An Overview of the Discourse Community of the SPCA

A discourse community is where, a group of people who share an interest come together as a whole. According to John Swales a discourse community is also goal orientated or purposed based. It can be job related, school, or even an extracurricular activities. One example of a discourse community is The SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

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) is a non-profit organization designed to help animals in a time of need. They have many possible missions and goals that they encounter but their primary goals is strengthen the bond between animals and humans, ultimately for adoption purposes.

A question that I would like to ask is why do certain people want to help animals in need? People who try and help these animals face a pretty big challenge, especially shelter workers. There are many different responses to this question. Personally I myself am an animal lover. If I was asked this same question I would talk about how all of my animals are rescues.

Some more responses from other people include, “I love animals”, “I love to volunteer”, “Animals can fill a special void in someone’s heart that people just simply cannot.” etc.

A definite number can never really be reached the approximate number of cats who are strays reach to be about 70 million. Cats are actually more likely to be strays due to their sneaky nature. The SPCA, was founded in 1873. It was originally named The Ohio Humane Society. Then in 1907, it’s named had changed to The Hamilton County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The SPCA moved to Colerain in the 1930s and eventually the Sharonville location opened in 2008. The SPCA annually takes in approximately 7,000 dogs and 6,000 cats.

The SPCA’s website provides all sorts of valuable information components such as “about” which includes the overview,history and locations of the SPCA. “Adopt” which shows all available animals that are ready to go to their “furever” homes. “Donate” which aping the animals with basic care. “Services” is where you can go to get help with training your dog or cat. “Education” is where you go refer to when you need a reference to basic animal care or how to set up vet appointments within your general area. To join this discourse community , one must have a very strong passion for animals. It’s one of the most frllows you to make charitable donations for the animals that are in the shelter. “Volunteer” which where you would go if you would want to contribute your time and effort into helustrating and tiresome of a job but it’s a very rewarding at the end of the day and worth being apart of . Being apart of this discourse community helps animals develop a strong bond between their furever homes. It also helps give some people a sense of purpose. Some say it also helps give animals a voice.

Most of the SPCA’s staff are volunteers who help out during the busiest of times. Without their volunteers, it would almost be impossible to keep moving forward with all the work they have to do. You have to attend a 3-4 hour orientation class before volunteering. You have to at least be available one hour a week for volunteering. You must be at least 15 to volunteer and must be able to have a parent attend with you until you are 18 years of age. The discourse community of the SPCA has both written and visuals to communicate to their audience. For example, the SPCA shares success stories on the animals who have been adopted and have found their homes. They have bulliten boards posted in their lobby and you can see some of them have pictures, all of them look happy and spoiled. Another way they communicate is through their facebook page (via social media). This page contains over 20,000 likes and followers. The type of people that the facebook page brings are all kinds of sorts, ranging from the volunteers to pet parents. Posts on this page range from the events going on, the people who have rescued an animal themselves, or possible donations that occur. Some people have used this page to post about their animals that have turned up missing and or that need to be adopted asap. They have tons of pictures from bunnies, dogs and cats. Their also is pictures of the staff themselves playing and taking care of the animals in the facility.

Written and visual text is very important when you have a discourse community, everyone needs to be able to reach out to each other and be on the same page and updated. In this specific discourse community , they have several ways in which they can communicate.