
Your goal is to identify and describe how specific features in each genre function to create or communicate:
genre knowledge – how writers demonstrate their ability to fulfill users’ expectations for the genre
rhetorical knowledge – how genres work to persuade readers
subject matter knowledge – how genres work to communicate knowledge about the topic being written about
writing process knowledge – how genres demonstrate writers’ understanding of the writing process
discourse community knowledge – what genres tell us about the discourse communities who use them
In writing your paper, you'll draft a description of your research methods and a list of three to four genre themes you developed when coding your data. Use your analysis to identify and describe the features of each genre, how each genre functions in your discourse community, how each genre is produced, and how each genre uses or adds to subject matter knowledge and enacts the values and attitudes of the discourse community.  Your final draft should contain the following sections:
Methods
Description of sampling procedures:  
How and why you chose your interviewee
The observation site
Description of procedures you used to collect data
Description of data you collected
Description of procedures you used to analyze and code data
Findings