Miller: Genre as Social Action

At the beginning of Carolyn Miller's essay, she is basically listing a bunch of shortcomings in linguistic theories which have attempted to classify genre before her. Some of the major faults she finds are that classifications are generally closed-system, a priori, and based on formal rather than pragmatic elements within a work. That last reason is huge to Miller, and especially so in a discussion about genre as social action. Genre is and must be a connection between what you want to be done and what you have done with your rhetorical actions in a situation that is by default social. Basing a genre off of its formal elements is too objective and materialistic (which is to say, isolated) for Miller.
 
Although there are recurring similarities, they are still only similarities not identical phenomena. As an example, if I were to take an apple and an orange they would have plenty of formal elements in common: they are edible, they are round, they are sweet, they grow off of trees etc. Yes, they are both fruit but not because of these incredibly specific formal elements. A blueberry is a fruit and it grows off of a bush. In fact, plenty of berries are inedible fruits. Bananas are fruits and they are not round. Grapefruit is a fruit and you would be hard pressed to find anyone who considers it sweet. What makes an apple and an orange (as well as the others) fruits are the pragmatic elements they share: their action and their usefulness. It's easy to think of the pragmatic value of fruit when one considers the expression fruits of ones labor. It's the idea that these things have become generic since they most easily represent a social function (a motive realized and substantiated) and they do so repeatedly. The motive would be to understand the phenomenon of fruit: why they grow on certain plants and where they will grow, how they may effect human hunger, what one may expect when one encounters them (and how to adjust reactions accordingly). This is how Miller would have us approach genre, as a motivated phenomenon substantiated by its given word. Why do certain genres crop up in certain cultural and historical contexts? How do these genres effect the human condition? What can we expect from certain genres and how should we react to them? It is a network of ideas.

This is where I realized much of the tension in Miller's essay though. We can't have bare classifications; these genres need to exist within a social realm and need to be understood as a response/ tool for the user (it needs to be a provocative or illocutionary speech-act). Genre, in very basic terms, is a system of classifying occurrences which happen regularly enough to incite responses. A response is an action and it is a social one. A response implies that a social need may be met through rhetorical action and that is motive. It becomes muddled though because I see a lot of disconnect between wanting "critical agreement and theoretical clarity" as well as acknowledgment of the "diversity and dynamism of rhetorical practice." Something that provides the level of clarity she is striving for must necessarily be reductionist. It's the idea that language doesn't exist in a vacuum; it gains meaning through its context (which I think she would agree on). Context, however, is implicit in a definition precisely because it defines what the word doesn't mean; it reduces a word to everything it cannot be.

If it can mean many different things at once (diversity), and if it can don a meaning whenever it supposes its appropriate (dynamism) there will be little clarity since it would inevitably catch subtle if not glaring contradictions in its scope and there will be little agreement if it is so malleable one may use it however one likes without consulting a basic (and shared) understanding of the word. If it is supposed to be dynamic and diverse, then why does Miller base all of her arguments on binary oppositions (closed- vs. open-system; formal/substantive/syntactic/semantic vs. pragmatic; inductive vs. deductive; rhetorical practice vs. a priori principle; etc.) ? Also, where does this leave us in terms of overlap? Can two genres be combined like a Sci-Fi romance (and if you have ever seen Captain Kirk work, I know you will say yes)? If that's true, does the conviction that some genres may never mix hold equal value (and I know if you like Sci-Fi you will refuse to accept that Sci-Fi fantasy will ever be a thing)? It just raises a lot of issues for me.