Read the attached essay on a discourse community by Tony Mirabelli, “Learning to Serve,” and answer the following questions, submitting your responses here.
Questions:
What is the author’s thesis/hypothesis about service work?
How does the author choose to define literacy? What kinds of practices are involved in his definition, and how is it different than a definition of literacy that might be given in the context of formal education?
What is the main genre of communication between waiters and customers? Why could this be considered a genre (what are the common characteristics that all of these share)?
Why do waiters have to be “literate” with the menu? What does Mirabelli mean by this? How could food items differ from restaurant to restaurant, and how could this impact an interaction between a waiter and a customer?
What does Mirabelli mean when he says waiters have to be able to “read” not only the menu, but also the customer? What is an example, besides the one in the essay, where a waiter would have to “read” a customer and decide how much power to give them? What is an example of why a waiter might manipulate the customer by interpreting the menu in a particular way?
Why do you think the author chose to include the script of several interactions between waiters and customers? What purpose does that serve, in terms of supporting his overall argument about restaurant literacy?
What is “emotional labor,” and how does it relate to interpreting a menu?
The conclusion begins with a summary of what the essay has discussed, but then states that, though these things are true, there is “much left unconsidered in this chapter.” Why do you think the author would bring up other aspects of this discourse community in the conclusion that he didn’t discuss in the essay?
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