Post # 3 Connecting all three!

A connection can be drawn between the two readings and Chandler’s thoughts on genre. Each reading completes the thought of the other. Chandler, in An Introduction to Genre Theory: The problem of definition, states that “a genre defines a moral and social world. Indeed, a genre in any medium can be seen as embodying certain values and ideological assumption.” Perhaps he is striving to say that genres define the world that we live in. With in this world, we follow the norm and up hold certain expectations that are produced by genres. This thought is then continued by Fish when he claims that “For most of us these matters do not require explanation, and indeed, it is hard for us to imagine someone for whom they do; but that acquired so gradually and so long ago that it doesn’t seem like knowledge at all.” He then continues by stating that “so that they are alike in fine detail, it fills them so that no one’s interpretive acts are exclusively his own but fall to him by virtue of his position in some socially organized environment and are therefore always shared and public.” What he means is that since genres define the norm for us, we tend to ignore the concept of individuality and refuse to ask for explanations. For example: when we think about “Western” movies we automatically think about guns, a bad guy, a good guy, hats, and horses. Who established this specific notion? Why are we incapable of discarding this notion about “western” movies? According to Freud in the Literary Theory, we can not reject genres because “the human ego is not even mastered at its own house, that each of us carries a stranger within, the unconscious, which is only partially accessible.” Perhaps this stranger is the key to individually and an end to genres.
One example where the social expectations and conventions are critical to interpreting interaction is a dental office. When you enter a dental office, you expect to see the nurse, the dental chair along with its operational tools such as the drill, and of course most importantly the dentist. You expect the dentist to be wearing gloves, the office to be tidy, and the tools to be sanitized.