Digital discourse in the realm of related phenomena

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of digital discourse as the most diverse socio-cultural background of the contemporaries’ interaction. This work outlines the theoretical background of digital-oriented discourse in a harmonious symbiosis with the practical manifestation of its existence. This paper distinguishes between the concepts of “computer discourse”, “virtual discourse” and “digital discourse”. The genres of virtual discourse, such as online learning classes, instant messaging, and video game genres are represented as related, but not equal phenomena. These cutting-edge sociolinguistic phenomena manifest the pragmatic intentions of clients and agents of digital discourse, which are discussed in the matrix of their characteristics. In the key focus of the study, one can find common and distinctive properties of related types of discourse, their parameters, and multilevel means that arrange them. Institutional and institutional-typological characteristics of digital discourse, conditions of communication and ways of its organization are revealed; its socializing and communicative purpose is outlined; hypero- and hyponymic dimensions of discourse are considered; strategies for sending and receiving information are presented; micro-, meso-, and macro-levels of digital discourse are identified; the concept of “digital discourse” is developed.

Keywords

• computer discourse
• virtual discourse
• english-language digital discourse
• genres of virtual discourse
• clients/agents of discourse